Saturday, we got back from a weeklong trip to the Grand Teton/Yellowstone National Parks. My parents, my brother, and our family went. I was going to put up some pictures, but my Windows computer has a virus, so I’m just blogging now from my Linux server.
We spent the first 4 nights at Colter Bay in the Grand Teton. Weather was perfect. However, there were several small fires going on, so there was the smell of smoke everywhere and a slight haze. Also, because it was so dry, they drained Colter Bay to allow Idaho potato farmers some irrigation water.
Grand Teton is a nice place to visit. There are huge mountains going straight up from a valley with lakes all around.
Colter Bay has a large grocery store and an inexpensive gift shop there. There is also a restaurant and a grill there. The restaurant, Chuck Wagon, was overpriced and the food was bad. The grill however made good buffalo cheese steaks. We stayed in some log cabins which were clean and had a basic bathroom. The cabin office was open 24 hours and had a internet connected computer.
We did a breakfast horse ride from Jackson lake. That was worth doing. My dad, brother, and I rode the horses, while the kids, Shiow-Lih, and my mom rode the wagon. It was a slow 1 hour ride to the picnic area. And there, we had some nice pancakes, eggs, ham, and coffee.
Jenny Lake and Leigh Lake were perhaps the best lakes to visit there. They are at the foot of the mountains and not crowded. Actually, it was never really crowded wherever we went.
We didn’t see too many animals at Grand Teton. We saw one fox (or what seemed like a fox) and a moose. But the main thing to see there anyways is the mountains and the lakes.
We had also spent one day at Jackson. Not much really to do there.
We spent the remaining time in Yellowstone. It was amazing how much of it was burned in 1998. Over 700,000 acres, or 1/3 of the entire park. Driving through Yellowstone, the only thing we could see were the burned areas.
The first night, we stayed at Old Faithful Inn. That lobby is really incredible. And if you go visit there, you must stay at least one night there. The second night, we stayed at Snow Lodge, the newest accomodations there.
While driving around in Yellowstone, we got to be smack in the middle of two bison road crossings. We wondered if we were just plain lucky or it happened all the time. We also got to see some elk and moose. But, we never did get to see any bears.
One nice thing about Yellowstone was the management company, Xanterra. They provided excellent service and ran everything very well.
The main thing we watched at Yellowstone was Old Faithful. We saw it erupt four times. Fortunately, one of those times, I was able to get some good pictures of the sun rising behind it while it erupted. That was probably the best pictures I took during the entire trip. And hopefully I can get my Windows box fixed soon so I can have some pictures up.