Growing Old Together: Old Faithful Inn

I made reservations to stay one night at the Old Faithful Inn in January of 2010. I was able to reserve one of the original rooms which were built in 1903 – 1904. While there we participated in a guided tour – learning about the history and recent upgrades. In the early days only the wealthy traveled by train from the East Coast to the Inn – the "place to see and to be seen". After dinner in the grand dining room couples would parade in the finest attire around the promenade on each of the 4 floors that opened to the Grande Rotunda. The individual rooms had no plumbing but the guests were given a warm "porcelain pitcher" of water to take to the room and use in the matching "porcelain basin". A commode was provided for each room so that guests would not have to go outside during the nights.

The amazing use of raw timber in the construction of the Inn makes me grateful that it survived the 1988 forest fire. It seems the perfect pieces of wood, including magnificent burls were selected individually to fit each application of the building. This use of wood certainly does justice Trees!

I didn't realize the significance of

being assigned Room # 1 - but we were right across the hall from a beautiful guest bathroom with walk in

shower! We were at the very end of the old building with our double windows looking right out onto the geyser basin. Please click on pictures if you wish to see a larger version.

I always wanted to be one of those people who were sitting on the second floor balcony of the Inn watching Old Faithful Erupt! There has always been a big clock displayed in the rotunda telling the estimated time of the next eruption. Old Faithful has become less "faithful" over the years – so Ron & I had time to go to dinner in the Grand Dining Room at 6:00 – enjoying a wonderful meal and spectacular service and still have plenty of time to see the Eruption that took place near dark on September 8th – and we watched again the next morning before leaving Old Faithful Inn.

There She Blows! September 9th about 10:40 am

The huge fireplace in the Rotunda has a fire pit on all four sides with places for guests to sit and enjoy the lodge. This picture is taken from the second floor showing the big clock on the fireplace. Note the beautiful wood construction throughout! What a Grand Place!