Grand Teton National Park - July 1-4, 2006

When we came over the mountains and saw the Grand Tetons for the first time, all the other fabulous sights we’ve seen in our travels were forgotten. Even if you’ve seen pictures, you’re never quite prepared for the reality of this scene – it’s overwhelming!

Our campground was just about six miles from the park entrance – a good jumping off point for our exploring. Driving down through Jackson Hole to the town of Jackson, we stopped at every turnoff for a Kodak moment. Jackson is a hoppin’ place – real stores like Eddie Bauer and The Gap mixed in with the obligatory tourist traps and some good restaurants. We joined a couple from Salt Lake for dinner at a great restaurant – he’s a former restauranteur who looks at fine dining as research – good company and fun to share a table with!

The wildlife in this area runs a close second to the scenery. We had to stop the car at one point while 20 or more buffalo crossed the road in front of us. We saw more elk than deer on our sightseeing drives – and we saw quite a few deer! Near our RV park, two pairs of osprey had built their nests on platforms constructed on top of power poles near the river. Every time we drove by you could expect to see the female sitting on the nest and the male perched close by watching for a likely fish dinner to swim by.

But above all, the Tetons are moose country! Lots of good habitat – ponds and slow-moving streams or rivers filled with grasses and surrounded by willows. We found that the best indicator of wildlife is when you see lots of cars parked at the side of the road with people staring off into the distance.

That’s how we found our first moose sighting – a cow and her calf standing in a reed-filled pond next to the road. They were feeding contentedly, apparently oblivious to the near pandemonium on the road above them! We snapped a bunch of pictures and went on our way. When we passed again a few hours later, mother and baby were still calmly entertaining the crowd!

Not all of our wildlife encounters had the same Disneyland-like atmosphere. We took off exploring on some dirt roads a few days later and came upon a pair of young moose who trotted down a hill near us, munched on some shrubs for a while, and then wandered back up the hill and out of sight. They seemed more concerned about the deer on the far side of the meadow than they were about us. This was the perfect time of year to be exploring because the remote forests and meadows are carpeted with dozens of varieties of wildflowers. Wish my pictures could do justice to the beauty of it all.

We drove up to Teton Village one afternoon. That’s where the ski resort is located. Even though it’s not ski season, the restaurants and shops were bustling and the tram to the top was running. We spent some time watching a classic car auction that was going on while we were there and somehow managed to resist bidding on any of the cars.

We decided to spend the 4th of July at the RV park and avoid all the crowds and noise at the big celebration in Jackson. What we didn’t know was that the park was hosting a youth group get-together and over 100 teenagers would be setting up camp across the road from our RV! ACK!!! Ez thought that blasting classic rock on our iPod player would send them packing, but no. . We finally relented, went inside the coach, closed the windows, and watched old movies on TV.

Don’t forget to stayed tuned for our next episode when our intrepid adventurers tackle the vacation hordes at Yellowstone. .