The lobby of the Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel was full of people bundling into their best winter apparel, excited to explore the unparalleled interior of Yellowstone National Park in the rugged luxury of a snowcoach.

“Welcome to the most magical time of year,” said Rebecca King, one of the snowcoach guides for the hotel concessionaire Xanterra, before the Dec. 16 tour. “Your visit today is so important.”

King was leading “today’s MOM,” what guides called the same-day round-trip tour from Mammoth to Old Faithful and back to Mammoth again. Her coach was the first in a loose convoy of five, all headed into the park for the first weekend of the new winter season.

“The ice crystals are forming on everything that it can possibly touch,” she told Cowboy State Daily. “Your hair, your jacket, your scarf, the boardwalk, the trees, the sagebrush, the bison. With the right light and the right conditions, it just glows. It’s like glitter surrounding you. It’s magical.”