![\"Traveler\"](\"http:\/\/derekbruff.org\/blogs\/disfordad\/files\/2015\/12\/IMG_2272-300x200.jpg\")
<\/a>After breakfast at Flagg Ranch and much packing, we headed south into the national park. A bathroom stop at the now-familiar Colter Bay Visit Center led to a fox sighting in the campground nearby. We drove around for several minutes, tailing the fox as he loped through the campground. At this point in the trip, all three of us knew our cameras well, so we got several good shots of our vulpine friend.<\/p>\nWe didn’t linger long, however, given our itinerary. We headed south along Jackson Lake, enjoying the stunning views of the Grand Tetons along the way. At one point, just a little beyond where we had visited the day before, the views were too good to pass up. We hopped out and I asked a friendly German tourist to take our picture. I only had one decent picture of the three of us from the trip, but it was from the hot springs in Thermopolis and we were in our bathing suits. Not exactly a shot I could use on the family Christmas card. I really thought our German friend came through for us, but upon review I realized one of the kid’s smiles was more of a grimace. Oops.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, the eleven-year-old had a bit of a tweenager moment. After a week hanging out with her dad and little sister, I guess she needed some alone time, because she left us behind, walking just far enough ahead of us so that I couldn’t see her, but she could hear me if I yelled. I was a little worried when I couldn’t see the magenta of her new jacket flashing against the green of the trail, but there were enough fellow hikers coming and going that I figured she was safe. Twenty or thirty minutes later, when she let us catch up with her, she was chipper as usual.<\/p>\n Although the girls were a little tired from the half-mile uphill, I think we were all glad we had seen it. And, of course, the half mile downhill back to the boat launch went quickly! We took the boat back across the lake just as the rain, which had been threatening for an hour, finally came down.<\/p>\n Her: “My feet hurt.”<\/p>\n Me: “The rest of the day is all driving.”<\/p>\n Her: “Great! Now my bottom is going to hurt!”<\/p>\n There was indeed much driving to do. Although there was lots we hadn’t seen (or photographed) in the Grand Teton National Park, I had to prioritize the horses. So we booked it south through the national park and world-famous Jackson, Wyoming. (First Starbucks sighting in days in Jackson.) The views looking back, north toward the mountain range, were simply stunning. We didn’t have time for photos (okay, maybe one photo), and I got a little jealous when I realized that there were a number of houses just outside of Jackson whose front porches opened up on those views every day. I figure those are the houses that folks like Harrison Ford buy when they get a summer house in Jackson Hole.<\/p>\n Meanwhile, inside our car, things were a little silly. As we had done on long drives earlier in the week, we loaded up some episodes of “Sparks Nevada, Marshall on Mars” from the Thrilling Adventure Hour<\/a> podcast. Their tagline is “a new-time podcast in the style of old-time radio,” and Sparks Nevada is a very funny space western featuring Mark Evan Jackson and Mark Gagliardi.\u00a0Think Princess Bride, but with a Han Solo spin. The show is right in the eleven-year-old’s humor sweet spot.\u00a0 (This is the same girl who, after we saw the new Star Wars movie recently, decided that Han Solo was her favorite character of the film.) Sparks Nevada and his faithful companion Croach the Tracker provided us many hours of entertainment while driving across the Wyoming landscape.<\/p>\n But if we ever go back, we’re going to drive Country Road 53 and see some horses.<\/p>\n What a trip. I love my girls, and I’m thankful I have the chance to go on adventures like this with them. There’s an amazing world out there, and I’m glad I get to explore it with my daughters. Where will we go next?<\/p>\n![\"On](\"http:\/\/derekbruff.org\/blogs\/disfordad\/files\/2015\/12\/IMG_2325-300x200.jpg\")
<\/a>After another quick photo op at the Jenny Lake overlook, we reached the Jenny Lake visitor center and had an early lunch in the car. (Peanut butter sandwiches saved my food budget on this trip.) We geared up for a hike, then set out around the south and west sides of Jenny Lake. After I saw something labeled “Moose Ponds” on the trail map, I hoped we might add another large mammal to our list of Wyoming sightings, but no luck. I don’t think it’s common to see moose out and about at high noon. However, we did see an elk, not a hundred feet from the trail, munching on some leaves.<\/p>\n![\"Jenny](\"http:\/\/derekbruff.org\/blogs\/disfordad\/files\/2015\/12\/P7111466-300x225.jpg\")
<\/a>The trail was easy to follow, with plenty of stops along the way to enjoy the view of Jenny Lake. At one point there was a bit of a beach, and the girls had fun playing in the water with the seven-year-old’s waterproof camera. I’m a runner, not a hiker, and so I didn’t realize how long of a walk 2.4 miles would be given the lakeside terrain. Eventually, the little one got tired enough to need me to carry her a bit.<\/p>\n![\"Hidden](\"http:\/\/derekbruff.org\/blogs\/disfordad\/files\/2015\/12\/2015-07-11-15.32.01-HDR-1-300x300.jpg\")
<\/a>I’m not sure how long we hiked, but it was longer than I had planned. I was loving the hike with the girls, but I was starting to get worried about our agenda for the late afternoon. Our window for seeing wild horses was rapidly closing. I thought about skipping the falls, as it was another half a mile or so from the boat launch at the end of the trail, but we had come this far, right? The waterfall was really pretty, situated among the trees. The seven-year-old, looking at all the signs pointing to the falls, observed that it was “not that hidden.”<\/p>\n![\"Junior](\"http:\/\/derekbruff.org\/blogs\/disfordad\/files\/2015\/12\/IMG_2384-200x300.jpg\")
<\/a>As we packed back in the car, after a very enjoyable few hours in the great outdoors, the seven-year-old gave us one of the funniest moments of the trip.<\/p>\n![\"One](\"http:\/\/derekbruff.org\/blogs\/disfordad\/files\/2015\/12\/IMG_2459-1024x683.jpg\")
<\/a>The next two hundred miles or so were simply stunning. Again, no time for photos (for real this time). Not that there were many places to stop and take them. Once we cleared the rural areas just south of Jackson, the drive along Highway 191 to Rock Springs was… desolate. There were a few times during this drive, as there had been north of Chugwater on Day One, where we were the only human souls within sight. The emptiness of the landscape was almost scary. And the storm clouds that formed over the Wind River Range, far to our east but visible across the flat plain, were impressive. I get why some people chase storms. There was a massiveness to the storms and the mountains and the great wide open that inspired awe.<\/p>\n![\"Country](\"http:\/\/derekbruff.org\/blogs\/disfordad\/files\/2015\/12\/IMG_2472-300x200.jpg\")
<\/a>Just about half an hour before sunset, we pulled on to Country Road 53, the start of a 23-mile route the cuts from Highway 191 over to Green River, just west of Rock Springs. It’s along Country Road 53 that one has the best odds of seeing wild horses, particularly at dawn or dusk. At this point, I was starting to regret the morning’s long hike, because had we arrived at Country Road 53 an hour earlier, we could have driven the length of it, and probably spotted a few mustangs. But I wasn’t about to take a 23-mile drive on a gravel road at night with no cell service. We drove for about twenty minutes before heading back to the the highway to continue onto Rock Springs. We didn’t see any horses, but we were treated to the most stunning sunset of our trip. All things considered, it wasn’t a bad way to spend our last night in Wyoming.<\/p>\n![\"The](\"http:\/\/derekbruff.org\/blogs\/disfordad\/files\/2015\/12\/2015-07-12-10.33.59-2-300x200.jpg\")
<\/a>We pulled into Rawlins very late, but that was by design. Leaving the hotel the next morning at nine gave us about five hours to finish a four-hour drive to the airport. Just enough time to see a little Roadside America along the way. The Giant Head of Abraham Lincoln<\/a>. The Ames Brothers Pyramid<\/a>. Vedauwoo<\/a>. Buford, Wyoming, the Smallest Town in America<\/a>. Then a sprint to the Denver airport. I cleaned out the rental car and repacked our trip gear in record time at a gas station near the airport. The flight home was smooth, and, just to help with re-entry, we saw a herd of deer in a field near my house on the drive home. Not pronghorns, of course; the local variety.<\/p>\n
![\"Vedauwoo\"](\"http:\/\/derekbruff.org\/blogs\/disfordad\/files\/2015\/12\/IMG_2542-1024x683.jpg\")
<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"