The Anticipated Best Summer Ever

Horseback riding

Mike and I went horseback riding on Saturday morning. Rides like these are usually pretty tame – no galloping, no going off the trail, staying at a slow pace right behind the horse in front of you.

The beginning of our ride started out this way. We went up about 1,000 feet along one of the mountains, then came back down. The planned ride was pretty boring: after the mountain, walk across a pasture, then back across it to where we started, and finish up (the ride was 2 hours total).

But then things got fun. The other riders on our group were two guides, two 7-year olds, and one of their mothers. One of the little girls was nervous, so a guide kept her horse on a lead, and held onto that rope the entire time.

The rope got caught under the guide’s horse’s tail, which startled the horse, who reared back, whined, and startled the little girl’s horse. Her horse started galloping around, with her screaming like a – well, like a 7 year old girl! That set all the other horses of, though not as much. Eventually they got the two horses settled, and I do have to hand it to the little girl for staying on the entire time!

Then we had to cross this irrigation ditch that was about 3.5 or 4 feet wide. The spooked horses refused to go across some wooden planks, so the guides decided to walk across it. One horse, then two horses, took one step in the water ditch, and one step out. The next horse… stops, looks, decides to jump it. All the other horses, including Mike and mine, follow suit!

Yes, it was a small ditch. But that totally counts as jumping across water on a horse!

And to make the ride even better, the pasture we went across had just been filled with 500 cattle the day before. The cattle started following our line of horses, all single file themselves. Then we went through the thick of them, and they stood so close, just watching us! It was incredible!

Work anyone?

Friday morning was work for me, and that’s no fun to write about. So instead I’ll tell you how much I was on the move this entire trip!

It’s too bad that Mike didn’t feel well. Or, maybe if you asked him, he would say he was happy for the excuse! Up every morning at 5:45 a.m. to jog, ride bikes, or hike, with three others on the trip. The motivation was great to keep me on track! I’m not much of a bike rider, but it was TOTALLY worth it when one in the group came up with the idea to finish the ride by going to the Four Seasons next door, valeting our bikes, and sitting on the patio with a cup of coffee. A deer sighting sealed the morning!

Mike did join us on Sunday for a short hike to Phelps Lake. We watched the sun rise over the mountains, which created this great mirror image of the mountains in the lake. Didn’t see any animals, though, unless you count the deer tracks!

Also golfed on Friday and Saturday afternoons with the whole group at Jackson Hole Golf and Tennis Club (Mike thinks it's important to note here that it's a Robert Trent-Jones II designed course). Not sure if the golf purists enjoyed themselves much since we did scrambles each afternoon – that’s when each person hits the ball, you choose the best ball, and then everyone moves to hit their balls from that spot. It’s a great game for beginners like me, though! Even if my teammate and I shot the highest score… and in golf, high isn’t good!

Waterfalls and sickness

Off to the waterfalls. These were more breathtaking to me than Old Faithful, just for the shear size and force of them. But in addition to the beautiful sights of the day, we were dogged by sickness. Mike was hit with something the night before – Wednesday, the day we arrived. We are all speculating altitude sickness, but he just was off the entire trip. I’ll spare you the details, but give kudos to Jesse, for when I stood up at one point and shouted, “Stop the bus!” he didn’t even hesitate. We were on the side of the road in about .5 seconds.

Old Faithful

Stopped at Old Faithful, and I’ve got to admit it… eeh. Certainly cool. But not the most incredible thing I’ve ever seen. Maybe I was just cranky from the long day!

Also stopped at another geyser area, and this one was a bit neater for me. It had different “kinds” of geysers – not the right technical term, but I wasn’t listening THAT closely to tour-guide Jesse!

Lots of pools of hot water, and bubbling mud.

Too close to the bison

At one point during the day, we saw three bison in the middle of a pasture. Jessie stayed on the bus, but told the group to stay at least 25 yards away from the bison at all time.
Do you THINK everyone would listen to him? Of course not. Especially Mike, and one other from the group. Maybe they were 25 yards away, maybe they weren’t. Maybe it was just that they went to the side of the bison while the rest of us were in front of them – creating a sort of closed-in sense. In either case, a park trooper spotted us, whistled us all out of the pasture, and started in on lecturing.

We think we escaped a ticket (at least, none of us got one), but our bus driver may be getting one. The trooper wrote down the tour bus company and bus number. Poor guy was not very happy about it.

Yellowstone

Tuesday the group rented a bus and headed to Yellowstone National Park. It was a LONG day – about 11 hours total – but we saw incredible sights!

Let’s start with the animals. Our tour guide (I’m going to steal a phrase from Lauren, and you’ll all know what I mean… bless his heart) was Johnny on the Spot when it came to sighting animals, and pulled over each time to let us get off the bus and take photos. You KNOW this was Mike’s favorite part of the day!

I forget the order at this point, but there were bison, elk and more bison. Here are the elk …

Off to Jackson Hole

We met up with my work group and headed to Jackson Hole, WY, on Wednesday morning. This place is just breathtaking. We stayed at the Hotel Terra, just one mile from the entrance to Grand Teton National Park. The mountains were an incredible sight to behold every day.

Lunch, a nap for Mike and a jaunt up to the top of one of the ski slopes for me (on a gondola, of course), then dinner with the group.

These photos are of the Teton mountain range.

Let me start from the beginning…

So much happened in the past week, and I couldn’t blog about it! Very frustrating! I opened something I shouldn’t have on my computer, and was hit with a virus. So besides being incredibly busy in Dallas and Jackson Hole, I couldn’t even get on my computer or e-mail!

Here’s all the updates, in a series of posts. I can only upload several photos per post, so I’ll try to separate everything out. And if veteran bloggers have a better suggestion for me posting these photos, let me know!

You have the shootin’ update, below. That was Monday. On Tuesday, Mike and I golfed with Keith and another Mike, from work. We went to the Cowboy’s Golf Club, and had a really relaxed, fun time. It was HOT, but Mike was happy for the cute cart girls helping him keep hydrated.

Dinner at Nobo with Debbie and Keith that night. I know – Nobo AGAIN! I’ve got to admit, though – not nearly as good as the one in Vegas. We tried to order many of the same things again, but the Dallas chef had his/her own spin on the items. Still delicious, and great company!