Grand Tetons--Day 5

Today I was so glad we brought Chris along (as we have felt each day but especially today). I awoke with a migraine and she took over the first shift of driving. My meds kicked in and when I felt better I was able to enjoy the scenery and take lots of pictures out the car window before taking over driving for the last 70 miles. We covered 315 miles today for a trip total of 1772 miles. As we drove, Barb made the wonderful exclamation "God must have been having a good time when He created Wyoming." The land is just crazy here. We drove for hundreds of miles between yesterday and today where there was nothing but endless brown fields. If there were any trees, there was usually a house situated under it but we are talking many miles between trees. The creeks seemed to all be dried up and the heat was almost 100 degrees. The land wherever there was a small town seemed to have more trailer homes than permanent homes. Then today the scenery suddenly started changing. First there was the brown rolling landscape. Then there was the brown landscape on one side of the road and green landscape on the other. Then there were rolling hills on one side and jagged hills much like the Badlands on the other. Then there suddenly appeared creeks and rivers and the rolling hills got bigger and bigger. Then there were deep red clay mountains (where we could imagine Indians getting red clay for pottery). Beautiful log cabins to log mansions sprouted up and we entered the Shoshone National Forest with amazing valleys with small rivers running through them, evergreens filling the landscape on the side of the hills. Then all of a sudden we round a corner and see an amazing stone mountain jutting up from nowhere and we think" we are in Teton County so that must be the Grand Tetons", but no. We don't know what they were called. We keep on driving and get higher and higher into the hills so we have to pop our ears and the views just get more breathtaking with wildflowers growing along the road in valley pastures, more log homes, horses, lakes, and then...boom. There they are...the majestic Grand Tetons looming before us. They are so vast and beautiful with snow still on some of the top peaks that I almost forget to keep my eyes on the road. We enter the Grand Teton National Park and drive around Jackson Lake to our lodge. We are in a cottage beside the Lodge and ate dinner in the lodge. When we entered the lodge there was a majestic staircase in front of us to the second floor. We walked up the stairs and were greeted at the opposite end of a large gathering room by two story class windows that encase the Grand Tetons like a picture frame. It is amazing. I am writing this blog from that room sitting beside an unlit fireplace in one corner that has a pull across screen taller than I am and the grates inside are iron moose heads almost as long as Dharma is tall and the wood would be placed where the back of the moose would be located. I can only imagine how picturesque the scene would be with snow outside in the winter. Well, I guess I have written enough for one day. Keep Dharma in your prayers because she is running a fever, complaining of a headache, chills, and a stomach ache. If she is well enough tomorrow, we plan on renting a boat and going out on the lake and going on a hike. If she is not well, I will cuddle with her and enjoy the view from the lodge while Sub, Barb, and Chris go hiking and do some water sports. Tomorrow when we finally leave, we head to Yellowstone just 50 miles up the road. Till then...you need to know that Barb took the picture from our moving car window.