Excelsior Geyser

On June 15th we visited Excelsior Geyser, located in the Lower Geyser Basin of Yellowstone National Park. This geyser used to erupt up to 300 ft before the 1900's but now it is a dormant geyser. Scientists believe that this geyser was so violent that it actually damaged its internal structure to the point where it didn't have access to its hydrothermal energy. In laymen's terms it lost access to its heat source. Although it doesn't erupt as it did, in 1985 it erupted for two days but it was only 20 to 80 feet tall-- a fraction of what it used to be. Present day it is considered a thermal spring and releases about 4050 gallons per minute! Unlike Grand Prismatic Spring the coloring in this spring is blue due to minerals rather than bacteria that cause coloring in Grand Prismatic. There was so much steam that we couldn't even see the spring until some wind picked it up and cleared the spring.