The Grand Tetons

 



Just a random picture of a neat looking bug!





The forest fire responsible for the hazy mountain pictures.



The Grand Tetons are about 80 miles south of Yellowstone and one of the youngest mountain ranges in the Rocky Mountains. We decided to take a day trip down and see the mountain range and to check out Jackson Hole.  Jackson Hole is surrounded by the Grand Teton mountain range giving Jackson the appearance of being in a hole.  Getting through Yellowstone is a time consuming process, as the average speed is 35-45 mph, which translates to about 2 hours to get out of the park.

Once we made it to the Tetons, we were amazed at the beauty of these towering mountains! The tallest is just under 14,000 feet and there are glaciers at the top. We spent the first part of the day just pulling off the road every chance we could get to snap some pictures and take in the sights. Around dinner time, we had made it to downtown Jackson and Karen found us a nice local pizza joint, called Mountain High Pizza, to settle down for some grub. The pizza was pretty darn good and that's coming from a guy who had tried some different varieties of pizza in the last 4 months! After lunch, we strolled through the town and did some window shopping with the kids. After an hour or so it was time to finish our loop around Jackson Hole and head back home.

As the sun was going down we got word from a park ranger that a grizzly bear and her cubs had been spotted just a few miles from where we were. So we made a U-turn and headed for, hopefully, our first bear sighting. Sure enough when we arrived we saw a mother and 3 cubs feeding on the mountainside only 50 or so feet from the road. We shut off the truck and snapped pictures for as long as we could. The problem with an animal sighting is there tends to be a traffic jam in a matter of minutes, so we had to move along to keep traffic flowing. Now we headed for home, with an over 2 hour drive ahead of us and the sun going down fast we headed to Yellowstone. About 3/4 of the way home, we pulled off in an open field to catch some stars. The moon was a little bright, but we were still rewarded with a great sky for star gazing. You know how when sky is really clear you can see those layers of stars you rarely ever get to see.









There are some stars in the pic!