Hiking to Phelps Lake, Grand Teton National Park

We spent two days looking for bears in Grand Teton Park, with no luck.

The Hawthorne Trees are filled with berries. However, the foliage is so dense that unless you get lucky you can’t spot the bears. We never got lucky. Still, we had beautiful spots for picnics, the days were smoke free and on the second day we hiked to Phelps Lake. Rating the hikes, Phelps Lake is the easiest. It’s normally 2.2 miles but the normal route is closed due to black bears. A temporary route is open which adds another 1.2 miles to the round trip, making the round trip 3.4 miles total in length.

The elevation gain is only two hundred and twenty-five feet and its rated as an easy hike. We spotted a doe and fawn black tailed mule deer. They were healthy, unlike the doe and fawn we see in our rv park, dying from chronic wasting disease.

Returning to our car we next drove to Sawmill Pond where we spotted a belted kingfisher. A moose had been visible, but it had disappeared just before we arrived. It was still a nice place for lunch. After lunch we drove the Teton Park Road. Lots of people, lots of people with electric bikes, but very little wildlife. The parking lots at Jenny Lake and Lake Taggert Trail were both jammed with cars, many being forced to park alongside the road.

We saw quite a few people at the Black Tail Pond Overlook. A juvenile bald eagle was soaring overhead, and we got a pretty good image. It’s a huge bird and the beak it unmistakable, the beak of an eagle. It’s not unusual for us to miss seeing any bears. Normally we see bears for about one day for every three days we visit. We’re not sure if we will get back to the park as our time is getting short and we will be heading south when our park closes. The water is shut off, on/about October 15th. Clear skies