Episcopal church at Dubois, Wyoming
It was tough to leave Hotel Lake Yellowstone, but we had the towering Tetons to look forward to.
We stopped at several vantage points, taking in the majesty of the gray monoliths dotted with glaciers that still cling to the mountaintops despite the rising heat. It was shirt sleeve weather as we drove by the Tetons.
Jenny Lake, a favorite with us and many, many others, was unreachable this trip because of the long walking distance and threatening dark clouds approaching. The main parking area was long since full, and there were long lines of parked vehicles on the shoulders of the main road.
So we settled at Dornan's Pizza, sited just up from where a ferry operated on the Snake River across to the Jackson valley. A portion of the wooden ferry is on display under a shed just up from the ferry site.
Jackson Hole, now a posh and expensive settlement by the Snake, was one of the last parts settled in this vicinity because of its remoteness, its severe weather, and its lack of arable land. Now its land is most highly sought after.
The crowds were definitely shifting to Dornan's, and there was a long line to pay ahead for food and drink. Mert and Min quickly hatched a plan. Min flopped herself on a briefly-open four-chair table to the right of the customer line near the paying station.
Meanwhile, Mert ingratiated herself with a woman, who obviously had some seats open at her primo spot by the picture window. I saw her animatedly engaging the obliging Wisconsin woman, as well as her eighth grade son when he arrived from the john.
The woman was somehow able to finish the last of her pizza, and she and the son finally ambled away. Then Min made a bead for the window table, giving up the other choice spot, and the women deftly blocked off the remaining two seats.
The pizza was good, and just down the road we suddenly were in a swarm of buffalo. They were all along the edge of a roadside fence and some charged across the highway. Min took lots of pictures. All this excitement came just after another bear sighting - this one a large black bear down in a creek with a ranger above eyeing the scene carefully.
We bypassed congested Jackson and headed for a motel (not hotel) at little Dubois in the state of Wyoming. With choices few, we had been thankful to get the last two rooms (they always tell you that) at the Stage Coach Inn.
The name is much too close to the Wagon Wheel Inn, which was such a down-trodden hostelry on the road to Ouray that the family still recalls it with foreboding.
But the Stage Coach Inn was very nice. The manager obliged Mert's request by letting us stay on the ground floor. There was a table in Zef and Min's room that had enough room for all the cards of Hand and Foot. There was a heated pool and hot tub, as well as an attractive laundry room.
Zef and I were sent to scout out the town looking for dineries. In doing so we happened upon one of the cutest Episcopal churches - a log cabin from 1912.
Also in our wanderings, we were intrigued by a sign by a long narrow alley that read "Public Restrooms." We got to the end and finally noticed another sign on a distant fence that had an arrow pointing to the left that also said Public Restrooms. We gave up the chase then.
We ran into several archways crafted with the apparently ubiquitous elk antlers. But we had not seen any of the live elks.
The steak house was closed on Sundays, and another possible option was "permanently closed" at the town of 911 citizens.
We ended up at Cowboys Cafe, just a few steps from our rooms. It was packed and our waitress (who had been on duty since 6:15 a.m.) was delightful. She helped us to a square meal and the house specialty - a long assortment of pies and a few cakes. Huckleberry was somehow missing, but Boysenberry was great.
After a hard fought Hand and Foot battle, that wisely ended in a tie, it was to bed in a room that might not be at the Lake Yellowstone Hotel, but it had a heat and cool button on the wall.
Antler arch at Dubois