Undaunted. How are you supposed to feel when you're finally hiking (and not just hiking, but backpacking) in a place you've dream about hiking ever since you first visited more than ten years previous? I wasn't entirely sure, but astounded awe seemed like a good place to start when my sister and I finally hit the trail on this year's visit to Grand Teton National Park in northwestern Wyoming. Like many places in the West, my sister and I had visited Grand Teton on one of our two-week long summer family vacations years ago, and we were determined to go back and see it anew with adult eyes. This time, our itinerary included a two night, three day backpacking loop through the rugged Tetons backcountry, and I can't tell you how much I was looking forward to it. As we checked in at the wilderness office, however, we were informed that avalanche risk along our intended route was high, and unless we had the proper equipment to deal with it we were advised to make alternate plans. After a brief discussion Lisha and I amended our hike, still planning camping two nights but making both nights out-and-back instead of a loop. Neither of us have the gear or experience to deal with much more than ankle-deep snow, and we didn't really want to test ourselves and end up needing a rescue. We're crazy, but not stupid.
It was with high spirits that we hit the trail, though it wasn't long before we were huffing and puffing with exertion and altitude. We slogged along slowly, but it wasn't a bad thing; the scenery of the Tetons is something that deserves to be appreciated at your own pace. We eventually made it the four or so miles up to South Fork Cascade Canyon and set up camp at the first unoccupied sight, settling down to nap the afternoon away. I know I drifted off, but have no idea how long I was out before voices woke me up and I found Alisha chatting with another hiker who was asking if they could set up somewhat close by. We had no problem with it (safety in numbers, and we were in a highly populated bear habitat) and ended up making friends with the couple. Ben and Beth live out east, and Ben turned out to be a teacher, so he and Lisha chatted away over dinner as we watched evening settle in around us while Beth and I held our own conversations. Not too long before sunset we bid each other goodnight.
Our wishes for an uneventful slumber were somewhat put out by a thunderstorm that echoed through our canyon in the early hours of the next morning, Lisha and I lying in bed watching the flashes of lightning illuminate the canvas above us as we waited for the rain. We were relieved when the storm moved up canyon without dumping on us, though we continued to hear thunder bouncing off the mountain sides as I slipped back into sleep. We were up before the sun that morning, climbing out of the tent when there was enough light to see and breaking down camp. We needed to make good time in order to reach the next camp that night, so we weren't in the mood to linger overlong. To our surprise Ben and Beth were up too, and we ended up leaving camp together after figuring it'd be safer to move through the dawn with a bigger group of people. You have no idea how happy I was to have them with us when Alisha spotted the first moose, a cow and her baby, next to the creek not too far off trail. It wasn't until a little while later, when I almost walked right into Alisha after she abruptly stopped with no warning, that I became incredibly grateful for the two of them. A cow moose had bedded down just off to the side of our trail, and there was absolutely no way we would be able to continue on trail past her. We approached slowly, tightly pressed together in an attempt to make us less of a target, but she stood up quickly and we dashed for cover behind a large boulder. We were there, trapped behind that boulder, for a good ten or fifteen minutes, with Ben and I keeping watch on either side of the boulder, trying to keep her in view. The moose didn't seem all too bothered by us unless we were in her path, and as long as we kept the boulder between us and her she left us alone to graze. The problem was, there was no cover between us and the trail and if we wanted to make it around her we were going to have to run for it. We waited until she moved down towards us, hopefully far enough that if she decided to charge us as we made for the trail we'd have a head start, before we made a break for it, crashing through the small meadow and through to the safety of trees, running full out down the trail until we put enough distance between our group and her.
Of course, when we stopped to pant for breath and congratulate ourselves on getting away without incident, I realized I'd dropped a water bottle and my tripod in our mad dash for safety. If it were just the bottle I would have left it for someone else to have, but that tripod was expensive and I wasn't about to give it up that easily. I eased back toward the meadow, Ben following behind to keep watch while Alisha and Beth waited down trail. I didn't see the moose, thankfully, and darted out from the cover of the forest to where we'd gotten back on trail. I found my stuff right on the edge of the trail, meaning I wouldn't have to go searching through the long grass and waste time, grabbed it, and ran back, looking over my shoulder convinced an angry moose was about to charge me. She didn't, and Ben and I returned to Alisha and Beth triumphant.
We were still exclaiming over our escape from the moose when Alisha once again brought us up short as she spotted another animal at a curve in the trail ahead of us. All four of us were keyed up, and it didn't take much to convince us that the huge humped brown back we saw belonged to a grizzly bear. That is, at least, until we saw the gigantic rack of antlers and realized that the huge humped brown back actually belonged to an enormous bull moose. Still nothing to lift your nose at, bull moose can be ferociously territorial, especially if there were females around, and we didn't exactly thrill to the idea of testing our luck a third time that morning. As we watched, another group of hikers passed by the bull with no incident, and by the time they reached us we were willing to give it a shot. He ended up being further off trail than it initially looked, but we still quickly and cautiously passed by while keeping wary eyes on his grazing rear. That he was facing away from us gave me enough courage to snap a few pictures of him as I had with the cow before we continued on our way. The rest of the hike passed uneventfully, and we said goodbye to Beth and Ben at the parking lot. There's nothing quite like making it through an eventful hike with strangers to bring you together, and this has become one of my favorite hikes of the past several years. Ben and Beth, thank you for being awesome and I hope you're doing well!
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