After lunch, I headed up by myself to the top, and conditions there were pretty fantastic – a little windy though, which was good for refilling the snow. The top got 10″ overnight on top of a foot or two the previous few days. It was pretty fluffy snow, and I was doing pretty well for myself on skis. I wasn’t quite missing the snowboard as much today. Ended up doing about five laps on the East Ridge chair before heading down.

Once I got below mid-mountain though, conditions started to get thicker and then icy again, and I could definitely feel the legs burning while on the hardpack.

We did apres at the Alpenhof, now we’re back at the condo, soon heading out for one more nice dinner at the Granary here at Spring Creek. Tomorrow, we’ll probably check out the park, town, and/or wildlife museum before flying back to Seattle tomorrow night.

Over the course of a few hours, we saw four moose (MOOSE!), a sage grouse, some mule deer, some bighorn sheep, a few coyotes, a bald eagle, and lots of elk – there is a huge feeding ground for them near Jackson. Somewhat disappointingly, no wolves. I might have spotted one later in the day, but it was probably a coyote – see below, you be the judge.

Things we learned:

• coyotes and wolves don’t like each other very much, and wolves generally win that battle
• for many years, conservationists thought that all predation was bad, which led to wolves being killed off – that position has changed, resulting in wolves being reintroduced in the wild, which has resulted in more manageable populations of competing species
• coyotes only weigh about thirty pounds – a lot of their size is fur
• wolves weigh about one hundred twenty pounds – big dogs
• they feed the elk, which is pretty controversial – but weaning the elk off the feed is difficult
• coyotes and wolves like elk
• coyotes and wolves almost never attack people
• the Tetons are a fairly new mountain range, as they have jagged peaks – older mountain ranges erode over time
• moose shed their antlers every year – you can tell the male moose by the stubs where their antlers used to be
• moose grow their antlers to duke it out with other male moose in attempt to woo female moose – if they can, they’ll kill each other doing so
• male bighorn sheep have more pronounced horns
• mule deer are very common in the west, whereas white-tailed deer are not

Below are some pictures. Some notes to self with respect to photography:

• clean the damn spot off your lens (it’s really problematic when zoomed in)
• get a bigger zoom lens (or at least a teleconverter…200 mm just doesn’t cut it sometimes)
• learn how to take better pictures

With those caveats, here are the photos – a few of them turned out well.

Bighorn Sheep

Elk

Coyote

Mule Deer

Moose

Geese

Pond

These are from later in the day when we made a separate drive through Teton National Park.

Tetons

Bird

Wolf? Or Coyote? Unless someone can prove otherwise (and if you can from this photo, I’d love to know how) I’m going with wolf.

Off to dinner at the Blue Lion, and then one more day of skiing tomorrow!

Apparently it’s a reference to Lonesome Dove, a Western novel turned miniseries. I’ll have to check it out.

Jackson got 2-14″ overnight last night, depending on the elevation and slope, which ordinarily would be fabulous news. There were two caveats:

• it was pretty thick, wet snow
• I was on skis.

I was skiing by myself most of the day, so I headed for lines that I would ordinarily be stoked to be on with my snowboard. Bad idea. Second run, I lost a ski in the “powder” trying to navigate some trees. After lunch, I hit an open bowl, and I was destroyed – every turn was a struggle. Here is me taking a rest in the middle of Cheyenne Bowl, counting down the meters until I reached Nick Wilson’s and could crack open a PBR tall boy.

Anyone who claims snowboarders chew up more powder than skiers hasn’t seen me on skis. I called it quits at around 3:30, then waited for Meagan to join me. Before we headed home, there were, as always in Jackson, a few dogs begging for attention.

Tomorrow we’re taking the day off and doing a wildlife safari. I’ll enjoy the break.

The after-ski scene was also a good time. We stopped by the Mangy Moose again, which had an older crowd, but entertaining. There seemed to be a large middle America, middle aged ski club getting their swerve on.

On the way out, we stopped by Nick Wilson’s, which had a pretty fun outdoor scene with a band, as well as a festive St. Bernard.

Afterwards, we headed back to the condo, where we had a more mellow and less traditional St. Patrick’s Day wine and cheese celebration. I nearly burned the condo down when a log fell out of the fireplace, but fortunately I was able to do fairly quick damage control.

Today we took the day off from the slopes and chilled in Jackson. First we had breakfast at the Bunnery, a really good bakery. Next, we checked out the shops and then stopped at the Shade Café for a rest.

Meagan checked out the local knitting store while I cruised around town taking pictures.

Finally, we had some Thai food and then stopped into the local pet supply store to get some treats for one of our friends back in Seattle.

We’re now back at the condo, where we’re doing some wedding planning (always fun), and getting ready to head to town to check out a gunfight (somehow I doubt it will be real), get dinner at the Sweetwater, and watch a movie, either No Country For Old Men or The Other Boleyn Girl, depending on my chick flick tolerance.

Only other thing to note was the parade of ten Jackson Hole cop cars heading up the relatively obscure road leading to our hotel when we left this morning. When we returned several hours later, they were all parked in the hotel lot.

We were curious what was going on, but disappointed that it was nothing terribly exciting – apparently there was some sort of awards ceremony going on in the conference center.

Finally, I am curious how many people are actually reading this blog since I started it, so if you’re reading this and want a postcard from Jackson Hole, email me your address.

Snow in the forecast…woohoo!

Then we headed to town, stopped at the Silver Dollar Bar for lunch, and I had a monstrous chili bacon cheeseburger.

After lunch, we drove to our condo at the really cool Spring Creek Ranch. Really beautiful location just outside the town of Jackson, looking out over the Teton Range.

Upon checking in, I lay down on the bed for what was meant to be a minute, but I guess I was still exhausted since I passed out for about four hours.

Making up for lost time, we headed out to a nice but pretty pricey dinner at Mizu Sushi.

Today, we headed to the mountain. We stopped for breakfast at a small café right near the hill – muffin, bagel, latte, mocha – $21. I remember Jackson Hole as being expensive, but that’s ludicrous – the $4.75 muffin took the…cake.

Hit up the hill, mostly skiing the Aprez Vous chair. They got about 3-6″ the night before and a few feet earlier in the week, but since I was on skis, we mostly took to the main runs, with a few darts into the trees to remind myself that I am not as good of a skier as I’d like.

We hit up apres-ski at the legendary Mangy Moose – I polished off a few beers and some wings, and Meagan had an over-the-top hot chocolate.

After that, we stopped for groceries, headed back, made some fajitas, and now I’m having a beer and heading to bed.

Gearing up for more of the same tomorrow, with the added bonus of fantastic St. Patty’s day in a ski town!