[You may view a map of Grand Teton National Park in PDF format.]

Had some Post Raisin Bran and made Folgers instant coffee to go. It was 28° (-2°C) with scattered nice clouds. I cleaned off the ice and snow from the Jeep, then we left in the Jeep at 8:36.

There was a group of pronghorns right near the road to the campground, so we stopped and set up to photograph from the Jeep. We moved up into position and photographed the buck (below left) and his harem of about a dozen females and young. We left around 9:10.


We took US-89 north, and came across a bull moose about a quarter of a mile (400m) away from the road among some nice golden grass near the airport. It was headed towards the road, so we got in front of it and waited. He kept heading in a straight line towards the road. Some houses in the background prevented us from capturing good full-body images, but we were able to capture some nice head shots as he walked close by us (above right). He continued walking across the road and straight away without pausing, so we left.

We took the Moose-Wilson Road to look for more wildlife. We didn't see any, but we enjoyed the trees with snow-covered branches. We turned around before leaving the park.

We went to the new Visitor Center at 10:15. It's across the road from the old Visitor Center and was completed two years ago. Glass walls on one side provide a great view of the mountains. We left at 10:37.

We took Gros Ventre Road beyond the campground to look for boondocking spots in the Bridger-Teton National Forest. The top of Grand Teton was visible above the cloud layer. The scenery along the Gros Ventre River was very nice and J suggested that we spend some time out here in the future. The Atherton Creek Campground has several nice sites for RVs that would provide lots of solar-electric power. :) The boondocking spots we saw were rather rugged, and probably better suited for SUVs or pickups rather than RVs.

We returned to our campground around noon and registered for another night. We returned to the RV and I downloaded images from the morning and did a quick edit.

Had my normal lunch around 12:20, then did some computer work. Worked up a blog entry. We left at 3:15 in the Jeep ready to photograph from it.

We headed north along US-89. The Tetons were out, but the tops were partially obscured by the edge of a cloud bank extending to the west.

We stopped at Oxbow Bend to look for river otter. They had been seen there recently, but they weren't there when we looked. Then we checked the road that goes down among the Oxbow Bend, and we saw some mergansers, but didn't try to photograph them. Then we checked both sides of the Jackson Lake dam for river otter, and didn't see any there either.

We shuffled things around in the Jeep at the Chapel of the Sacred Heart so J could ride up front with me. J had been cold in the back of the Jeep and I had been cooking up front.

We took the Jenny Lake loop, a road that neither of us had taken in a long time. J wanted to show me where some pine martens had climbed up on the hood of her car. No pine martens showed up this time, probably because we weren't having a picnic dinner in the car like J was before.

We came across a bull elk and a small harem moving mostly parallel to the road and coming ever so slightly closer. We followed them for a while, and J took some handheld shots with her 100-400.

We went down the Moose-Wilson Road. We saw a bull elk with a large harem high on a ridge, but we didn't see any moose. I was tempted to continue down the road to have dinner at the Mangy Moose Restaurant and Saloon in Teton Village, but we turned around. I've eaten at the Mangy Moose on all of my previous visits to Grand Teton National Park, and breaking the tradition was hard to do.

We returned to our campground around 6:35, and a cow moose was feeding not too far from the loop road. It was shortly after the official sunset and the light was really low, so we didn't try to photograph her.

We returned to the RV and had dinner of Lean Cuisine Skillet Sensations Chicken Alfredo kicked up a notch w/grated parmesan cheese and fresh-cracked pepper.

After dinner, I made a batch of trail mix. The Albertson's-brand raisins are as sticky as the Dole raisins. :( That's the last time I try to save some money by not getting Sun-Maid raisins. I used a mixture of Dark Chocolate Peanut M&Ms and Milk Chocolate Peanut M&Ms. The Milk Chocolate Peanut M&Ms were the special "Susan G. Komen for the Cure" M&Ms in various shades of pink — I'll look so cool eating this trail mix. :)