Grand Teton National Park

We traveled south through Yellowstone to get to Grand Teton. Wildfires near the northern entrance to Grand Teton had closed the road for the week previous, but it reopened just in time for us to get there.

The air was smoky, and we saw lots of firefighters, and could see active burning in the forests around Jackson Lake.

Mountains – they are my very favorite. The Rockies. The Appalachians. The Alps. They are all magical to me. And the Grand Tetons are some of the most spectacular out there. The land surrounding the range is incredibly flat – barren of many trees, and mostly covered in scrub brush, so there isn’t anything in the way of you and your view of the mountains as you approach them.

At home in North Carolina, I am IN the Appalachian Mountains. They are above, below and beside me.  When we were in Canada, I was in the Rockies.  I took gondolas to the tops of the peaks. I was in the valleys standing on lake shores looking up. The mountains were everywhere, on all sides of me.

At Grand Teton, I was never truly IN them, and maybe that’s why they are so majestic, so huge. Because I was simply looking at them from afar.
Camping in Grand Teton can be a bit tricky – it was almost Labor Day Weekend, and none of the campsites take reservations, so upon the suggestion of my Park Ranger friend, we got a site at Gros Ventre, a campground in the southern region of the park and close to the tiny community of Moose, a short drive from Jackson, WY and many of the sites I wanted to visit in the park.

The campground itself was definitely showing its age, and was mostly filled with large RVs and surrounded with sagebrush, but it served it’s purpose as a place to stay while we explored.

I took so many pictures at Grand Teton. I could have taken hundreds more. It is truly a special place. Every turn in the road showed another view of the mountains. Photographers like Ansel Adams made the mountain range famous with his incredible photos, and I was inspired by those works as I tried to take some of my own masterpieces.

My dad and I got up before sunrise our first morning there and drove a few miles to the Mormon Row area to watch sunrise. Though thousands before me have probably snapped the same picture, it’s easy to see why. The way the light chased it’s way across the grassland, it was breathtaking. First, it hit the very tips of the peaks of the mountains, bathing them in a pink glow. Then the face of the mountains were covered in light, and slowly, the sagebrush became illuminated, and finally, the face of the 100 year old barn burst into full light.  It was a great way to spend a morning!

After sunrise, we picked up mom from the campsite and headed out to explore. We visited Schwabacher Landing, where the reflections of the mountains in the crystal clear water was awesome. We stopped at the Snake River overlook where Ansel Adam’s famous landscape was taken, and continued around to Jenny Lake, which I jokingly say is named after me.

The Jenny Lake visitor center was undergoing a major overhaul, but I was still able to grab a postcard and tshirt with my name on it.

Jenny Lake is a pristine little spot in the mountains. The lake is has a greenish hue, from the moraine of the glaciers above it, I’m sure.

On the way back to camp, we stopped at the Moose visitor center and then for afternoon drinks at Dornan’s Pizza, a small family run spot with the most BEAUTIFUL roof top bar in the world. I’m not kidding. There is no bar, on the planet, with a view quite like this. The beer tasted better being able to see the light dance on the Grand Teton Range!

After drinks with a good friend from college who is a park ranger, I spent my last night camping on the month long adventure. We packed up the following morning and headed east for home.

Grand Teton is a really special place. The beauty and majesty of the mountains is truly a sight to behold. I want to visit again in winter, or at least late spring, when the mountains are still covered with snow.