Grand Teton National Park

The last I wrote, we were crossing Wyoming, listening to bad country music. We had a plan to camp at a state park near Shoshoni. When we arrived, it was already dark, and there were no campgrounds to be found, despite what our map led us to believe. To make a long story short, we ended up driving at least another 75 miles to find a campground in Sinks Canyon State Park. We woke the next morning to find ourselves next to a mountain creek in a beautiful canyon.

We spent the next three or four hours driving through the most incredible scenery I have ever seen. It was “A River Runs Through It” territory—just breathtaking. We also passed through some neat old towns; the town of Dubois was straight out of a Spaghetti Western.




We arrived to Grand Teton National Park midday and found a sweet campsite at Jenny Lake, a tent-only campground (no RVs). As soon as camp was set up, we set out on a short hike around the southern perimeter of Jenny Lake and through the woods to some moose ponds. It was a beautiful walk, but we saw no moose.


As soon as we arrived back to camp around 6:30, we jumped in the car and headed up to Signal Mountain overlook to take in a most awesome sunset. Gideon snapped photos (along with a horde of other photographers) and I watched the show and tried to keep warm... a task I would spend the rest of the night working on—it feels like a D.C. winter out here already!



Our second day in the park started with pancakes, bacon and eggs, thanks to camp chef Gideon and my dad’s 40 year old Coleman stove. Yum! Next we took a drive south towards Teton Village, the home of Jackson Hole ski resort. The drive meandered through fields, forests, and by ponds... perfect habitat for moose. And wouldn’t you know, a bull moose was feeding in a pond just waiting for me! If you know me well, you know I have a thing for moose. It’s like a spiritual connection (don’t laugh) and I live for moose sightings. This was the first bull moose I’ve seen, and I had the total pleasure of observing it for a good fifteen minutes while Gideon snapped pictures. As far as I’m concerned, my trip is complete.



Later in the day, we set up camp at Colton Bay, in a more northern area of the park, and set out on another hike. This hike sent us along the shores of Jackson Lake, the largest lake in the park, and then out to some ponds, marshes, open fields, and forests. The hike was supposed to be an easy five miles or so, but we soon learned the hard way that trails in the Grand Teton are not clearly marked and can be awfully confusing, and maps aren’t much help. Reaching what we thought would be the last mile of the hike, we could not quite figure out which way to go. After hemming and hawing for a while, we agreed to go forward through the fields and forest ahead following a rather narrow trail. You can see where this is heading... yes, we got lost. Really lost. For a good hour or so. It was nearing 6 o’clock and the sun was beating a hasty retreat. We figured out that we had been following moose and elk paths through the fields and woods. Once we turned around, we couldn’t figure out which trail we had taken in. There was great potential to freak out, but I kept cool, knowing that if there was anyone who could figure out how to survive in the Teton wilderness, it was my own personal MacGyver, Gideon. Plus, we really weren’t all that far from civilization. It was just that pesky business of the sun setting. Finally, Gideon climbed a pine tree to try and get a bearing on the area. He had an idea of where we needed to go at that point. Shortly after that, we stumbled across some bleached moose bones, which would have been an ominous sign, had we not found the trail at about the same moment.

Thankfully, we were able to work our way back to the real trails and reach camp shortly after 7pm, our 5 mile hike clocking in closer to 8 miles. With sore feet and relieved hearts, we beat it to the bath house for hot showers. After a late dinner of burritos and red wine, we hit the sack, happy to be in our sleeping bags and not under a pile of brush in the wilderness.