Thursday, August 26, 2010

Scenes from day 6 of Summer Vacation 2010

August 4, 2010 - and the theme for the day was "Mountains and Waterfalls". For our final day in West Yellowstone, we took a road trip south to go see the Grand Tetons up close, even though it was an almost 3 hour drive. In my humble opinion, 3 hours is nothing when you get to see beautiful scenery the entire way.
We packed up in the my dad's BAT truck and left the campground by 8:30 AM. Our first stop was at Lewis Falls where we got to walk out on a log jam to see them closer. Of course, there were lots of helping hands along the way to make sure no one took an unexpected swim.

In seemed like no time at all and we made it to the gorgeous Grand Tetons. We had a picnic lunch beside Jackson Lake. We had to put our sweatshirts on because it felt so cool in the shade. Seriously, the pics don't do it justice. Maybe it is because I am a flat-lander from the prairie, but the mountains take my breath away.
After three hours in the truck, we were very interested in going out on a hike, particularly, Kippy, who wanted to hike IN.THE.MOUNTAINS; however, she had to settle for hiking around the mountains instead. We picked a trail along Jenny Lake with an interesting destination of "Hidden Falls." We even took Miss Bella on the hike with us along with what we thought was plenty of water. Turns out, we are bad map readers and what we thought was going to be a 3 mile hike, round trip, ended up being 5 miles and taking 2 1/2 hours. Although the terrain was challenging at times, the view of Hidden Falls and the shear SIZE and the SOUND made it all worth while. We were all pretty dusty, tired and completely out of water by the time we got back to the BAT truck, but felt we had accomplished something special. Of course, ice cream treats all around helped brighten everyone's mood.

Some of these flower pics were taken in YNP and some were from Grand Teton National Park, so I don't technically have the collage labeled correctly. Beauty was all around us and I feel so blessed that we were able to see and appreciate it up close and personal. We certainly had a lot to talk about on the way back to W. Yellowstone. We enjoyed a late supper at a local Mexican Restaurant which had the spiciest salsa. I couldn't stop eating it even though my lips were BURNING. In fact, that meal was only one of 4 meals the entire trip where we ate out... all the rest were meals-on-wheels from our camper or picnic lunches we had packed. It was a wonderful day and my folks definitely make great tour guides.

3 comments:

Lori said...

BE-U-TI-FUL! I love the mountains. That is one of the things I miss the most. Great pics of your adventures!

Mikey said...

oooohh pretty....

Charlene said...

I miss the mountains too!!! Very majestic!! I have hiked near Jenny Lake so I'm wondering if you guys made it down to Jackson Hole? It is one of our favorite places to visit!!!