US Trip 2017 – Day 16 – To the Tetons!

In Out caching
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The route this day took us from Salt Lake City to the cabin we had booked at Headwaters Lodge, in the middle between Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks.

Approximate time on road/out caching: 13 hours
Total miles driven: 395.2 mi / 636 km
Total cahes found: 23
Total DNF: 1
States visited: Utah, Idaho, Wyoming
Famous places visited: Grand Teton National Park
Most memorable cache: GC759JB ID- A Pirate’s Life For Us!
Biggest surprise: How easy the webcam cache turned out to be
Weather: Partly sunny, light rain
Highest temperature: 73°F / 22.8°C
Lowest temperature: 52°F / 11.1°C
Roadwork: Yes

So, we meet again!

We attended GC759J7 UT- A Pirate’s Life For Us! the day before, so we just had to attend GC759JB ID- A Pirate’s Life For Us!

The only problem was that we had more than two and a half hour to drive to get there, not including stopping for caches. Or roadwork… We got up early, and hit the road a little after 7am. We made it into Idaho, without stopping at all. Idaho had two things to offer us this day. Roadwork and smoke.

But we still made it in time! 😀 And we even had time to find a cache along the road. And lunch.

Not the biggest event we’ve been to

This was definitely not the biggest event we’ve attended. But it was still fun! And it was nice sharing some stories from our travels, and equally nice listening to the “pirate stories”.

I nice bonus was the bottle of sauce we got to bring home. Funny story, we made sure to wrap it real good. Several layers of plastic, duct tape and clothes. So it was kinda fun when we opened the luggage at home, just to discover that TSA had opened everything to check this bottle. It traveled all the way from Denver (where we flew home from) to Haugesund, Norway. Without our amazing home made bottle protection. But it survived the trip!

A few select caches

We didn’t have too much caches on the plan, since we wanted to reach Grand Teton before dark. After all, it would be nice to see something in the park…

But we did have a few on our plan anyway, both special types and new counties. The next was an earthcache and a traditional at a rest stop. Before two virtual caches in Idaho Falls.

GCG2RB Bring & Brag (Where the Red Fern Grows) asks you to bring your pet to take a photo. Since we can’t bring our pet on the plane from Norway, we used a photo on our phone instead.

A simple webcam

The next on our list was GCQR80 Hey, Look! It’s Me!, which we though was going to be hard. Both to find parking for, and get to work.

So it was a pleasant surprise when we could park right at GZ, and get the picture almost immediately after getting out of the car. Sometimes things go a lot better than planned 😉

Hello Wyoming!

We didn’t stop at more than a four caches before reaching the Wyoming border. And since I enjoy state signs, we had to stop. The cache that was there was a nice bonus!

The tourist trap

We eventually made it to Jackson, which was filled with both cars and tourists. The upcoming eclipse had drawn even more people to Jackson than normal. But even with muggles everywhere, we found a cache on Cache Street 😀

We stopped at a couple more caches along the way out of Jackson, before it was time to head towards the park.

In and out

We actually didn’t spend very much time inside the park itself. We went inside just to find GC85B2 Teton Stretch. All the other caches and other famous places we wanted to visit, were all outside the park. Or at least outside the fee area.

A famous farm

The next stop on our list was the Mormon row and the famous Moulton barns. While visiting the first, we ran into the dutch muggles we met while glamping in Moab. Sometimes the world feels really small!

After visiting the first barn, we continued to the next one. We were not alone in wanting to photograph this barn today… Too bad there’s no cache here!

A quick detour

After photographing the barns, we did a short detour to find GCYMZZ Cache Across America – Wyoming and a virtual/earthcache twofer a bit further down. We’ve been to all the corners of Wyoming, so it was about time we found this cache!

Grand view

Back on the main road, the next cache was GCGFH9 Grand Tetons Cache. Wow. Just watching how the mountain controlled the sunlight was mesmerizing. The photos do not capture the feeling you get when experiencing something like this in real life.

Breathtaking sunset

The last cache of the day, GCGGZF So you wanna spot a MOOSE?, took us on a very short hike. We barely made it in time before it was too dark. But we got to enjoy the sunset, with this breathtaking view. It might actually be that it was the altitude that was affecting our breathing, but the view was still amazing!

That’s not how that’s supposed to work

By the time we made it to Headwaters Lodge, it was dark. Very dark. And a bit cold. So we really looked forward to getting some rest in our cabin.

Too tired to walk…

Well, that didn’t go as planned. I’ve opened quite a few doors in my life. And I like to think I’m good at it. At least I’ve never experienced any major issues before. But this door was a completely different story…

My key skills are apparently good enough. I got the key working. But it was all downhill from there. Instead of opening the door, the lock opened instead, separating the handle from the door. And if you’ve never had this happen before (like us before this), I can tell you that it’s kinda hard to open the door when the handle is off…

So I had no other choice then to go back and ask for help. And hope that the already overfilled parking lot didn’t get even worse in the meantime.

They were kinda baffled, just like I was, when I told them what happened. Eventually we got help from maintenance to get inside. And ~30 minutes later, a brand new lock was installed. And my normal door opening/closing skills worked on that one! Perfect! Now it was time to get some rest…

Pictures

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