One Beautiful Day in Grand Teton National Park
The Verdict: This is one of our favorite national parks. It’s a mountains-and-lakes kind of park, and the scenery is jaw-dropping in a Banff-like way. The town right by the park, Jackson, is one of the nicest national park-adjacent towns we’ve been to; it seems like a great place for an extended stay (though when we were there -- in late summer after 18 months after a pandemic -- it wasn’t the most affordable). Our only regret about Grand Teton is not being able to stay longer!
The COVID moose was a hit. Way to be adorable, St. John’s Hospital.
Stuff We Recommend
#1: Hiking to Surprise Lake & Amphitheatre Lake (~10 miles total: 5 miles out and 5 miles back; strenuous): This hike is AMAZING! You'll hike to two extraordinarily beautiful lakes against the backdrop of Grand Teton (the park's namesake mountain). For me, these lakes recalled the stunning lakes at Canada's Banff National Park. The hike is pretty much uphill the entire way; it is definitely strenuous but not because of any particularly challenging areas, rather because it is a marathon of an incline. We saw elk and pika, as well as a marriage proposal at lovely Surprise Lake! The full hike took us about 5.5 hours, split about evenly between uphill and downhill, excluding the time we spent picnicking at Surprise Lake. It was pretty cold sitting by the lakes, so definitely take a windbreaker for that bit.
Surprise Lake
Amphitheater Lake
If you choose to do this hike, check out Earthtrekkers' excellent summary. Note they recommend adding on Delta Lake -- we tried, but the lack of signage made it too difficult to find our way, and we ultimately decided not to pursue this additional portion of the hike.
Hiking up to Surprise & Amphitheater Lakes - take 1
Hiking up to Surprise & Amphitheater Lakes - take 2. See how the smile disappeared? It’s a difficult hike!
Elk hanging out along the trail
Pika chilling in the rocks by Amphitheatre Lake
Logistics: Park at Lupine Meadows Trailhead. BEWARE the insane potholes on this road. Not sure how anything besides a 4x4 or high-clearance SUV can do this, but we did see a handful of sedans that made it. We needed a solid car wash after doing this drive. We got here on Friday around 11:30 a.m. and the parking area was 90%+ full; we were able to park on the side of the road in a designated parallel parking area.
Alternate option: Don't want to do such a long hike? Try the shorter hike to Taggart Lake (starts from a different trailhead and parking lot; looks very beautiful). You can actually hike to Bradley Lake & Taggart Lake (5.5 mi roundtrip) from the same trailhead as Surprise Lake & Amphitheatre Lake, but these two hikes share the first 1.7 miles of a pretty unremarkable uphill climb, so the Taggart Lake-only option starting elsewhere might be nicer.
View of Taggart & Bradley Lakes from the hike to Surprise & Amphitheater Lakes
#2: Jenny Lake Boat + Hiking: Jenny Lake is the most popular part of the park. We hiked most of the Jenny Lake Loop (which goes all the way around the lake), but we recommend doing things a bit differently: Start at the String Lake Parking Lot and hike counterclockwise along Jenny Lake for incredible views of the lake. Stop when you get to the area for Hidden Falls (a very large and stunning waterfall) and Inspiration Point (a beautiful, high viewpoint over Jenny Lake). Going to Hidden Falls and Inspiration Point is about 2 miles roundtrip and well worth it, though a bit steep and very crowded. Then, retrace your steps and hike back to the String Lake Parking Lot.
Bridge at the junction of Jenny Lake and String Lake
Hidden Falls
View of Jenny Lake from Inspiration Point
View of Inspiration Point from the Jenny Lake Shuttle (boat)
Alternate option: If you don't have time or don't want to hike/walk along Jenny Lake, you can park at Jenny Lake Visitor Center Parking Lot and take the Jenny Lake boat shuttle roundtrip to/from Hidden Falls and Inspiration Point. This is expensive ($18pp roundtrip) and means you miss out on some of the especially nice views of Jenny Lake, but it is time efficient and may make sense if you have limited time to spend in the park. If you do this, get to the Jenny Lake shuttle as early as possible. When we walked by it around 11a.m., the line for the shuttle was extremely long.
One of our favorite views of Jenny Lake, walking on Jenny Lake Scenic Loop from the String Lake parking lot to Hidden Falls
What we actually did (somewhat suboptimal): We parked at the Jenny Lake Visitor Center Parking Lot and walked along Jenny Lake about 3 miles to the intersection of String Lake. Most of this walk had trees obstructing the view of the lake; it wasn't that scenic. From String Lake, we continued along the Jenny Lake Loop trail and saw Hidden Falls + Inspiration Point, as recommended above. Then we took the Jenny Lake Shuttle ($10pp one way) across Jenny Lake to get back to the Jenny Lake Parking Lot. The shuttle was a 2-3 minute boat ride across the lake with very nice views of mountainous Inspiration Point, but it felt like a ripoff. The shuttle can also have very long lines, so if we did it again we'd save ourselves the trouble. This took us about 3 hours in total.
View of Jenny Lake in the morning, close to the Jenny Lake Visitor Center.
Sometime during the first ~3 miles of the Jenny Lake Scenic Loop starting from the Visitor Center and walking counterclockwise.
Logistics: We're not sure about what it's like to park by String Lake. If you park at Jenny Lake Visitor Center, there are a few large parking areas. When we arrived on Friday around 7:40a.m. there were plenty of available spaces, but when we returned around 11a.m., the parking lot was full and cars were circling for spots as they opened up. Get there early to save yourself the stress of finding a parking spot!
#3: Drive along the 42 mile scenic drive loop (map): We drove most but not all of this, and it was definitely very pretty throughout. Exhausted after a long day, we only stopped at Oxbow Bend (amazing, and easy to get to as it’s right off the main road) and Schwabacher Landing (nice, but hard to get to due to a VERY pothole-y road; not sure if it was worth it.)
Oxbow Bend before sunset
Schwabachers Landing
Of course, there are plenty of other things to see and do at Grand Teton National Park. We loved the way we spent our one day there, and we hope to return to see more!
Lodging:
Springhill Suites by Marriott Jackson Hole: We spent one night at this hotel and it was perfect. The rooms are upscale and cozy, check-in was efficient and thorough, the downtown Jackson location is great, and the breakfast buffet was varied including delicious healthy options. We would have loved to stay longer, it's just very expensive! Logistics: Though the hotel offers pricey parking, we found free street parking right in front of the hotel and there were plenty of open spots. The city of Jackson also offers free parking garages, including one very closeby to this hotel.
Colter Bay Campground: Located right by Jackson Lake in the northern part of the park, Colter Bay is about an hour north of the city of Jackson and 30 minutes north of some of the most popular park areas (Jenny Lake, Lupine Meadows). We were lucky to get a campsite just a few weeks before our trip, but Colter Bay wasn't terribly special. It wasn't scenic and, while convenient to get an early start to our day from inside the park, it wasn't quite as conveniently located as Jenny Lake Campground since that is more central to the most popular hikes. However, Jenny Lake Campground was booked out several months in advance.
Jackson, WY:
This is a very nice town with an unbelievably scenic backdrop and great amenities (restaurants, bars, nice lodging). Though we only had enough time to spend one night here, we would have loved to spend more time. We enjoyed the panang curry and IPAs at Thai Me Up, a Thai restaurant + brewery.
Logistics: The city of Jackson has free parking garages. Street parking is also free.
