Our 5 days in the Tetons.....the rest!

Here are the rest of our adventures as we finished our 5 days in the Tetons...

The rest of Tuesday - 

 

Our time spent in the Tetons was full of fun and adventures. We knew we were there for 5 days and we were familiar with the area. We also knew that with the girls being older, we wanted to venture out and do more hiking and different activities.

After the Hot Air Balloon ride, Don went out exploring and the girls and I wandered around Teton Village.

We decided to revisit Bungee Trampolining.   

Both girls had a good time, then lunch and some rest time. Our room was a Sundance Junior Suite with a full kitchen.  It was gorgeous and we used every available space. We decided on the full kitchen because we were there for 5 days and it gave us more living space. We also had a full technology corner set up with charging cords, etc.

 That evening we decided to go to the Jackson Hole Playhouse to see their production of “The Ballad of Cat Ballou.” It was a lot of fun.  It was a dinner theater experience, where there was a singing wait staff and then you moved into the attached theater for the show. Don agreed to go because this was the one thing that I requested, and it was my gift to myself for doing all the planning and organizing for the trip. It was a great western musical,  and very funny. The girls and I appreciated it a lot…..Don….not so much, but he was a good husband and admitted that there were a FEW parts that he found funny, but I know that he would have much rather have been out finding and photographing animals.

Wednesday - 

The next morning was Carleigh’s paragliding adventure. Don went out early animal hunting and I took Carleigh to the 7:45 meeting with her “pilot.”  It’s not often that you would send your 12 year old 4,000 feet up a mountain alone with a complete stranger, and encourage her to hold onto him tightly and take a running leap off the side of the mountain. But….I did. And it all turned out fine.  

Carleigh’s pilot was Trey. He was a great guy. She went up in the tram to the top of the mountain with all the other pilots and “co-pilots.”  We were instructed to go to the “Landing Zone” over on the other side of Teton Village and wait for them. We would see them fly off the mountain and the professional photographers would tell us who was who, as they were flying….so we would know if our flyer was out yet. Don met us there and we waited…..and waited…..then I got the cell phone call from the top, Trey had called to say that they were on a weather delay because there was lightning in the area and it would be another 30 minutes. Great…my daughter at 10,400 feet with lightning in the area…..but it cleared, and they started to fly off the top. Carleigh and Trey were about the 7^th flight off and we watched and it was incredible.  They soared, and dipped and spinned…and after traveling about 7 miles, they landed and the look on her face was worth any stress and every penny (Thanks Rina!) that was spent for the adventure. She LOVED it!

Here’s a video of her adventure. They attached a Go-Pro camera to the balloon and took off…..

 The first few moments are stock footage of other people and winter events...then Carleigh's adventure starts. (the video of her flight starts at about 30 seconds in)

After paragliding and then on to breakfast, we went out for a family hike. We ventured out to String Lake and did a short 2 mile hike around a lake. It was really pretty and again, the girls and Don put their feet in the cold lake water.

After hiking and lake wading, we returned to the hotel  and had “preschool nap time.” Everyone rested, and we planned our evening.

We went out to dinner and then did our evening drive back into Grand Teton park to look for animals at dusk. Dusk and dawn were when the animals are usually more active and Grand Teton National Park – the southern part is full of animals!!! We were lucky again that night and found a herd of Pronghorn Antelope in the field. They were moving and decided to cross the road right in front of us. It was very cool and lots of fun to watch them up close and personal.

We also got some great shots of sunset and the Tetons.

Thursday – 

We woke up Thursday morning…Don left to go hunt for animals, and we ate breakfast and met up with him late morning. That morning we were on a mission to find K-Mart and get a car charger for our cell phone, an auxiliary adapter for the I-pod for the car, and bug spray. We were gearing up for part 2 of our trip on Friday into Yellowstone for 4 days.

But first, after the K-Mart adventure, we headed to Snow King Resort in Jackson for the Alpine Slide ride.  This is a real treat. You take a chair lift up to the top of a mountain – it’s really pretty high…

And then you get a slide, similar to a winter bobsled run, and slide down the mountain. We all did it and had a blast…so much that Don and the girls took a second run. I stayed down to photograph and save a few dollars.

After the slide, we ate lunch and headed out to Colter Bay – near the top of Grand Teton park. We were planning on another hike and then dinner up there at a lake side pizza place. The girls were determined to swim this time, so they wore their bathing suits and off we went. We arrived and were deciding which hike to take, and the park ranger informed us that there were recent Grizzly Bear sightings on the shorter hike, so guess which one we took……Katie wasn’t very excited about that. She sang very loudly the whole time and was just a bit nervous. But, we never saw a bear…and the girls did get to go swimming for a short time.

Then we cleaned up, finished the hike and it was dinner time. We found the pizza place – Leeks Marina Pizzeria. It was very good and the view was pretty incredible.

Then we headed the hour drive back to the hotel – and saw cars stopped on the side of the road, which at dusk means that there is probably an animal or two in the area. We followed the crowd and that is how we found these beauties…

We spent about 45 minutes just watching them. I had never seen moose up close like that with a full head of antlers like that. It was surreal and incredibly awesome.

We then headed home and packed and tried to get to sleep – tomorrow would begin part 2 of our adventure. 

After 5 nights in the Tetons, we were venturing into Yellowstone tomorrow.