Beneath The Trap Door: Old Faithful Inn roof

Here are my photos of my trip up onto the roof of Yellowstone's Old Faithful Inn. The general public is not allowed beyond the 3rd floor mezzanine, but the bellhops can take two people with them with they go up to raise or lower the flags. I went up with Edward, the bellhop, who was a really great guy. A woman from France also tagged along.
Anyway, here's our destination (looking up from the 2nd floor deck).

We climbed a dizzying (but really damn cool) set of jungle-gym-like stairs up past the crow's nest (which you can see here) and up to these doors that lead to an outside set of steps that go up to the very top of the Inn. Here's Ed telling me not to go into the light.

Who's this dork up on the roof? Here's a hint: it's not Ed and it's not the nice woman from France.

We were really lucky this day. It had just stopped raining, and so we got to see this nice rainbow while Ed took down one of the flags.

Here's Ed taking down the American flag. I got to help him fold it up, which was neat.

And then, as if I wasn't already having the best time ever, Old Faithful geyser decides to go off, so we stayed on the roof to watch the eruption. The overcast sky made for a rather dramatic shot. The building in the distance is the Old Faithful Lodge, where I worked part of the summer of '91 and the summer of '92.