YellowstoneEstablished in 1872, Yellowstone National Park in the western United States was the first national park anywhere in the world. Today it is famous for its geothermal activity and its wild animals, as well as for a landscape of beautiful mountains, deep canyons, lakes and rivers. It also remains one of the largest national parks in the U.S., covering almost 9,000 square kilometers, most of which lie within the western state of Wyoming. What makes the park truly unusual, however, is what lies beneath it. Yellowstone sits on top of an ancient super volcano known as the Yellowstone Caldera, which is still active. About six kilometers below the surface lies a lake of hot liquid rock that, according to experts, is under enormous pressure. It is this combination of pressure and heat that causes geysers to shoot hot water out of the ground and mud to boil. As a result, the park is home to more than 300 geysers; in fact, no other place on Earth has as many geysers and hot springs. The most famous of them is called “Old Faithful”, and it owes its name to the fact that it is so reliable: it erupts, sending hot water shooting out of the ground, about once every 90 minutes. Because Yellowstone lies on a high plateau with an average height of 2,400 meters above sea level, its winters are very cold, with average January temperatures of between -18 and -7 degrees Celsius. Even so, some areas of the park stay open to visitors all year round. Among its most impressive sights is Yellowstone Canyon, which is about 365 meters deep. The Yellowstone River flows through it, dropping 93 meters at the Lower Falls, and a path allows visitors to get very close to the top of the falls, where they can both see and hear their power. The park has also shown that it can recover from disaster. In the summer of 1988, forest fires burned large areas of it, yet most of those areas are now covered with plants and young trees. Finally, Yellowstone is home to the largest group of wild animals in the lower 48 states, including bison, grizzly bears, deer, foxes, beavers and wolves. In 2024, park officials estimated that there were about 4,500 bison, which makes it the largest group of wild bison in the world. There is, it seems, still a wild west in America, and its name is Yellowstone.
