Shoshone Geyser Basin Trail

If I may take a moment to brag, my husband and I are slowly building up an impressive list of backcountry trail hikes. So far we have hiked rim to rim of the Grand Canyon, the Juan du Fuca trail, a Mount Rainier Loop, and now, Yellowstone National Park.

Shoshone Geyser Basin Trail.

This year we took on the Shoshone (pronounced, much to my surprise, SHOW-SHOW-NEE) Geyser Basin Trail. This 22 mile (35km) trail is comprised of sections of the Lonestar Trail, Shoshone Geyser Foot Trail, North Shoshone Trail and DeLacy Creek Trail. The hike was rated as "strenuous" (more on that later), and promised hydrothermal features and picturesque lake views.

Day 1: Lonestar Trailhead to 8G1 Meadow Campsite

I think I might be in danger of becoming a hiking snob. As we hiked the first 2.7 miles down the Lonestar Trail, I couldn't help but think how easy the trail was. The trail is (what I presume to be) an old maintenance road, and is apparently used regularly by hikers and cyclists. The trail offered no incline and limited scenery-- just trees, and a few glimpses of a meandering creek.

At the end of the trail was the Lonestar Geyser. We had tried to plan our trip so that we could arrive before the geyser erupted, but we were about 45 minutes late, and were still heading up the path when a flood of people (okay, it was only like, 8 people) were leaving.

Lonestar Geyser steams in the afternoon heat.

Andrew and Ashley boiling water for lunch.

The Lonestar Geyser steamed away while we stopped for lunch, but it wasn't scheduled to erupt for another 1.5 hours, so after a lunch of Buffalo Chicken wraps, we headed off.

I tried to find a photo that would suitably demonstrate what the rest of the trail was like, but I really didn't take many photos for the rest of the day. My next series of shots are from when we reached our first backcountry campsite, 8G1, just past Grant Pass.

Tom observes our food hanging from the bear pole.

On previous hiking trips, we have either had bear lockers, or metal bear poles for hanging our food and toiletries. The Yellowstone campsites all had bear poles, but required us to have our own rope to hang the bags. This was a new experience, and kind of fun!

Day 2: 8G1 Meadow Campsite to 8R3 Shoshone Lake Campsite

Ahhhhhh... Camping. Somehow, each year, I always forget how terribly I sleep. My senses go into high alert, and I wake up at the most innocuous noise. It probably didn't help that we watched a 20 minute video on backcountry camping when we picked up our hiking permit, and it made me incredibly paranoid about wildlife. So in the middle of the night, when something fell into the creek running behind our campsite with a huge splash, a lay there in high alert for the rest of the night.

I was happy when morning came, and started the daily ritual of bandaging up my feet. I am incredibly prone to blisters. Sometimes I can hold them at bay by strategically placing band aids and mole skin, but I've come to realize that I will blister, and I just have to deal with it.

Bandaging my feet for Day 2 of hiking.

In the morning, we hiked another 5km through forest. There was a bit of incline, but for the most part, the trail was pretty flat. I began to wonder-- were we going to see anything other than forest on this hike? And then we finally came across the Shoshone Geyser Basin.

Hydrothermal features.

Finally, something to look at! We wound our way through steam vents, fumaroles, hot pools, and brightly coloured streams with bright white calcite deposits.

Hydrothermal pools.

A backward glance at the steam rising from the Shoshone Geyser Basin.

Once we exited the geyser basin, we were able to catch our first glimpse of Shoshone Lake. We passed through wide field of tall grasses that were thick with mud, and wound our way to the shore.

Heading towards the Lake Shoshone.

Arriving at campsite 8R3, lakeside.

By the time we arrived at our campsite, it was about 4pm. We made quick work of setting up our campsite so that we could test the waters of the lake and take a quick dip.

Setting up tents, lakeside.

The water was freezing! It was cold, cold, cold, cold! But it felt good to be in the water after two days of hiking.

Swimming in the lake.

We ate dinner while flies tried to bite us through our clothes, and were treated to a lovely sunset. The sky was hazy with smoke that had blown in from the Idaho forest fires, so the sky was purple, pink and red.

Ashley and Andrew watch the sun set over Shoshone Lake.

Day 3: 8R3 Shoshone Lake Campsite to DeLacy Creek Trailhead

Somehow, I managed to get a slightly better sleep on our second night. I use the term "better" in a relative sense. I did not sleep well-- just better than the previous night...

In the morning we ate a quick breakfast of Raspberry Granola and Milk. Then we set off for the last 12km of our hike, following the lake shoreline. When we stopped for a mid-morning snack, we noticed tracks along the sand. At first we weren't sure if they were grizzly or black bear prints, but a little research later on lead us to believe they belonged to a grizzly.

Lakeside bear prints in the sand.

Lakeside deer prints in the sand.


Tom heading away from Lake Shoshone.

Around noon, we turned away from the lake and began to follow the DeLacy Creek trail. This portion of the trail was about 5km to our car at the trailhead, and we thought it would take us about an hour and a half to make our way there. Apparently we were much faster than we predicted, because an hour later, we saw the trailhead straight ahead!

Ashley and Andrew happily approaching the finishing trailhead.

I struggled to rank this hike compared to the other three we've completed. But my thoughts on the rankings are as follows:

1) Rim to Rim Grand Canyon 

2) Mount Rainier Northern Loop

3) Yellowstone Shoshone Basin Trail

4) Juan du Fuca Trail

If it weren't for the lakeside campsite and thermal features, the Shoshone Basin Trail might have dropped to the bottom of the bunch. The hike itself was not very challenging, but the sights made it worthwhile. 

Something else that made this hike worthwhile-- the fantastic meal we ate afterwards at Olive B's Big Sky Bistro. We gorged on steak, fish and seafood, and finished off the meal with three desserts. Dessert included mud pie, skillet cookie with huckleberry ice cream and peach raspberry cobbler with peach icecream.

Celebrating our hike with multiple desserts.

Now the question remains-- where will we hike next year?