Hike Around String Lake

We were glad we took the chance yesterday and went hiking - in spite of the weather forecast. It was beautiful all day and we had another great experience hiking in the glorious countryside in Grand Teton National Park. We took a total of 134 pictures and it was difficult deciding which ones to post here in this blog entry. I grouped the ones we selected by category, so you are able to see a good selection of our shots.

Starting with photos of String Lake as we walked the 4.3 miles around the whole lake:

and of course, Josie was snapping pictures of wildflowers we saw all along the trail:

The trail was mostly subtle rises and falls and there were no really steep parts. A couple of the trail shots are below:

At one point, we had to move off the trail to let these horseback riders pass:

Along with all the beautiful wildflowers, we saw several different kinds of Butterflies:

As we came around to the western shore where we started our hike, we came to the picnic area where there were many families enjoying the lake. The water temperature in String Lake is the highest of any of the mountain lakes because it is the most shallow, and the sun can heat the water faster. This first one was taken from the opposite shore:

and then the picnic area as we approached:

We took a picture of the lake with Mt Moran in the background. You will notice the dark line at the summit. Three quarters of a billion years ago dark colored magma penetrated into a crack in the existing metamorphic rock and solidified. As the Teton Range uplifted, it became visible as the black dike apparent today. It is 150 feet wide:

The total time for our hike was about 3 hours and we reached our car again at around 1:30. By this time, we were getting hungry as we didn't bring lunch this time, so we stopped at a restaurant - Dornans - that is close to the Park entrance. Not bad. I had a pulled pork sandwich and Josie had a steak sandwich.

As we drove through Jackson on the way home, we stopped at the Visitor's Center again to pick up another, more detailed book on Hiking in the Tetons. Now that we are getting into this hiking thing, we thought it would be best to get information on more options and also have more detail on future hikes.

Our final shot is taken at the main intersection in Jackson. We stopped at the light and asked these officers if they minded if we took a picture of them. So, here is a shot of Jackson's finest:

We originally planned to go to Pocatello, ID, today, but since we have so much to do before going back to work, we decided to stay home. That most likely will be on next week's schedule...