National Geographic Special - The World\'s Most Beautiful Places

111 STARK & WILD

grand

prismatic

spring

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL

PARK, WYOMING

The Grand Prismatic Spring is a watery,

earthbound rainbow, a hot spring painted by

nature in its most brilliant colors. Diferent

microbes in the spring flourish at various tem-

peratures and assume pigmentation appro-

priate to their environment. Temperatures

at the center of the spring are too high to

support bacteria in any numbers, so the blue

is the blue of ordinary water and its selective

absorption of visible light. The science may

be prosaic—but the result is magical.

DON’T MISS

View the Grand Prismatic Falls on the easy Fairy Falls

Trail (2.5 mi/4 km), a two- or three-hour round-trip

from the trailhead on the park’s Grand Loop Road.

Take another hour to see Spray Geyser and Imperial

Geyser beyond Fairy Falls.

An aerial view of the multicolored Grand Prismatic

Spring, the largest hot spring in the United States