Yellowstone National Park
Wyoming, Montana, Idaho
Canyon Visitor Education Center

Enter the new Canyon Visitor Education Center and the world of Yellowstone’s supervolcano—an idea that has captured the minds and imaginations of people around the world. For the first time, park visitors will see, hear, and learn how the Yellowstone volcano, its geysers and hot springs, and geologic history shape the distribution and abundance of all life found here. Explore these ideas through interactive exhibits, animations, audio-visual productions, and real-time scientific data.

Unique exhibits include: 

• A room-size relief model of Yellowstone that illuminates and narrates the park’s volcanic eruptions, lava flows, glaciers, and earthquake faults for visitors on the first floor; from the second floor view, visitors can hear tribes associated with the park interpret the park’s geology from their tribe’s perspective.
• A 9,000 pound rotating globe illustrating global volcanic hotspots.
• One of the world’s largest lava lamps illustrating how magma rises by heat convection.
• Computer-generated exhibits displaying real-time earthquake and other geologic data exactly at the same time it is being collected in the park.
• Murals and enlarged photographs showing the enormity of Yellowstone’s glaciers and their lasting effect on the landscape.
• Detailed panoramas, dioramas, and cross sections of life in a lodgepole forest and a grassland—habitats made possible by Yellowstone’s fire and ice.   -NPS

Yellowstone Bus parked outside Canyon Village Gift Shop and Dinning Room

For the past several decades the buses were used for tours in Alaska.  The company that had owned them asked Yellowstone officials if they wanted them back.  Roughly $1.9-million later, the buses have been refurbished and brought up to current safety standards.

The original buses were handmade and were quite a challenge for the drivers, who had to deal with steep hills, windy roads, and wild animals.  Back then, the drivers were called "gear-jammers".

The buses are spread out through the park-- five are at the Canyon Village; two are at Old Faithful, and one is at Mammoth. They can be used for short, one-hour tours, or all-day tours.

   Agate Fossil Beds NM|Agua Fria NM|Arches NP|Badlands NP|Bandelier NM|Big Bend NP|Big Cypress NP
Big Hole NB|Big Thicket NP|Biscayne NP|Black Canyon of Gunnison NP|Bryce Canyon NP|Cabrillo NM|Canyon de Chelly NM|Canyonlands NP|Canyon of the Ancients NM|Capitol Reef NP|Capulin Volcano NM|Carlsbad Caverns NP|Carrizo Plain NM|Casa Grande NM |Cascade-Siskiyou NM|Cedar Breaks NM|Chaco Canyon NHP|Chamizal NM|Channel Islands NP|Chickamauga & Chattanooga NMP|Chimney Rock NHS|Chiricahua NM||City of Rocks NP|Colorado NM|Congaree NP|Coronado NM|Crater Lake NP|Craters of the Moon NM|Death Valley NP|Devil's Post Pile NM|Devil's Tower NM|Ebey's Landing NHR|Dinosaur NM|El Malpais NM|El Morro NM|Eugene O'Neill NHS|Everglades NP|Flaming Gorge NRA|Florissant Fossil Beds NM|Fort Bowie NM|Fort Laramie NHS|Fort Larnard NHS|Fort Pulaski|Fort Union NM|Fort Vancouver NHS|Fossil Butte NM|Glacier NP|Glen Canyon NRA|Golden Gate NRA|Golden Spike NHS|Grand Canyon NP|Grand Canyon/Parashant NM|Grand Teton NP|Giant Sequoia NM|Gila Cliff Dwellings NM|Glacier NP|Grand Staircase/Escalante NM|Great Basin N P|Grand Portage NM|Great Sand Dunes NP|Great Smokey Mountains NP|Guadalupe Mountains NP|Hagerman Fossil Bed NM|Hanford Reach NM|Hells Canyon NRA|Hohokam-Pima NM|Hot Springs NP|Hovenweep NM|Hubble Trading Post NHS|Ironwood NM|John Day Fossil Bed NM|John Muir NHS|Joshua Tree NP|Kings Canyon NP|Klondike Gold Rush NHP|Lake Mead NRA|Lake Roosevelt NRA|Lassen NP|Lava Beds NM|Lewis and Clark NHP|Lincoln Home NHS|Lyndon B Johnson NHP|Little Big Horn NM|Mojave NP|Mammoth Cave NP|Manzanar NM|Martin Luther King NHS|Mesa Verde NP|Minidoka Internment NM|Montezuma Castle NM|Mount Rainier NP|Mount Rushmore NM|Mount St. Helens NM|Muir Woods NM|Natural Bridges NM|Navajo NM|Newberry Volcanic NM|Nez Perce NHP|North Cascades NP|Ocmulgee NM|Olympic NP|Oregon Caves NM|Organ Pipe Cactus NM|Padre Island NS|Palo Alto Battlefield NHS|Pecos NHP|Petrified Forest NP|Pinnacles NM|Pipe Spring NM|Pipestone NM|Point Reyes NS|Port of Chicago NM|Redwood NP|Rocky Mountain NP|Rosie the Riveter NHP|Saguaro NP|Salinas Pueblo Missions NM|San Antonio Missions NHP|San Francisco Maritime NHP| San Juan Island NHP|San Juan NHP|Santa Monica Mountains NRA|Santa Rosa - San Jacinto Mountains NM|Scott's Bluff NM|Sequoia NP|Sonora Desert NM|Sunset Crater NM|Theodore Roosevelt NP|Timpanogos Cave NM|Tonto NM|Tuzigoot NM|Valles Caldera NP|Vermillion Cliffs NM|Voyageurs NP|Walnut Canyon NM|White Sands NM|Whitman Mission NM|Wind Cave NP|Wupatki NM|Yellowstone NP|Yosemite NP|Yucca House NM|Zion NP

More Photographs by Steve: Antelope Canyon|Monument Valley

National Park Lover Home Page

Copyright © 1995 - 2007 Steve Schmorleitz. All rights reserved.
Revised: March 23, 2008.
Contact Steve Schmorleitz for approval of photo usage.