Day 8: Grand Teton National Park

Sitting at the airport with another hour till my flight home, this seems like as good as time as any to talk about my day in the Tetons. I'll be able to start this post in Jackson Airport and finish it in Denver. I have a good wait between my connecting flights.

The day started early-- I wanted to be up at sunrise at Oxbow Bend to get shots of Mount Moran reflecting in the water. I wasn't alone, there were at least four others taking landscape shots along with two birders with spotting scopes. The weather was perfect for the reflection.

Another photographer shooting Mount Moran

I think it was worth getting up at 5am for this

I drove the Teton park road once I was done and noticed there was a daytime moon over the mountains. Tried to capture it but I don't think I was able to really capture it.

Daytime Moon over the Mountains

I went back to the cabin and took a nap, by the time I woke up it was overcast and the tops of the mountains were obscured. I decided to go drive Antelope Flats Road and check out Mormon Row. The cloud cover did give good light despite hiding the mountain tops.

Old Barn on Mormon Row

After Mormon Row I kept going on Antelope Flats Road. I noticed a large bunch of sunflowers (I think they're balsamroot, but not sure) and decided to try for a shot with them and the mountains behind it. I took the opportunity to get some better shots of the Larkspur that was growing as well.

Larkspur

Larkspur

I kept going and saw a small group of pronghorns. One male and several females. I was grabbing a few shots of the male when he suddenly started to attack and headbutt a sagebrush bush. I think another male may had left a sent on it or something. But he really was aggressively ramming it.

Mr. Pronghorn did not like this sagebrush!

Male Pronghorn

Mr. Pronghorn's Girls

While I was shooting the pronghorns, I spotted a small bird hovering over the meadow. I knew it was probably a kestrel and got a good look at it and confirmed that. Much to my surprise, he flew closer and wound up hovering right in a straight line of sight for my lens. I got a great shot, a little blown out, but how often do you get a head on shot of a kestrel??

Hello Mr. Kestrel!

I stopped by Mormon Row one more time and noticed a collapsed barn. I took a few shots of it before heading back to the highway. I stopped at blacktail ponds overlook... I took a landscape shots with some sunflowers in the front... and then saw a moose for the first time this trip! A good looking bull.

Blacktail Ponds Overlook

Mr. Moose likes his willows for dinner.

That's the summary of day eight. I did a little shooting before getting on my flight home, but not much, since I already had most of the gear packed. It's been a great trip.

Days 7: Once more around the upper loop

Being my last day in Yellowstone, I decided to drive the upper loop and hit Lamar Valley one more time. The first half of the drive was fairly uneventful. Some nice elk cows and that was about it.

Elk Cow

In Mammoth there was a small herd of elk with a baby not far from the parking lot. The baby went down and vanished into the brush as soon as I got my camera, drat. The one cow that was still up grazing by the parking lot had a backdrop of a swatch of cars and the hot spring terraces. Sort of summed up Mammoth for me. Lots of people, and elk.

Elk, cars, and hot springs... Mammoth in a nutshell

On the way to Tower I stopped at Floating Island Lake again to check on the sandhill crane on the nest. No luck with her mate showing up, but she did have her head up a few times.

Mrs Sandhill on her nest

There were a pair of Barrow's Goldeneyes swimming around and the Ruddy Ducks showed up again, closer this time. I actually got some nice shots.

Barrow's Goldeneye Drake

Ruddy Duck Drake

I also noticed a small bird hawking an insect. I trained my lens over at it and found a nice looking male Yellow-rumped Warbler. The western color variation is much prettier than the eastern variant we see back home.

Yellow-rumped Warbler

I kept going, and missed my turn for the northeast entrance and lamar valley. I didn't realize it till I hit Tower Falls. It turned out to be a good thing, if I hadn't I'd have missed a lot of wildlife.

There were a small group of bull bison not far from the Roosevelt lodge. I wouldn't have probably bothered with them, but I caught sight of three cowbirds perched on one of the bulls, and there was a place to pull off, so I figured it might make a nice shot.

Three little birds-- every little thing, gonna be all right!

Big boy bull bison

While I was shooting the bison I noticed a pronghorn in the distance. As I took some shots of her, suddenly, a small blur came bounding out of the brush to her-- a Pronghorn fawn!

I was hoping to get better shots with the big lens, but Momma pronghorn decided to move off with her baby as I was setting the lens up.

I started driving again, still not aware I was headed in the wrong direction. I hit a huge bear jam, two black bears by Rainy Lake. I started to set up my lens when the ranger came by and ordered everyone back into their cars. There was a third bear he couldn't account for. I dragged the 500mm into the car with me and took several shots from the car.

 Black colored Black Bear

Brown colored Black Bear

When I realized I hit the zoo of a parking lot at Tower Falls I realized I had gone the wrong direction. I turned around and went to Lamar Valley. As it turns out, nothing much going on there.

I spent the rest of the day driving south to the Tetons. I didn't stop and shoot much, but I did see a nice reflection of the mountains in Jackson Lake and I pulled off to grab a shot.

Welcome to the Tetons

Okay, that's pretty much it for day seven. Hopefully I'll have sometime to type of day eight today.

Days 6: Canyon to Lake

It's hard to believe this trip is coming to an end. It's been a busy few days now, and tomorrow evening I fly home. I hate to leave. There's a lot of days to summarize and pictures to post here. I'm going to run down day six tonight and try to get the rest posted tomorrow.

Anyway, day six started out very early. I wanted to get to artist point at sunrise. I was the only one there, so it was pretty serene. The light was beautiful, both during the blue hour and during the golden hour, and I got some great shots.

Lower Falls from Artist Point

After Artist Point, I visited the Upper Falls overlook on the south rim. I was pretty sure I remembered it being hard to find a good angle to shoot. I was right, I'm still not happy with any angle I got. Upper Falls is really impressive though for the sheer volume of water going over it.

Upper Falls

 After Upper Falls, I left the South Rim and headed to the North Rim drive, where I took some nice shots from Lookout Point. Remembering the Osprey nest I saw someone shooting on my first visit to this overlook, I went back to the car and got the big lens, and got some shots of her on the nest. I was hoping her mate would show up at the nest but no luck.

Lower Falls from Lookout Point

Osprey Nest

I decided to drive the lower loop road again. Not far south of Canyon there was a bear jam with a grizzly in the distance. Other than that I didn't see much. I was hoping to see the Old Faithful area bison by the road, and maybe get some more shots of bison calves, but no luck, they were by Madison but way off in the distance. I did finally stop and get some shots of Gibbons Falls.

Grizzly near Canyon

Gibbons Falls

At this point, the afternoon had been almost disappointing, having driven the entire lower half of the loop road and not seen very much. Then, just north of lake I hit a bear jam-- grizzly and two cubs!

I got to Lake Lodge and checked in and was somewhat shocked at the state of the cabins. We stayed there about 10 years ago and they looked like they hadn't been maintained since. The bathroom floor was sunken and it was clear the base floor under the linoleum was rotted. It was the only poor cabin experience I had this trip, I was surprised.

The marmots living under the cabins were cute though.

Marmot living under the cabin at Lake Lodge

Marmot peeking out from under the cabin

I couldn't get a cell phone signal at Lake, but the guy who checked me in told me if I drive the East entrance road about 10 minutes or so I'd get a clear signal with AT&T. I did and called home from a pullout. There were a pair of ravens bopping about. After I checked in at home, I rolled the car window down to try and grab a shot of one of the ravens. Much to my surprise, the other raven came over and began to preen the first. I guess they were mates. It was very very cute-- and cute is not something I usually associate with ravens.

That's about it for day six. I'll hopefully post day seven and eight tomorrow morning.