Grand Teton Day3 no.2

Only a less than a mile to the Amphitheater Lake from Surprise Lake. 

Then Amphitheater Lake! It was 3000 feet elevation gain, but I didn't feel any difficulty. Probably because 1) trail is not rocky and easy to walk, 2) trail is not straight up, switchback is offered

About 1), I mentioned that on a previous entry, but 2) is also a big factor to make a hike easier compared to hikes in East. There is not a single switchback in the East, so I was appreciating how generous the Teton National park made a trail full of switchback. I had never thought about this until I lived in the East. It is funny! 

Amphitheater Lake

Amphitheater lake is very gorgeous. High mountain and really calm water at the bottom. It was a beautiful day with blue sky. We had a great time sitting at the shore and eating lunch and chilling. 

Mr.N and Ms.F1 jumped into a lake. It makes sense people who grew up in Montana are not afraid of cold water. To me it is too cold! I was wearing a jacket even on a sunny day on a warm rock. 

Behind us sometime pika were communicating, "Peeeee!" 

Pikas look like rodents but closest animal is rabbits. They are so cute! One of pikas ran behind us with carrying grass. They dehydrate grass and store for winter food. Cute cute cute.....

After we enjoyed being at a beautiful lake, we started descending. Some clouds came and thunder sounds were generated in the distance, but nobody cares in this area. It is common to have a short thunderstorm in the afternoon, people just continue to hike. 

Eating eating

On the way back there were two nice meetings. One is greedy squirrel. He got a stash and he was so focused on eating pine cone. Cute! It must be really yummy.

Another meeting was two 82 years old women, twins. 82 (if I remember correctly, anyway 80-something) girls who went to Stanford, which means that they are really clever, especially considering the era they went to college, were hiking strong. Wow. Even more surprisingly, one of them will climb Grand Teton in a few weeks and will beat a record of the oldest person who climbs Grand Teton. It is super impressive and I though I also want to keep hiking until such kind of age. 

This was a very beautiful hike. 

Bison

After the hike, we drove back to our campground. On the way, we saw a bunch of bison. There are babies and kids! 

Two babies were captured in the right picture. Babies have lighter color. Baby bisons are so cute! 

Bison crossing the road

 

 

 

Baby running

 

Luckily, we encountered the bison group crossing a road from one side of grass field to the other. All cars stopped for bisons, but they might be scared, they ran to cross the road. After running and reached the other side of the field, bisons seemed to feel secured and relived, and stopped running and started walking. 

The running bison, especially babies were very cute as you can see in the picture above. 

Then we stopped by Oxbow Bend Turnout. There is a famous photo taken by Ansel Adams in the Teton. Ansel Adams is a famous photographer who took many beautiful ones in the wilderness in the West. First time I heard his name was when I went to Ansel Adams wilderness. It is in the Eastern Sierra. My favorite spot in the wilderness is Thousand Island Lake which reside within the Ansel Adams Wilderness. 

At Oxbow Bend Turnout

His famous picture in the Teton contains Teton mountains and snake river. The specific point he took it was Snake River Overlook, but Oxbow Bend Turnout was also great. It was drizzling when we stopped there and the drops turned out shiny in my picture. In any weather, there is beauty there. I am glad that Teton offered a variety of weather, including sunny, cloudy, thunder, and drizzling, but not rainy days. Rainy days are also pretty, I admit, but I also confess not very happy for hiking.

Mr.N and I took many pictures and Ms.F1 and Ms.L focused on eating chips for the first half and then switched to taking pictures on the latter half. 

I asked Mr.N, "Oh they are eating chips, maybe bored, should we hurry up?"

Mr.N said, "They are spoiled by beautiful view in the West, so it is okay."

Then Ms.F1 wanted alcohol for evening, so we went to general store. Ms.F1 bought wine, Mr.N bought beer. 

At the campground we had campfire, had salad, soup, alcohol, etc and had fun. Suddenly at 8:30 p.m, strong winds came and rain came so we ran into the tents and slept. 

We had great day with spectacular scenery.