From Yellowstone to Grand Teton National Park

08.06. / Wednesday / Yellowstone - Teton

After watching a great movie about Yellowstone National Park in winter on TV, we know that we are really lucky with our current temperatures! Because it gets as cold as -30°F (-35°C) here, which also affects the bison. Since their food is grass and the snow cover is thick, they have to dig quite a bit to expose the dried stalks, which have the nutritional value of cardboard. Nevertheless, they dig holes in the snow with the help of their thick heads and pull out the grass. Now, such a giant creature needs to eat a lot, and that's hard work in the winter. So, towards the end of the long winter, the animals sometimes migrate towards the areas of the park heated by geysers and fumaroles. However, the grass there is not really good due to minerals and acids, and if spring doesn't come at some point, they would probably poison themselves.

We are amazed to hear that everything is usually free of snow here by early June. Today is June 8th, and definitely not everything is free of snow. The winter was really harsh. There are several packs of wolves in the park, the only animals that benefit from the long, hard winter because the gradually weakening animals are the best prey, and the wolves come out of the winter really strong.

After our educational TV session, we have a quick breakfast at the hotel with the usual paper plates, plasticware, and rubbery jam - the highlight is scrambled eggs.

It is dry, but the clouds are very low when we start at 10:00 am. We are excited to see a few breaks in the clouds and drive to several fumaroles and geysers with amazing colors.

We drive to the Fire Lake Drive, a short loop with some springs and bubbling ponds.

There's spouting and steaming everywhere. We take another loop, walk a short trail on the usual wooden walkways, and see the Sapphire Pool with its incredible blue color.

Next to it is a geyser that almost looks like a cow's stomach. So not everything here is beautiful... Drops of water keep falling, and keeping the lenses dry is almost impossible. So, we go back to the car and hopefully head to Old Faithful.

Because we hope that the weather there is better today than yesterday, as we have seen clear blue skies. So when we arrive at the "Old Faithful," it slowly but steadily starts to hail. Very nice. But I endure it with two jackets and my camera wrapped in my fleece.

There's a nice cold wind blowing. At the same time as the eruption, a massive hailstorm comes down, including lightning and thunder. I run back to the Visitor Center, but I'm still completely soaked and couldn't take any real photos. Now, I could use an underwater camera. We stand behind the tall panoramic windows and watch the gray-white spectacle from a distance, while slowly it feels like 2 liters of rain and hail drip from my jacket, pants, and hood.

The film in the Visitor Center comes just in time. The cinema is dry and relatively warm, so you can dry off a bit. After half an hour, it's over, and we are not treated to a second film. So let's dry off somewhere else. Maybe in the gift shop? So we go there and touch 100 things, hoping that it will eventually stop raining outside. There is an announcement asking people not to stay outside for too long, as there is a severe weather warning for the Old Faithful area. Let me tell you: I'm so done with the Old Faithful, I really don't care about it anymore. Maybe it's reliable, but I don't need to get soaked every time I wait there.

We sprint to the nearby Old Faithful Inn. The hotel, built in 1904 from thick logs, is one of the largest log cabins in the world. A huge fireplace made of natural stone is the centerpiece of the cozy 23-meter high lobby.

The hotel has survived several earthquakes and the 1988 fire. We even manage to get two comfortable leather chairs here, grab coffee and sandwiches from the cafeteria, and sit here for a good hour waiting for the downpour outside to stop. Two Americans give us their rain ponchos, which are better than plastic bags, and we hurry across the large parking lot to our car just after 4:00 pm.

Wet pants again...turn on the heating and "head south, following the sun." We still have about 90 miles to drive and need to cross Craig Pass, nearly 2,700 meters high.

The snow is piled up about two to three meters high on both sides. Many hiking trails and picnic areas are inaccessible and covered with several meters of snow. We see the signs sticking out of the snow wall, sometimes just peeping over the top. The rain is now getting lighter, but the amount of snow here in southern Yellowstone is gigantic, and even the plains are still covered in a thick blanket of snow. We reach the lowest temperature of the day at 35°F (1.6°C). We had reached 56°F (13°C) earlier today (for 10 minutes).

The Grand Teton National Park welcomes us once again with bison and deer, but also with an incredible cloud formation over Jackson Lake and the mountains of the Teton Range behind it.

Unlike Yellowstone Lake, the lake is no longer frozen. However, the nearby Louis Lake is still completely frozen. The valley soon widens, and we see the magnificent mountains of the Teton Range on our right side. Since we are still at an elevation of over 2,000 meters, the mountains, despite their height of 4,000 to 4,100 meters, don't seem so incredibly high, but they are very impressive.

We drive through the small but lively town of Jackson, cross the Snake River, and have to go to Teton Village, a winter sports resort, to pick up the key to our apartment. Jackson, with its colorful shops and people on the streets, is the busiest place we've seen in about a week.

The apartment in "The Aspens" complex is located between Jackson and Teton Village. We booked it through Expedia. The apartment has two floors with an open kitchen on the lower level, a living room with a fireplace, and a room with two beds. Upstairs, there is a large room, and there is a bathroom on each level. We'll be staying here for 3 nights and are thrilled that it's so great.

We drive to the small town of Wilson, which is about 10 minutes away, and have a rustic and expensive dinner. Maybe everything is expensive here? Anyway, the portion of tortellini is so big that we take half of it with us for tomorrow. We spend the evening on the huge sofas in the living room.