“Celebrate we will, because
life is short but sweet for certain”
Two Step by Dave Matthews
Band
Grand Teton was supposed to
be a simple stop on the way down to Salt Lake City, but quickly shot up the
list to my favorite park of the entire trip.
It was a rough road getting here though.
We woke up early in Yellowstone and planned to get to Grand Teton only
45 miles south by midmorning so that we could get a hike in and check out most
of the park. Compared to Yellowstone
it’s a much smaller park, about 300,000 acres (Yellowstone is 2.2 million
acres), encompassing a 40 mile stretch of the Teton Mountain range. The parks road sits the east of the range
offering spectacular views of the mountains which have peaks over 12,000 feet.
Again the start of our day
was rocky (no pun intended) as we hit numerous areas of traffic and road
construction on our way to the park. We
did not even get to the park until 1 and the campground board at the entrance
showed that the best campgrounds were full.
The day itself was sunny so we were hopeful for a great day. The first site of the range was
fantastic. The mountains were a result
of earth being thrust upward through plate movements and earthquakes and then
carved by glaciers. They are ragged in
shape but are made more impressive by the lack of foothills. They just go straight up from the ground,
over 6000 feet above the valley below.
The first campground we found was in an awful location, so we decided to
see if maybe the signs were wrong and the better campgrounds had openings. Since I get to write this I will leave out my
angry, frustrated moments finding a site, but in the end it all worked out and
we found a site at a campground on Jackson Lake overlooking the mountains. Then in rained.
The afternoon shower ended
quickly, but there were more clouds around so we decided to get a quick hike
in. We picked up some trail maps at the
visitor center and headed for a 4 mile loop hike to an alpine lake at the base
of the mountains. It was sunny when we
started and was a great relaxing hike through the meadows, eventually leading
to the lake. By the time we hit the lake
the sky was completely gray, we relaxed for a little but when the thunder
started we headed back to the car. Now
this storms-at-the-end-of-hikes bit may seem like redundant story telling, but
if I have to suffer so do you.
Thunder at this point has
become part of the hikes and I was starting to find it relaxing. The winds and rain can be cooling after a hot
hike. As I had finally come to terms
with this style of hiking, Shriver pointed out that the mountains behind us
were almost completely out of view as a wall of rain headed towards us. This was not going to be a nice storm. We had about a mile left to go. In my head I had visions of disaster movies
where the protagonist is able to outrun a tornado or erupting volcano. I could do it too. Shriver didn’t seem to mind so he continued
to walk. I ran, and as he disappeared
behind me I became hopeful I’d outrun it.
I couldn’t. The storm hit hard,
much harder than rain. It wasn’t until
the path filled up with pea-sized balls of ice that I realized it was
hail. It hailed for the whole run back
to the car. The final section took me
away from the protection of the trees and into an open field with lightning
strikes seeming to be just overhead. I
survived and waited about 10 minutes for Shriver to emerge alive.
Completely drained from the
run and tired of rain, all I wanted was some warm clothes, food and a bed. We returned to our wet campsite, attempted to
cook dinner, got hit by more rain and then the clouds went away. Shriver convinced me to take a walk down to
the lake for sunset. We had a short walk through the woods to the stony beach. The sun setting over the Tetons is now in a
special memory place with the first views of Crater Lake and Grand Canyon, the
night sky on my private island in Belize and my campsite on the beach in
Washington. We returned to camp finished dinner and then went back to the lake for a few of the stars and a lightning storm far in the distant. Each bolt lit up the Tetons.
The next day we got up early
with plans to do one last epic hike before Shriver parted. This time there were no clouds and only a
chance of thunderstorms around 2 PM.
That gave us over 5 hours to hike.
We chose a popular hike that starts with a boat ride across Jenny Lake
to Cascade Canyon, a canyon between the tallest two peaks of the range. It started off as an easy out and back hike,
with a gradual elevation change of 2000 ft over 7 miles, for a total of 14.4
miles. The path goes through pine
forests along a river with rapids and multiple waterfalls, with a final 2-mile
strenuous section through a meadow up to Solitude Lake. It was not the toughest hike of the trip, but
easily my favorite. The views were
endless.
We stopped for some food
after the hike and then continued south to Jackson, WY for a night out to celebrate the end of a great two weeks weeks. The night started with a stop at the Snake River Brew Pub and then we happened upon a free Hold Steady concert (courtesy of Budlight). It was the perfect end to the best day of the trip yet. Grand Teton was exactly what I need to be rejuvenated
for the final 2 legs of the trip. I will
definitely come back here more than once.
It’s been a fun two weeks with Shriver, we hiked a ton, saw a ton, and
tried a lot of local beers. Today we
head to Salt Lake City where I’ll drop him off and spend the next 10 days alone
on the road. The trip continues to exceed expectations. Next stop is a return to Utah for Salt Lake City, Canyonlands, Moab and Arches and then Colorado for Rocky Mountains and Denver.
Stats:
Miles Driven: 6914
States: PA, MD, WV, VA, TN,
NC, AL, MS, LA, TX, NM, AZ, UT, NV, CA, OR, ID, MT, WY
National Parks: 14
Miles Hiked: 73
Number of marmot attacks: 1
Blog Views: 3230
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