Wednesday, August 22: Great Falls to Tetons
I thought this looked familiar…
This was to be another long travel day for us.
We got up, packed up our stuff, and had our “complimentary breakfast”. This was a voucher for the associated restaurant. It basically entitled us to a selection from their “lite” menu, which was rather meager. It was roughly the equivalent of one egg. If you ordered this stuff normally, it would have cost you $5.
We drove around to get a quick view of a clock tower that Michael had heard about (nearby and not too special), and then we headed south.
We passed through Sulpur Springs around lunch time, so we stopped again at the Cornerstone Deli for lunch. This was the same place we had lunch roughly a week earlier as we headed north. It is a fairly good deli, and to be fair, Sulphur Springs is about the only sizeable place between Great Falls and the interstate.
When we reached Yellowstone, we stopped at Mammoth for some ice cream. Then we continued south and got some gas at Old Faithful. Heading south from Grant Village, we stopped at two waterfalls and got some pictures. The first wasn’t that impressive, but the second, Moose Falls, was nicer. There were some teens climbing around off trail, which was not allowed. A ranger showed up while we were there and chewed them out, but I doubt it did any good.
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The main large mammal we have yet to see on this trip is a moose, and Amy really wants to see one. At the first waterfall, someone reported seeing a moose a little bit south, so we kept an eye out, but we never saw it.
In the Tetons, we stopped at the Colter Bay visitor’s center, then proceeded to the Jackson Lake Lodge, where we got a cottage (cabin) for two nights. It turned out to be rather large and nicely done, although it wasn’t cheap. Its main advantage is that it is inside the park.
The architecture of the lodge is not, in my opinion, that stunning. It’s main feature is that you walk in to registration at one level, and then you climb a set of stairs to get to the “main lobby”. Once you do so, you get a view out some huge back windows at the lake and mountains behind.
The regular restaurant couldn’t seat us for 1-1/4 hours, so we had dinner at the cafe. This is set up like a traditional diner, with a long undulating counter and a set of fixed stools along the counter. There are no tables.
Unfortunately, the views of the mountains are rather indistinct due to the haziness. This in turn is due to some forest fires out went in Idaho. These could have resulted in a great sunset silhouetting the mountains, and apparently did the previous day, but not when I was looking at them.
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