Posted on

Grand Teton National Park: Part 3

I got on up and grabbed a bagel and some coffee (regular coffee is slowly growing on me), then took a shower and cleaned up the camper cabin.  Said my farewells to everyone at the lodge, then headed south towards Grand Teton.  I had already gone back and forth on the inner road, so after a quick stop at Jackson Dam for some photos of the thunderstorms going over the mountains, I took the outer road south towards Jackson.  The views were different, and still gorgeous.  Bonus, one of the pullouts was next to the Elk Ranch Flats, a horse farm/dude ranch, and the horses had learned if they stood by the fence the tourists would come over and pet them!  I hung out around there for a good half hour just petting horses and taking photos of them.  There was this one horse that was a big guy, white with brown freckles, who kept following me around and if I got close enough he would wrap his head around me and snuggle then lip my hair.  He was soooo sweet!  After I said farewell to him I looked at my hands and saw all the fleas, oops, hopefully they’re gone now.  I haven’t seen any.

I kept going south, stopping at the various turnouts for the view of the Tetons.  I stopped by the Gros Ventre turnout and visited the Mormon Row Historic District Moulton Barns, and their other cool buildings.  Then I proceeded to an area along a creek/wetland where moose were supposedly known to frequent, but didn’t see anything.  It was still a nice quiet place, so I just sat and listened to the water for a bit until I ran out of time.  I drove to DQ for some food and gassed up the rental, then headed to the airport.  I guess it was because I got there mid-afternoon, but it was hardly busy at all and there was no line for TSA screening.  Totally didn’t need to get there 2 hours early.  But that gave me time to chat with the TSA agents who admired my skull cat t-shirt and I got to talking to one agent exchanging stories about our cats for a while until other people showed up and she had to get back to work.  I thought it was cute 🙂

The flight home was uneventful, and I miss this place already. Although I got a lot done this week, I also missed a lot too. I guess I’ll have to go back!

Posted on

Grand Teton National Park: Part 2

After the long days on Tuesday and Wednesday I was pretty wiped out.  I slept in until 7ish, and I don’t know if I’m just getting used to it or what but it didn’t seem nearly as cold and I slept pretty well in my blanket cocoon.  I went and got a late breakfast, then changed into already dirty clothes and drove over to the trail ride area.  I rode a lovely, big, brown and black horse named “Ed” with the lady that works at the convenience store, Tanya the waitress, and Christine the horse guide.  We rode on the backwoods trails at a leisurely pace and saw a mule deer and her two babies, a great view of the mulberry creek/wetland area, and the woods that burned back in 2016 and is regrowing.  While we were riding I kept noticing these old large stickup groundwater monitoring wells.  I asked Christine if this area had been used for anything other than the lodge or park in the past, and she said the area used to be an old military area.  That made sense, and would explain why they were/had been monitoring the ground water.  She didn’t know what I was talking about so I pointed out the wells and told her they were probably monitoring for metals, but they were so rusted probably not anymore.  Christine laughed about that because people had been asking her for a while what those were but she didn’t know, now she knows!  Once you start doing environmental work you can’t stop doing it, even on vacation.  In the wetland areas I was still finding myself trying to identify and mentally delineate them. 

After the ride I took a shower to get the horse stank off me, then spent time backing up photos and clearing space on SD cards.  It was almost 2pm by the time I got out of the campgrounds and drove south towards the Grand Tetons.  I stopped at Signal Point and drove up the mountain to a gorgeous view and spoke a little Japanese with a Japanese tourist family, and on my way back down there was a mule deer right next to the road eating. Further down, a full grown bull elk was laying down maybe 50 feet off the road.  I pulled over, of course, and got my telephoto lens out and got some great pictures.  There were two wildlife management officers right there directing people to move closer, or away, or left, or right, depending on what the elk was doing but the elk didn’t seem to care about the people at all.  Eventually he crossed the road and headed off into the woods. 

I continued down to Jenny Lake, and I was going to take the ferry over and climb up to Hidden Falls and Inspiration point, but by this point it was almost 5pm and the weather couldn’t figure out if it wanted to rain or stay sunny.  Given that my feet were already blistered and hurting, I didn’t think I really wanted to hike uphill for 1.5 miles in the rain, so I took a pass on the ferry and wandered the lake perimeter checking out all the cool mountain rocks for about an hour.  Then I went up to Jackson Lodge, which was so busy by the time I found a parking spot I decided to just skip it and go up to Colter Bay Lodge.  This one was calmer, and had their own rock beach, so I again walked up and down the rock beach looking at rocks and enjoying the view. 

Eventually around 7pm I got hungry, so I went up to the marina just north of Colter Bay where the Lodge staff had all been praising the pizza at Leek’s Pizzeria.  To be fair, it was pretty good, especially considering the other options in the area.  You get tired of sandwiches and salads after a few days so a super cheesy greasy pizza really hit the spot.  After eating I wandered across to the marina to watch the sun set and then headed back north to the Lodge.  I stopped by the main lodge to get online for a bit and use the bathroom, and when I came back out noticed lightning coming out from the south, struggling to get over the mountains.  A big group of us sat in the parking lot watching the extreme “War of the Worlds” level light show as the storm made its way over the mountains and towards us.  At first it was just impressive flashes with no sound at all, but once it got over the mountains the thunder was SUPER loud, and once it got too close for comfort I hopped back in my car and went to the camper cabin.  I stood outside chatting with neighbors (and petting their dogs) and watching the light show for another half hour or so before it started to rain and we all ran inside.  When it started raining it rained HARD with almost constant lightning and thunder.  It was pretty cool! Definitely glad I was in the camper cabin and not a tent!

Posted on

Yellowstone National Park: Part 1

Today was a day of bucket list items.  I’ve always seen gorgeous photos of the Prismatic Spring so that was definitely going to happen, and since Old Faithful was nearby I wanted to see that too.  It ended up being a full day of geysers, hot springs, lots of steam, and stinky sulfur smells.  Basically, I loved it!

I got up early and got breakfast at the Headwaters Lodge & Cabins at Flagg Ranch restaurant, it’s a little pricey but for the convenience and the area it’s well worth it.  The staff are super nice too, and went through my map with me picking out “must see” places from the perspective of people that live and work there.  My plan was pretty much the same as the day before, get out the door and see what happens.  I headed north into Yellowstone south entrance and made my first stop at Lewis Falls at the Lewis River, a cute little waterfall and wetland area.  I continued north then veered toward west Yellowstone, where some moose cows and spring calves were hanging out but there were so many people I didn’t stop to take pics.  They were eating so it’d just be pics of their butts anyway.  I made another pit stop at Craig Pass and made my first major stop at Old Faithful since it was only about 10 minutes away from going off anyway.  I have to admit, it’s a bit anti-climactic.  It takes a long time to build up and doesn’t go as high as I thought it would. It was also a cold morning so there was so much steam you couldn’t see the water, although the steam did make a pretty rainbow in the mist. 

I jumped back in my car and headed to Prismatic Spring, and even though it was only 10am there was already a line to the parking lot.  My suggestion is if you don’t mind walking just park along the road and walk.  I didn’t realize you could do that and drove around the lot twice amongst angry, frustrated people all looking for a spot before I found one.  Seeing the spring from the ground is pretty neat, you can walk around all the steam and see some really cool patterns on the ground.  They almost look like abstract or impressionist paintings.  Once you make your way around the wooden walkway (don’t fall in!) head back around to another parking lot about a mile south down the road and park.  It’s the same parking lot for the Fairy Falls hike.  There’s only one trail to start, so get walking and enjoy all the springs everywhere as you do.  About half a mile in the trail splits and you can go straight to the Fairy Falls trail, or turn left to go up to the Prismatic Spring overlook.  Word of advice: DO IT!!  The overlook is so incredibly worth it!  I admit, I was huffing and puffing a bit at the top, but that’s totally because the air is thinner up there and not because I’m out of shape…yeah.  I stayed up there for about an hour, just watching the steam and how the colors seemed to change every five minutes. 

After Prismatic Spring I was getting hungry, so I went back to Old Faithful where there is a nice cafeteria and got a salad and drink.  Since I was there anyway, I watched another eruption, then decided to walk the short wooden path around all the other geysers.  My favorite was Depression Geyser, I felt personally attacked by it.  By the time I walked around, it was time for another Old Faithful eruption so I sat and watched it again with some ice cream.  On the way back to base, I stopped at Kepler Cascades and then to West Thumb and wandered the lakeside geysers.  It was getting late, and I really needed a shower, so I headed back to the campground early.  Tomorrow is going to be an early day!