Pictures from Grand Teton National Park

With the Gand Teton National Park enterance just a few miles from our hotel, we slept in a little bit this morning. At 8am our group met for breakfast before heading up the road. Our first stop was a very nice visitor center. We spent a few minutes shopping and taking a look at the model of mountains while Laura conferred with the rangers to figure out what we'd do for the day.

Our first stop was Taggart Lake. When we pulled into the parking lot we could not see any water. We had to actually hike to this location. The weather was a bit annoying: jackets would be required for a few minutes, then the clouds would part and the sun would heat us up. Fortunately Laura picked a long, but not challenging trail. Each turn brought us beautiful mountain and forest views.

We made it to the lake without incident. It was gorgeous.

The trail is a loop so we didn't have to make the return trip the same way. Most of our way back to the car we followed a stream.

On our way to lunch we stopped at a pullover lot to take in the mountain glacial formations. Lunch in the park was lackluster (actually had) - prepackaged sandwiches from the Jenny Lake Visitor Center Gift Shop. There appeared to be a lot to do in the Jenny Lake area, but some of us were itchy for some relax time. We skipped the boat ride to the far section of the lake and decided to go to a few of the vantage points. We spent some time on the rocky shore tossing sizable rocks in the water for the fun of it.

As the day progressed and we visited scattered gift shops members of our crew were picking up the 100th anniversary sweatshirts. It got to the point where Dave and Lee were the last holdouts and Dave caved first. We decided our final nature thing of the day would be to see the Snake River. With beer on our kids we came up with the plan to drive out of the park to the bridge the runners crossed on the marathon course. It was only a mile or two away from Q Roadhouse. After taking in the river we visited Q and took up residence on our picnic table from Friday night.

The Grand Teton National Park is a place we would definitely visit again. There are several lodges within the park that offer boat rentals and paddle boarding. There's a ton of beauty with every turn making this a perfect spot for a mountain/lake getaway.