venturing4th: Death Canyon Trail

We made a "quick" trip down to the Tetons today - quick as in "just-for-the-day"; it took us over 5 hours to drive, round-trip, the 234 miles to the southern tip of Teton National Park. We had planned to hike the Jenny Lake Trail to Hidden Falls/Inspiration Point, a hike we have done several times before (the other times we took the boat across the lake, but that service was closed for the season so we were going to walk around the lake). When we got to the Jenny Lake trailhead we could hear, and then see, helicopters flying over the lake ferrying huge rocks - the trail was closed because they are doing major renovations to it.

The park has changed since we last visited in the mid-2000s. In the 1940s, when John D. Rockefeller, Jr., donated much of the land for the park, the family retained a secluded, private retreat on land at the south end of the park, including Phelps Lake. In 2007, Laurance S. Rockefeller transferred this land to public ownership and a visitor center was built and once exclusive trails were opened to everyone. This was all new to us. The visitor center is dazzling and it seemed like it would be a privilege to try the trails - so we did. We chose to sample the Death Canyon Trail, and aside for the name, it was stunning.

Approaching the southern entrance to Yellowstone we could glimpse the Teton mountains from the road and...

it made us excited to know that we would soon be in their midst. (Did I ever mention that the Tetons are my most favorite mountains?!)

As we drove the park road south we stopped at several viewpoints for these pictures. This one of Mt. Moran.

Was is so unique about the Tetons is that there are no foothills. The mountain peaks just spring from the valley floor.

It's been a while since Frederick has had his picture taken with a moose - this one is outside the the visitor center where we stopped to buy trail books.

The trail to Death Canyon begins off a spur road behind the visitor center. The trail rises 400 feet to take us up to the Phelps Lake Overlook where...

we ate our lunch.

We then hiked down 400 feet to...

the Phelps Lake level and then...

headed into Death Canyon.

We were only able to go less than a mile into the canyon before we ran out of time and had to turn around to start back to West Yellowstone at 4 p.m., so we wouldn't have to drive through Yellowstone Park in the dark.

Along the trail we had seen evidence of horses, and, just as we were pulling out of the trailhead, this rider and another one, came by us at a trot. They still had plenty of energy after climbing the trails - good for them!