Like Mother, Like Daughter

Almost to the peak of Hidden Hills Falls, Jenny Lake, Grand Teton National Park

I admit it. I am a total freak. I am a nervous nellie and I am basically just like my mother. I am actually totally fine with that but I do realize there is a fine line between it being over the top and using common sense. (Shawn may disagree on where I draw that line, but whatev.) But the truth is, I have always been this way. After college, I backpacked in Europe for 2 months over the summer and when I was in Prague, I had the opportunity to see Pearl Jam for $5 at a small bar. I didn't go because the walk there required me to go through some sketchy looking allies. And who goes to Pearl Jam concerts? Scary people that will want me to do drugs. No thank you. So I have a history. But I am trying to prevent that fear from allowing us to do cool things on this trip.

So we ended up leaving that campground a day early after all. The mosquitos literally drove us out. But before left, we had one last full day in Grand Teton National Park and we had a blast. On Thursday, the kids slept in until after 9:30am because they were so worn out from the Rodeo! While they slept I packed a picnic lunch for all of us and when they woke up, we took them out to a great little hike (like .09 miles) and had a picnic lunch at the peak that had stunning views of the Tetons. We also learned a nice little lesson on how to make Luke more excited about the hikes. We designated him as our line leader/explorer and he relished his role as being in charge and “making the macisions.” As usual, Jude was not being a good listener. He kept running and we kept telling him to stop because he was going to fall on the rocks, and sure enough he did. We didn’t run to check him out or console him given the fact that we had told him not to run in the first place, and we knew he was not really hurt at all, just tired. A few minutes later Macy said, “Mom, I can’t wait to have kids.” Me, “Why?” Macy, “Because I am going to treat them a lot better than you guys do.” She does NOT like her brothers being in trouble, or any discord for that matter, but her statement still cracked us up. Shawn wanted to take the kids a little further into the forest. A forest totally ripe for bears, and I drew the line and we turned around. When we finished up the hike, we sat at the beautiful Jackson Lake Lodge and had a beer and got the kids some ice cream and enjoyed the views. It was lovely. We got back to our mosquito infested campground and Shawn rented us a movie from the office there and we laid up in bed and watched it. (We would have watched it in the den/main area but that DVD player only plays the movies in black and white. Of course it does.)

This morning was an awesome morning. My in-laws had explored Jackson Hole all day yesterday and loved it (I see an anniversary trip for the two of us to JH in our future!) and offered to let us get up early and head off for a nice long hike sans kiddos in the morning. We headed off around 7:15am and hiked a glorious 6.5 miles around Jenny Lake and the Grand Tetons. It’s amazing how efficient we are when it’s just the two of us. About 2 miles in, a young couple stopped us as they were coming back on the trail having already been to the summit, and asked us if we had seen a bear on the way in. Um, no. Negative. You would not be looking at me right here, right now, if I had seen a bear. Turns out they had seen a grizzly about 1 mile into the path (so 1 mile behind where we were at that very minute). The woman said it was terrifying, and while neat to have seen a grizzly, it is something she would have liked to see while she was getting in her car, not hiking toward it. (duh) She said it was right on the trail and wandered off and they eventually kept going. (Freaking crazy lady) The good thing was, I was prepared for this hike. The day before at that Jackson Lodge, I dropped $50 on bear spray. It could have cost $500 and every penny would have been worth it when that lady told me she had seen a grizzly a mile behind me. (I admittedly felt like a tool when I had strapped it to my belt loop and it was so heavy it was pulling my pants down.) I had spent the drive on the way to the hike reading Shawn all of the ‘Bear Safety Tips’, to the point where he finally asked me to stop reading it and freaking us both out. I guarantee he was fine with my studiousness once we passed that couple.

We hiked to the top of Inspiration Point, ate our Kind bars (totally obsessed with those right now), and then over to the Hidden Falls (a beautiful waterfall), and headed back down the trail and back to our babies. We packed up and headed off to Yellowstone a day early, and away from the West Nile forest.

I really didn’t know what to expect on the way to Yellowstone other than the fact that it was a straight shot through Grand Teton National Park, we hoped to see some animals, and it would be a 90 mile drive. I had no idea if there would be guardrails, elevation changes, etc. so when we started creeping up this mountain on a two lane road and there were NO guardrails, I started to get nervous. Shawn gets supremely annoyed when I get nervous. For two reasons. 1. It just ruins the beautiful experience he is supposed be having when seeing all of these glorious sights and 2. I start making him nervous when he probably wouldn’t have thought to be nervous otherwise. So when we rounded around a huge bend and off to my right was literally a massive drop off into a canyon and I muttered an “Oh My”, I quickly followed it up with “Wow, that’s beautiful” in an effort to mask the fact that I was uttering scary phrases. I followed that up with a “look at that topography change. How cool.” Right. Like I care about topography. Or even use the word topography for that matter. But it seemed to work and I used all remaining will power to not say another word until we were on even ground. Shawn loves to make all the driving very educational so I usually have a map or atlas in my face explaining what we are passing. It is especially hard to concentrate when we are hanging on to the road by dental floss (ok, slight exaggeration), but I try. On the way to Grand Tetons, I was looking at the atlas and said, “hey, we just passed the grave site of Sacajawea.” Shawn said, “Oh cool – who is that?” The man went to college for 9 years, has 3 degrees and has read every history book ever written. Ever. He damn well knows who Sacajawea is. All you fellow Snaggers out there know what this was. A little Shawn test. My response “She led Lewis and Clark through the great expedition.” Shawn’s response “Oh yeah. Good job honey. I’m impressed.” I could only let a minute pass before confessing that I only knew about it from ‘Night at the Museum’ with Ben Stiller. And he thinks Hollywood hasn’t taught me anything.

We are now settled into our new campground in West Yellowstone and I couldn’t be happier. We have cable (whoo hoo!) and we can walk into this cute little town where there is other human life. Something I require on vacation but Shawn doesn’t. The internet is still not good (thus the lack of pics in this entry), but apparently that's a common issue in the boonies. We are here for 5 nights and I cannot wait to explore – the sights on the way in were amazing!! And I haven’t seen one mosquito yet.

P.S. - I was able to get some pics uploaded! I guess the trick is getting up before the rest of the campground starts using the Internet!

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