Melissa & Jason in Idaho: Cross Country Skiing in Grand Teton National Park

A couple of weeks ago we decided to make out weekend activity cross country skiing. There are several different locations for cross country skiing in and around Idaho Falls, but after missing out on the chance to ski Grand Teton in November I wanted to go back. The plan was to ski from the Taggart Lake trailhead (This is where the park road closes in the winter) to Jenny Lake.

The park roads in GTNP on the way to Taggart Lake trailhead

Melissa has had lots of experience with this sport and my experience is limited to the outing from the previous post and this one. As you could expect I was huffing and puffing alot more that she was. From the trailhead, we started off down the trail on some well worn tracks through the snow. Snowshoers also use the trail, but on a parallel track that doesn't mess with the ski ruts.

Jason huffing and puffing

Melissa thoroughly enjoying seeing Jason huff and puff

In the summer, I've hiked from the same trailhead, and while we may have been on the "real" national park trail for part of our trip, we certainly weren't on it for the entire trip to Jenny Lake. I suppose that is an advantage of winter hiking you can take the path of least resistance and still be low impact. By taking the ski trail we passed by cabins for a climbing camp that is located off the park road and another set of cabins used by park staff in the summer. There were a couple of difficult spots going through the trees. I know at one point I was practically crawling to get over a log across the path. As expected Melissa navigated these challenges much more gracefully than I. After a good 2 to 3 hours we finally reached the shores of Jenny Lake. The water was unfrozen and quite a delight to see.

The bridge to the Jenny Lake dock. It was piled high with snow.

I couldn't wear a hat. I was generating more than enough heat on my own

Unfortunately the mountains had been hidden behind a veil of clouds for our journey to this point, but as we began to head back the clouds began to lift. As anyone who has visited Grand Teton National Park can tell you, some of the best views of the mountains in the park occur on the park road between Jenny Lake and Taggart Lake trailhead. On the way back, we took the park road to make things somewhat easier, and I was starting to get the hang of the push and slide motion required to effectively cross country ski.

This is the furthest ahead of Melissa I ever got. I was chasing her most of the day.

The Grand starts to peak out from behind the clouds.

As you can see, Melissa was getting some great pictures of the mountains when fatigue and carelessness got the best of me. In a cloud of ski's and poles and snow I fell to ground. I was unscathed aside from a batter ego, but my pole was not. Graciously Melissa did not snap a picture of me sprawled on the snowy road, although she admitted to me later that she very much wanted to. In another act of kindness, she lent me her poles and continued on to the truck with only my unbroken pole. After a few more photo ops, we made it back to the truck as the sun was setting tired but satisfied with a good day of skiing in a beautiful place. The ski shop back in Idaho Falls didn't even charge us for the broken pole, so quite the satisfying trip indeed.