Snake River rafting trip

On Thursday, our plan had been to get up and out the door by 6 a.m. so that we could take photos of the Teton mountain range at sunrise from Oxbow Bend Overlook, which was about an hour away.

But when Greg’s alarm went off at 5:30, he admitted that he would rather go back to bed instead. The hike around Jenny Lake had wiped us both out. Consequently, we decided to relax for the morning. There was nothing in the park that we felt a strong need to see by this point.

In the afternoon, we headed to Signal Mountain Lodge because we had tickets for a rafting trip down the Snake River.

On the way, we stopped to take a few more photos of the Teton mountains.

More plein air painters! These weren’t even the last ones we saw. So jealous!

Signal Mountain Lodge is beautiful. The lobby area has a huge picture window overlooking the Teton mountain range and Jackson Lake.

The rafting trip didn’t start until 4:30, so I knew that we would not be getting great photos of the Teton mountains. It is simply impossible to get good photos of them in the afternoon because of the direction of the sun.

But I love any opportunity to get on the water, so off we went.

It did not disappoint.

Our guide, Joe, reminded me a lot of Scott. He was incredibly knowledgeable.

Some of the wildlife we saw on our rafting trip included deer, a red fox, a hawk, a beaver, lots of merganser ducks, and eagles.

Those two dots in the tall tree on the left are a pair of bald eagles.
This was the third bald eagle we saw on our boat trip.
Sunset over the Teton Mountains
The silhouette of the mountains as we were driving back to the campground

The Night Sky

Since the park gets very dark at night, and it was a crescent moon, we decided to go back out and see if we could get some photos of the Milky Way.

This is the best I was able to accomplish with my cell phone.

On to Zion National Park!

Palisades Reservoir

Greg was a man on a mission today, and that mission was to get to our campground in Jackson as quickly as possible.

As a result, any photos I wanted to take had to be done from the car’s windows, because he was not stopping, despite the breathtaking views and ample pullouts for just that purpose.

I can tell you that the Snake River is a beautiful river. I just can’t prove it with pictures.

However…

I did manage to snap a few photos of the Palisades Reservoir, which is fed by the Snake River. So here are those:

I finally realized why so many of my car photos look underdeveloped. It’s the tinted windows.
See those weird ridges in the soil (rock?) below the line of vegetation? I have no idea why it’s like that, but I think it’s cool.
More weird ridges
The water level seemed to be really low.

After we arrived at the campground, we headed into Grand Teton National Park to pick up some information at the visitor center.

Tomorrow will be another early morning.