We saw a moose but not a Teton!

10/3/2013 Note to friends: This is an attempt to recreate a blog I posted on 9/28. That post got lost, and so has my memory...but here goes...

After a few days in Yellowstone, our plans were to drive through the park right into Grand Teton National Park. Best laid plans: We booked a extra day in Yellowstone because the weather service was predicting 1 to 2 feet of snow, and we thought the extra day would let us get to Grand Teton safely. In the end, the snow waited until that extra night and closed all the passes in Yellowstone the day we tried to leave. 

We ended up driving through half of Idaho (okay -- maybe a little bit of an exaggeration). to get around the closed passes. On the positive side, Idaho was in full fall color. The reds and golds were impressive.

Jan in the very elkhorny Jackson town square

But we finally did reach Jackson, in all it's elkhorny glory. And we managed to have a great lunch at the Local before hitting the Park. My favorite story from the restaurant: I asked the waiter how the banh mi sandwich was, to which he replied, "well, it's...alternative." I ordered it anyway; it was wonderful!

We made it to Grand Teton National Park!

In case this is the only moose we see on our trip

Beautiful (and sneety) Jenny Lake

Grand Teton is such a beautiful park. We saw beautiful lakes, and high plains and marshes and trout streams and more elk and bison and lodges and all kinds of things. And snow. And sneet. The one thing we never saw was...the Tetons. The snow clouds stayed low on the mountains and blocked our view.

Unable to see the mountains, we went off in search of moose. It was one animal we had not yet been able to see. So I suggested we take a little "shortcut" to get to the Gros Ventre River. Jan's car needed to be broken in. It's fine.

Just a little "shortcut" helps break in Jan's new car

We waited an hour and a half in cold sneet, but eventually did see not one, but two moose. A bull and a cow were about 100 yards from us. I've never seen a moose in the wild before. So exciting! So we got up early the next day and went to look for them again. We were rewarded with seeing the cow just about 50 yards away. 

Female moose bedded down on the Gros Ventre

The National Museum of Wildlife Art is a great place to see more animalis!

Some whimsy at the Museum of Wildlife Art

We stayed at the Angler's Inn. Great little place right for a reasonable price near the town square. Funniest comment by a hotel guy: We said we had heard that the Flaming Gorge was a nice thing to see on our way to Colorado. He said, "That depends on what your "values" are. It's just a recreation area." "Values?" Read tomorrow's post to see how odd/funny that comment was.

Best business name: Jake's Midnight Taxidermy. 

Best vanity plate: FUNTIMZ.