2000 coolant problems

Recently i have been noticing an enormous amount of coolant loss. I can refill it and drive and drive and has no problems, but later, all of a sudden ill park somwhere and see a big puddle of my coolent leaking. On time i filled it up a litle too much and it poped the saftey thing under the cap and loss all the coolent while driveing. luckily i didnt have to go far. but as i was driving with no coolent, i didnt see any abnormal changes in the temperature gauge. But one thing i did notice before coolant started leaking was that the temp gauge would creep over just about 2 or 3 hash marks. i wasnt even driving it hard when it did that. what is up with this? do i have a gasket somewhere blown? could hitting a bump cause a chain reaction of events, i remembering this happening twice and the two times it did it i hit a bump. if its a leaky hose, have you heard of the pepper trick and does it work? I would really like some help with this. Thanks.

To tell you the truth, I had the same problem. More than likely is is your water pump that has gone bad, or the gasket is leaking, which usually means that the water pump has gone bad, and I recommend, that If you get the water pump replaced, might as well as get your timing belt/chain replaced along with it cause that will probably be the next thing to go. The water pump on these Grand Am's is costly, but they are quality. Hope I've helped.

well i took it in the other day and they couldnt tell what it was. It wasnt coming out internaly though. Since they couldnt really figure it out, the said to take a preventative measure they would replace the thermostat. So far it has been running just a tad bit warmer but it is running alot better. I have been looking around and this seems to be very common on the 3400.