July 31st - Yellowstone to Grand Tetons National Park

While talking to staff at the campground office, a frequent visitor, familiar to the staff appeared. Bart the Buffalo apparently often roams the campground loops. Angie got a picture of him entering the park.

​​After a leisurely morning, we hitched up the trailer and hit the road. We stopped at our favorite beach on Yellowstone Lake to give the dogs some exercise. Our campground did not have a place for them to run, except on the road, which is too hard on Hank's knees.

We crossed the Continental Divide (only 8,000 feet) one last time and descended into the Pacific watershed. We exited Yellowstone via the South Entrance and entered the Grand Tetons National Park. As we arrived on the east shore of Jackson Lake, we got our first views of the Tetons- amazing! They were so close and rose dramatically from the valley below. Their remarkable jagged peaks evince their youthful age of 10 million years.  Their older brothers, the Western Cascades and the Sierra Nevada, are 40-45 million years old, while the grand sire Appalachians are 541 miilion to 1.1 billion years old. Unfortunately, smoke from California wildfires made the views from a distance hazy.

Our home for the night - Colter Bay Village campground, on the shore of Jackson Lake - had an impressive set of nearby conveniences, including a swimming beach, cafe, restaurant, bar, espresso stand and gift shop. The camp host directed us to Jenny Lake for the best view of the Tetons and, wow, what a sight!

As we approached Jenny Lake, the mountains grew larger and larger and our sense of awe increased exponentially. We had never seen anything like it! These mountains are like "all up in your face" mountains. It was like an extreme close-up with nearly 130-degrees of our field of vision filled with mountains. The peaks rise sharply 6-7,000 feet above a fault line on the far shore of the narrow lake. It was the most magnificent example of God's art and architecture - even surpassing Zion National Park - in Hank's opinion. It is remarkable that the rocks in the mountains were once part of the bedrock of the valley floor before they were upthrusted in such a dramatic fashion.

People were actually wading and swimming in Jenny Lake. We walked a short distance around the lake on a paved path until we found a more-secluded, level, rocky beach where the dogs could swim a bit. Unfortunately, after a short 10-minute play period, a ranger shooed us out, informing us that dogs are not permitted in the water and must stay on the paved walkway. Several on-lookers commented on how much they enjoyed watching the dogs swim before we were shut down. Angie immortalized the memory of the dogs swim at Jenny Lake, with what Hank thinks is the best photo of the trip. What do you think?

We returned to our campground and after dining al fresco on a delicious white pizza from the cafe, we walked to the beach for a view of the sun setting behind the mountains on Lake Jackson. Unfortunately, a sign informed us that dogs were not allowed on the beach, so Hank waited by the gate with Streak and Charlie while Angie walked to the lake shore and snapped some photos. We resolved to arise early the next morning in order to catch a sunrise view from Jenny Lake.