Page 6 | Western Road Trip 2017

Moulton Barns on Mormon Row

Ten years ago when we first visited the Tetons we stayed in a cabin at Moulton Ranch, just a short walk to perhaps the most photographed barn in the world, that built by homesteader T.A. Moulton.   In fact, not too long ago I posted the photo I took at that time. My wife and I remember that morning ten years ago when we walked down to the barn at sunrise to get a couple of photos.  When we looked back to the cabin from where we'd walked we were shocked to see that our route was now blocked by a herd of bison.  Eventually they did move along and we were able to return to our cabin without incident.

I have read that there were 27 homesteads in this area, established by mormons arriving from Idaho in the late 1800s to establish a new community which they called Mormon Row. These barns were built between 1912 and 1945.

Ranching and farming were difficult.  I was told by one park ranger that the shortest recorded growing season here was 17 days.  That means only 17 days between the last frost and the first frost. Ranchers needed hay for their horses and cattle during the winter. This was hard to acquire.  One could at most get two cuts in, while not too far away, at lower elevation, three cuts were possible.

The images below were taken about 8am after an overnight rainstorm cleared off, creating some dramatic clouds and allowing for a few moments of light to shine through on the barns.

Barn #1.  This is the iconic T.A. Moulton Barn.

Barn #2.  This one was owned by John Moulton.

Barn #3.  I don't know the details of this barn.

Page 5 | Western Road Trip 2017

Grand Teton National Park

Staying at: Jackson KOA followed by Gros Ventre GTNP campground.

One of the dramatic things about landscape images in GTNP is the fact that there are no foothills in the Tetons.  There is no gradual increase in elevation.  Basically you have a high desert (high plains?) landscape running right up to the mountains and then boom... straight up. You will see that phenomenon in several of the shots below.

Mount Moran 

The tallest mountain here is the Grand Teton. 

Snake River Overlook.  Made famous by Ansel Adams.
Today much of the foreground view is blocked by new growth of  trees.

The Buck and Rail fence is genius.
No post holes are needed!

As much as I like landscapes, it pays to look down from time to time!

Jenny Lake

bison will cross whenever they feel like it.

Page 4 | Western Road Trip 2017

Jackson, WY

We spent two days in Jackson, camping at the KOA there for an outlandish daily fee of $80.  This is high priced real estate along the Snake River. Of course, no one forced us to stay there.  

Jackson is so much more congested than it was when we were there ten years ago.  It was hard to find parking!  And the tour buses where everywhere. I have to say we spent little time in the town and most of the time making foreys into Grand Teton National Park.

A few photos:

The raging Snake River.  Highest on this date in the last 45 years.

KOA Jackson Campground

We highly recommend "The Virginian" for breakfast.  Locals and tourists alike dine there.  It can be a busy place but you don't have to wait long.  Laurie claims this omelette was the best she's ever had.  I had no problem with the eggs, sausage and buttermilk pancake special. They have a server dedicated to refilling coffee mugs! My kind of place.

Jackson Hole Ski Resort seems rather tame
without snow on it and from this angle.

"The Stage is a' Comin' "
Note one of the elk antler arches that adorn each of
the four corners of the town square.

Elk Refuge Visitor Center is well worth the visit

Page 3 | Western Road Trip 2017

Cruise America

This is the rig we rented. We arrived in Salt Lake City on a Saturday and the camper was ready on Monday, just as promised.

We would not rent it again. Our conclusion: adequate for one person but too small for two.  The sleeping area above the cab was fine with its queen size mattress, though it was easy to bump your head.  But the body of the camper was too small.  To be fair, it was designed to be small. It can be easily parked in a normal width parking space.  We much preferred the 25’ Cruise America Class C RV we rented out of Spokane, Washington last year.

Page 2 | Western Road Trip 2017

Salt Lake City the First Two Days

The Family History Library

A trip to the world-famous Family History Library was mandatory for us.  In fact, it was the first thing we did after renting the Forester at the airport.  It was Saturday afternoon and we knew the library would not be open on Sunday, and Monday was to be our day to pick up the truck camper.  Laurie is very interested in family history and looks forward to returning just to take advantage of the resources and available at the library.

Most of my photos during our two-day stay in SLC are mere snaps.  We don’t particularly like cities and Salt Lake City is no exception.  All I can say is thank goodness for GPS and cell phone travel apps, our favorite being mapquest.  Salt Lake City is absolutely covered with highways, merges, double cloverleafs, ramps, exit only lanes, etc.  

The Hampton Inn and Dee’s Restaurant

The Hampton Inn further from the airport (there is also a Hampton Inn close to the airport where we stayed at the end of our trip) was nice but also had two highly prized benefits. First, the sliding windows in our room actually opened!  I hate it when hotels install a stop on the slider which prevents the window from opening more than a few inches.  The second reason we liked it was that across the parking lot was a really fun family restaurant.  Nothing gourmet.  It is called “Dee’s” and there are at least two of these family owned restaurants in Salt Lake City.  It’s the kind of place you go if you want a good burger and fries, a milk shake or perhaps meatloaf and mashed potato.  But don’t forget the homemade pie.  The strawberry pie is wonderful, though for some reason I don’t have a photo of a slice.

Bacon Blue Cheese Burger.

Cobb Salad

Banana Cream Pie

Antelope Island State Park

On Sunday morning (our second day) we drove to Antelope Island State Park out on the Salt Lake.The traffic was reasonable. We were so lucky it was not a weekday.  There is swimming, camping and at least one marina.  It was hot and dry.  That is not surprising because you are essentially on the desert.  The 28,000 acres of wide open spaces were nice, though distant views were hazy, and it was fun to look for the wild American bison.  The bison are not indigenous, but a few were introduced in the 1890s as a way to protect the then near-extinct species. Today the herd is managed at about 600.

Snowbird. Skiing until June 18!

Can you believe it? Skiing available June weekends until father’s day!  After visiting the desert and Antelope Island we headed for the mountains just outside of Salt Lake City.  Within a couple of hours of seeing bison on the desert we were arriving high in the mountains at Snowbird. There  was quite a party atmosphere at the base lodge, even though the skiing seemed so sparse.  Skiers were taking the tramway to the top and picking their way down, sometimes removing their skis or snowboard to get to the next skiable section of snow.  

The final image below is from Alta, a bit further up the road and at (I assume) a somewhat higher elevation.  Though there seemed to be more snow at Alta, it was closed for the season.

Part 1 | Western Road Trip 2017 Completed

Our trip last month to Wyoming was not completely a road trip, I guess.  That's because we took a plane to Salt Lake City from Logan Airport in Boston. It seems to me that to be an "official" road trip you must drive the entire trip. Anyway, it was in SLC that the road trip component of our three-week vacation actually started and ended. Here we hung out for a couple of days seeing some of the Salt Lake City sites via a brand new Suburu Forester rental, and then we picked up our rented (reservation made four months prior) pick-up truck camper from Cruise America and headed out of Dodge, er I mean Salt Lake City.

The main objective of the trip was sightseeing in Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks, and it was in these two parks in Wyoming that we spent most of our time. Some of our travels took us briefly north into Montana (where we camped one night along the Yellowstone River in Livingston… and visited and fell in love with Bozeman the next day), Idaho (most of a seven-hour drive from West Yellowstone south to Salt Lake City at the end of the trip was through Idaho along routes 85 and 15), and of course Utah (where the airport is).

Below is a map showing the roads we drove. Some of them were driven more than once. I am a big fan of driving a scenic road in both directions, as the scenes are different depending on the direction, as well as the time of day. Our total driving distance was about 1,900 miles.

If you are a member, you can pick up free maps at AAA. I often use a clean map after our return home, to record our route as you see here, and we save as a remembrance our well-worn “working” map on which we made all kinds of notes and remarks. Our maps will reside in a pocket folder with other paperwork from the trip.  At least for a few years, we tend to keep a collection of all kinds of things collected, such as receipts, maps, brochures, even the campsite placard that you tape to the front windshield during your stay.

We also used AAA to get our hotel reservations in Salt Lake City and for the car rental.  For years we have been using our local AAA branch for this.  On the other hand, they can not help with RV rentals or with campground reservations. 

By the way if you are 62 or over don’t forget to get your lifetime pass to all the national parks.  It’s only $10!!  And that is for all parks and I presume national historic monuments, etc.  And it is for your lifetime.  There is rumor of the price going up to $80.  My wife even bought a second one in case she lost the first, though if we are traveling together one pass is enough for an entire car load of people of any age.  The pass also got us campground fees for 50% off!

The senior pass is the size of a credit card.
You will also need to show a picture ID.