We left Dubois early in hopes of getting a walk-in campsite at Jenny Lake in Grand Teton National Park. Patrick had stayed at this campsite before – it sits on Jenny Lake, so nice views and a good central location. We arrived around 8:30 am but were told the campsite was already sold out. Apparently, cars start lining up around 6 am; today the line was all the way out to the main road and only 13 sites were available. Needless to say, we were not even close to getting a campsite. So, we continued up to Colter Bay Village to try our luck there. We waited for about 45 minutes but were successful! This campground has over 300 sites and they are packed in closely, so it is not ideal. This persuaded us (mostly me, Patrick was already on board) to look at backcountry hiking opportunities. We stopped in the ranger station and visitor center to get the lay of the land and check out the backcountry situation in preparation for attempting to get permits the next morning. Once we had some more information, we headed back to Jenny Lake to do the Hidden Falls and Inspiration Point hike. This hike is about 5 miles round trip (much shorter if you take the ferry, $19/person). On the hike out, we saw a buck about 5 feet from the trail, eating grass, paying no attention to the hikers. The falls were a nice sight, powerful and big, but because it is so accessible (the ferry drops you off essentially at the falls), it was very overcrowded. We snapped our couple pictures and continued another 0.5 miles up to Inspiration Point (steep climb). Again, very overcrowded, but beautiful views at the top. We completed the hike in about 2 hours and 45 minutes, including all stops along the way and navigating the crowded trail. While the destination points were enjoyable, it was not our favorite hike of Grand Teton.
After the hike, we drove down to the town of Jackson. I had never been, and Patrick had only stopped there briefly once. The town is very cute and during our visit, the local theater was putting on a street shootout performance. We walked around a bit and had a couple drinks at the Cowboy Bar (cliché tourist spot with saddles as bar seats). Then we grabbed dinner (buffalo burgers) at The Local – very tasty. Our drive back to Colter Bay was about an hour and once we got backed, we hunkered down in the tent for the night.
We arose early again the next morning to get in line for backcountry permits. We were in line around 7:15 am and there were two groups ahead of us. The backcountry permits can be competitive, but since we didn’t have any strong feelings on which hikes/sites we got, we were very pleased with what we ended up with – one night in Death Canyon and the second night at Leigh Lake. We were surprised that we could get both nights since typically the permits are only issued for consecutive hiking itineraries and we had to drive to different trail heads for Death Canyon and Leigh Lake. But we weren’t complaining! Once we obtained our permits, we went back to the campsite and made breakfast (eggs, bacon, and salsa tacos). We moved slowly and relaxed for the rest of the morning. We then headed down to the marina to see if we could rent a canoe or kayak for the morning. Prices for rentals were a bit out of our budget (around $30/hour, minimum 2 hours). Instead, we did an easy lakeshore hike that started at the marina and took us to Heron Lake and Swan Pond. The hike was about 2-3 miles with great views of the mountains and lakes. We saw great blue heron and two swans (as you can see, the lakes are aptly named). Surprisingly, the hike was not that crowded either. We spent the remainder of the afternoon/evening packing our bags for our upcoming backcountry hikes and making dinner over the fire (cheddar brats with Doritos).
The next morning, we packed up the campsite at Colter Bay, filled up on gas (also at Colter Bay), and headed to the Death Canyon trail head. To reach the trail head, we had to do a little bit of off-roading, but our highlander made it! (As did many other smaller cars, so don’t worry). The first part of the hike leads up to an overlook of Phelp’s Lake – absolutely beautiful! We then climbed down a bit to start the ascent into Death Canyon. The trail is a bit steep leading into Death Canyon but flattens out once you reach the canyon. The entire hike up is beautiful with mountain streams/waterfalls coming off the peaks on either side of us into the stream running down the center of the canyon. As we crossed over the stream at one point, we saw a moose and her baby drinking in the stream! We were a good distance away, so we took a few pictures and then hurried along (didn’t want to disturb them). We made it to the camping zone more quickly than we anticipated (about 5 miles from the trail head).
At the beginning of the zone, there are about 5 campsites that are within the first mile. The first three sites are located within the forest and didn’t look that appealing (no views, smaller, near the path), so we continued on. The fourth campsite we encountered was neatly situated up on the rocks but didn’t have as great of a view as to be expected since it is still somewhat in the forested area. Again, we continued. We came across the sixth campsite (the one before the group campsite) and we immediately liked it. The site itself was a large meadow area surrounded by trees, located near the stream (easy access to water). And the tent area was up higher on the hill, so it felt very private. We decided to select this site and set up our tent. After placing the bear box away from the site and hanging our bags (the ranger warned us that marmots in the area liked to chew through shoes and bags), we continued walking up the trail to see more of the canyon (much easier without our packs). Shortly passed our site, the entire canyon opened up and produced a beautiful meadow area with lots of wildflowers. So pretty! The group site is located near the start of this meadow area and we continued walking to see two additional campsites. The last campsite we saw was incredible. Had we not already set up our tent, we may have gone back to grab our gear and continue to this site. It was situated on many large rocks with plenty of flat areas to set up the tent. And it offered a beautiful view looking straight down the canyon. We would highly recommend others continue to this spot (and we don’t know what the ones further down the canyon look like either!). Once we got back to the campsite, we laid in our hammock and read for a while. We had a friendly visitor who hung around the campsite for a while (a deer). At first, I was surprised by how close it was getting to us but was also relieved because I figured if the deer was around, that meant a bear wouldn’t be (I have an irrational fear of bears). Around 6 pm, we got our bear box and took it to the stream to cook dinner (about 100 yards from our tent per all ranger instructions). There was a bridge over the stream near our campsite, so we cooked on that. Dinner was Mountain House Sweet & Sour Pork and Beef Stroganoff (using boiling water from our Jetboil). Both meals were pretty tasty! After dinner, we got ready for bed, stored the bear box, hung our bags, and got into the tent. We listened to our audiobook and read our individual books until it got dark. We left the fly off the tent for the night so we could enjoy the night sky.
Waking up to our own private meadow in Death Canyon was amazing, especially since it meant we did not get eaten by bears during the night. We packed up around 7:30 am and started our hike out (since we had to hike into Leigh Lake later that afternoon). As we were heading down to grab our bags, a moose walked right up into our campsite. We slowly backed away as to not startle it, but she appeared to be completely indifferent to our presence and continued on her way. There was no baby moose, so it was different than the one we saw the previous day. Once it left, we finished packing and set off. On our way out, we ran into a couple groups that told us they saw a black bear and two cubs. I, of course, was terrified, but Patrick was thrilled and immediately put the long lens on the camera. We kept our eyes peeled and I sang (poorly) a good way down the trail to make noise. Sure enough, we saw them (from a distance, thank goodness!). We finished the hike in about 3 hours.
From the Death Canyon trailhead, we made a quick detour to the Antelope Flats and Mormon houses before driving to the Leigh Lake trail head for our next hike. The hike into Leigh Lake was only about 2.5 miles, so only took about an hour. I packed a few more items for the lake (my small foldable camping chair, swimsuit, and towel). We had site 12C, which was a great site! I would go back to Grand Teton just to stay at this site again. It offers a beautiful view of the lake with the Grand Tetons behind it, private beach (sandy with some rocks when you first get in), , sitting logs, flat place for the tent, fire pit, and a bear box (all site have the last two). We could have (and probably should have) spent multiple nights here. This is really a must-do in our opinions. I was exhausted by the time we arrived, but we dropped our bags and started gathering down, dead wood for our fire. We both took quick dips in the lake – it was cold but felt nice to rinse off. After our dips, we read for a bit on our private beach. While doing so, one of the volunteer rangers stopped by to check in on us. She mentioned that a bear has been hanging out around the campsite in the past few days but indicated that it has been scared off typically by noise, so we should be fine. Just need to be extra diligent about the bear box (I am always diligent). We cooked dinner by the water (a good ways down from our campsite), which was Mountain House Chili Mac and Beef and Backcountry Pantry Chicken Alfredo. Both were good, but the Chili Mac and Beef has been our favorite meal so far. After dinner, we got ready for bed and read, journaled, and watched the sun set. The next morning (after no bear sightings), we read by the water before hiking back out. We were back to our car around 12 pm to drive to Yellowstone.
Side note, we learned from the volunteer ranger, that she and her husband live in the backcountry lodge on Leigh Lake and have been coming here for 19 summers! They hike/canoe all supplies and groceries. We would love to do this one day!
Grand mom has been enjoying your blog. Loves how Jessica is describing your adventures.