Day 11

No pictures because of low bandwidth. I have some places marked where pictures will go, but there will be many more that will be posted separately.
On to Day 11
Day 11 started out quite cold. I have no idea what the temperature was, but it was cold. Somewhere in the thirties we think. Whatever it was, it was cold. We woke up slowly and started moving around. Jim set up the pocket rocket for coffee and tea. That’s so handy.  About this time Pam came out of the tent and said it was too cold, tomorrow they were moving to plan B. Then she brought out some of the chemical hand warmers and asked if these would help. SO, it was cold enough to go to plan B, just not use the hand warmers….OK…..A couple of hot drinks and we were off. We were all dressed for a cold summit.

Today’s  ride would take us to Moose Junction and on in to Grand Teton Village. The ride itself turned out to be another interesting one. It was 20 plus miles with another couple miles of dirt road. Again, we don’t have pictures of this. Oh well.    ….  Jims 735 In sight of the Tetons…..        The plan was to take the tram to the summit. They call this The Top of The World. From here we would take the Summit Trail back down to the Tram base in Grand Teton Village. This is a hike rated as Strenuous.  7.4 miles all down hill of course.

The tram ride to the top was just a terrific ride. We saw some moose while on the tram. The views were really one of a kind.

                            

The hike was strenuous, no doubt about that. It was also pretty cool.

When we arrived at the Top of the World we were greeted with temps in the hi 60’s. This was a surprise. We were expecting temps in the 40’s.  We took several really good pictures here.    …..insert top o the world pics……. We got to watch the launch of a parasail doing a tandem flight. Way too cool. If I wee 30 years younger, I might do that. As it is, I’m not 30 years younger and I break much easier than I used to.

Sandy and Jim however, (both older than me by the way) think jumping off a mountain,( a really HIGH mountain) with only a few ounces of fabric to hold you up, is a good idea. That will be on tomorrows blog.

…..More pictures  of the hike here…..

It was, as advertised a very strenuous hike, but  really neat one. We saw places where skiers jumped off the summit down chutes that did not look even a little friendly. We saw a badger near a snow field. No pictures, he dove headfirst into his hole when we approached.  Doug slid down a snow patch to get to a lower part of the trail.

………..Pictures of his trail here……..

There was also a red fox sighting. Again no pictures they were gone before the camera could be brought to bear. We did however get pictures of Sandy throwing snowballs at us….not near us just at us.

We continued the hike to the bottom of the mountain. It’s amazing the amount of flowers and the variations in color at 10000 feet and below on the mountain.    ….Insert pictures here……..

We stopped at a pizza place to get some drinks and it was obvious the waitress had seen the likes of us before. After ordering only drinks, she brought out refill carafes for our drinks saying she was sure we would need them. She was right.

We finished the drinks and walked back to the bikes. Me quite sore for the trip to the bikes. We took an alternate route out of the Village so as not to hit the dirt road. We stopped at the store on the way back to pick up a couple of fleece blankets to help with the cold.  We also bought dinner.

After dinner it was showers and laundry night. 

Until tomorrow, when we'll have more information on the para sailing off the mountain top.