Jason the Conquerer

I've come to the conclusion that men and women are wired differently. I know - I should have reached this conclusion by the age of 3, or at least 5, especially given the crazy situations that my male cousins would get into, i.e. "Mark's on the roof again!" or something of the sort.

But seriously - here is my latest example of how differently we are wired:

The last time we were in Grand Teton (last month), Jason saw a book in the visitor's center called "Mountaineering in the Tetons", and just had to have it.

Since then, he has read it cover to cover, and from what I can gather has become very inspired by crazy men from the late 19th Century and early 20th Century. They were crazy men - no ropes or modern equipment. Jason is now regularly talking about free climbing and mountaineering up colliers (we can't agree on the spelling, and since we don't have the book with us here in Jackson, can't check it).

Now, he sees a mountain and is planning how to climb to the summit.

Me? I see a mountain and I think "Oooh. Pretty." and that's where it stops.

This morning, we hiked about 8 miles before noon, and a good half of those miles were straight uphill.

And it was gorgeous.

But we ended up a third of the way up one of the Tetons before Jason would consider coming down. I wasn't going to hike any further in the snow. Jason was thinking, "Well, we've made it this far, let's just keep going."

Check out this video to see where we were:



I love my husband. I love that he needs to conquer. I love that his need to conquer pushed me up a mountain to this kind of view today.

But geez... left to my own devices? I'd take a flat hike with some wildlife viewing, and looking at the mountain from the base. "Oooh, Pretty."

That's why we're so good for each other. I keep him from trying to summit, and he keeps me hiking up the hill.

A metaphor for marriage, don't you think?

Chasing Jason up the mountain.

And the funny thing is, I heard the same conversation from another family on the same hike. The father and son immediately plowed up the snow covered mountainside, headed at least to the waterfalls above. The mother and daughter decided to sit on a rock and wait for them.

Then.... the mother in all her guilt decided to go, hollering at her husband, "Wait up, honey, I'm coming!" Her husband, 100 feet above her, turned around and yelled, surprised, "Really?"

I bet she didn't regret going at all, and I bet going with kept her husband and son from doing something stupid.

See? Balance.

Tomorrow? Jason must Conquer again. :) "Oooh. Pretty."

Taken yesterday by a stranger at the top of Signal Hill in Teton. For the record, I got dressed FIRST that morning... Jason copied me. And yes, our matchy-matchy outfits are gross.

On an early part of our hike today, at the lower falls, when I was still easy to convince to keep hiking upward.

At the top, ready to start down.

A Close Second

On Sunday we had another great day - not as wonderful as Saturday, but definitely a close second. :)

We started slow, having breakfast in Jackson and then talking with my parents on the phone for a little while. Got lunch to go and packed it with us into the park, taking advantage of a brief lull in the weather to get out on the only "open" trail in Teton.

Open... HA!

The trail was 1.6 miles each way to Taggart Lake. The first part was the easy part, and it was uphill. The second half of the hike was in 4 foot deep snow, walking on the snow pack. Poor Jason kept sinking all the way! That's almost a mile in the snow each way!

I realized a very large victory on our hike - I did not once have trouble with the circulation in my hands and feet. I've written briefly about this before, but due to my celiac disease, I developed a circulatory disorder called Raynaud's Syndrome when I was 23, where I lose circulation in my hands and feet whenever I get chilled. Prior to our time in Wyoming, I would lose circulation in my hands when the weather dropped under 70 degrees (if I was not appropriately dressed - long sleeves and a jacket.) Now, I can take a two hour hike in the snow if I'm dressed properly. That's a BIG DEAL! It was pretty exciting. :)

We ate lunch at Taggart Lake and hiked back out just in time. Right after we got back to the car, the skies opened up and the rain started coming down. I don't think my circulation would have done as well in the rain if I had gotten wet.

On the drive back into Yellowstone, we finally saw another Moose. This was actually a pair of Moose (the male is just starting to grow his antlers back after dropping them last season), and the first we'd seen in a month since one ran across the road in front of our car.

I Love Moose. They're so amazing!

We also encountered this little lady eating an apple core someone must have tossed from their car. Isn't she sweet?

We stopped for dinner at the Yellowstone Lake Lodge at Lake Village in the park. The food was SOOOOOOOOO much better than what we'd had at the Old Faithful Lodge, and the view was spectacular. Add to that the Pianist they have on staff who plays music nightly in the Lodge, and the setting is complete. The Pianist was playing all the old standards, especially Gershwin, and I was charmed. There's no other way to put it. Charmed. I couldn't stop singing along and think I was making Jason a little crazy.

We finally got home to find out that one of the mares had her foal on Saturday morning as we were driving out. (I KNEW I saw something!) She's all gangly legs. I can't get enough of watching her play and nurse and sleep. :) It's my new favorite pastime on the ranch. We have another foal due in early July - I can't wait!

The Best Day

Yesterday was (in my opinion) the best day we've had since we've been in Wyoming. Have you ever had one of those days where everything just works out perfectly? Where you're totally open to where the wind takes you and the pieces just magically come together?

It was one of those.

It started early - too early since I woke Jason up a half an hour before our alarm. I got confused and thought it was time to get up at 5am. Oh well. We were sleepy, but excited to get going on our adventure.

Upon entering Yellowstone Park, we saw THREE Grizzlies. We had gotten in there early enough, and well, we just got lucky. (I have a video of the mama bear and her cub, but the internet here is pretty slow, so it will have to wait for upload until we're back at the ranch. In the meantime, you can see Jason's photos of them by clicking here.)

There is something I call the Yellowstone Effect (and Jason thinks should be called the Yellowstone Syndrome). The minute one person stops on the side of the road to take a photo, they are immediately surrounded by at least 20 other people with cameras so expensive they can't possibly know how to use them - all shooting in the same direction just in case something's out there.

In the case of the bears, we saw the crowds and looked and saw the bears - it worked out for us. A few other times in the morning, we stopped for Jason to take a photo of the landscape and were swarmed - all by disappointed amateur photographers who thought we saw a moose or wolf or grizzly. In our mood yesterday, it was all just funny. :)

Jason essentially says "Kiss my ass (crack)" to all the amateur photographers following him around.

We had lunch in Teton National Park at the Jackson Lake Lodge. Beautiful Lodge overlooking part of Jackson Lake! We had lunch at the diner there, where the only seating is at these big wrap around counters. (There's a diner like it in Yellowstone, too, at the Fishing Bridge). Because we were bellied up to the counter, we of course had neighbors, all who had traveled in on or another tour bus, most seniors.

I happened to be sitting next to a particularly charming woman (and I mean that without any facetiousness - she was great.) She is widowed, traveling alone on the bus with all the other couples. She was trying to figure out how to delete old photos from her digital camera (from last year's trip to Turkey - my kind of woman!), so she'd have space. We offered to help and struck up a conversation. The conversation began like this:

"Can we help you with your camera? We'd love to."
"We have a saying where I come from: 'Does a bear s*%$ in the woods?'"

It was awesome. She and her buddies from the bus were the quiet protesters, the ones who sit in the back and grumble about the driver and how they never get to stop and see neat things - they just keep on driving. They're on a two week tour of many of the parks in Utah, Arizona and Wyoming, and will wrap up their trip with two days in Vegas.

We told them what we were up to, about working in Cody, and she said to me, "Do exactly what you're doing - see the world, take risks, enjoy your marriage before you have kids. Enjoy every moment and explore." It wasn't that, verbatim, but it was something to that effect.

Like I said - awesome.

After we left our new friends at the Lodge, we headed South through the rest of Teton. It's all frozen over still, but just gorgeous. Prettier than I expected, in fact. Jason continued to stop for his photos - I would get out, check it out, and then freezing jump back in the car to wait for him. All the normal stuff. At pilgrim creek, though, I got out to follow Jason, only to have this angry Yellow Bellied Marmot (Close cousin of the woodchuck, just smaller) barking at me in a tree. She was not happy to see me. Unfortunately (for the Marmot), I was very happy to see her. Cute, isn't she?

Jason's idea of parking.

Jason at Jenny Lake. Even he thought this one was awesome. Go me. :)

We ended up in Jackson Hole. I had been told it was an awesome town and thought I was prepared. I was not. Jackson Hole is a REALLY GREAT TOWN. If you've never been here, you have to make it a point to check it out sometime. It's a little hippie, a little ritzy, a lot of western, and just downright cool. This weekend also happens to be the big ElkFest (celebrating the nearby National Elk Preserve). These arches are permanent in the town square - they really love their Elk here.

We explored Jackson, and ended up in this store that sells pawned and never claimed jewelry from New Mexico. We bought this piece for $29, and it's all real. It wasn't in our budget, but geez.... you can't pass that up. And the woman who owns the store is a character and a half. She's the kind of woman I expect my sister to be when she's in her 70s. Totally done up to the nines - hair and makeup always with HUGE pieces of jewelry on. Again - awesome.

We bought tickets to an early evening showing of the new Pirates of the Caribbean movie and saw it with all the Jackson locals. Again, we were shocked at regular priced movie tickets for adults UNDER $10!!!!!!!! Wyoming has their movie tickets priced correctly! Anyhow, the movie was awesome - MUCH better than at least the last Pirates and probably the second one, too (in my humble opinion.) Penelope Cruz is SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO much better than the combo of Keira Knightley and Orlando Bloom, you don't even miss them. In fact, you realize just how much they muddied up the last few storylines. Go see it. You'll have a blast. :)

Entering Jackson, through our windshield. The slopes are LITERALLY in town.

After the movie, we had dinner at the Snake River Brewing Company, which is in fact the most award-winning small brewery in the United States. The food was awesome, and according to Jason (since I can't have beer... sad...) the beer was really great, too.

The Jackson Hole Visitor's Center has a grass roof!

Finally, we made it to our classy accommodations - the Super 8. There are some really, really awesome hotels here in Jackson, but they're all way above our super-saver budget. This Super 8 is pretty nice, though, and one of the cheapest in town. We're happy. And aside from Jason snoring last night, I slept great.

OH! We watched a couple of episodes of Extreme Couponing on TLC last night. We'd never seen it before and were both hooked (especially Jason). Have you seen it before? Those people are crazy! They're like organized, super saver hoarders. You sort of envy them and pity them at the same time. Definitely something to be learned, though. We're not taking advantage of any coupons really, and should be saving SOME money at least. :)

The only mar on the day was a bug that decided it needed to fly into my eyeball. Nasty. Fortunately, Jason was able to gently get it out.

Sorry for the super long post, but like I said - Awesome day. :)