Jackson Hole

Jackson Hole, Wyoming! We went a few weeks ago and it was exactly the refresher that I needed. I've already posted some of these photos on Facebook so if you've seen them there I'll take no offense to you marking this post as read and moving on with your life. I wouldn't even know about it. Just sayin'.

So where was I? Jackson Hole, Wyoming! I've been there in summer and fall, but never winter. A friend of ours was working up there for a few days and he invited us to come along. I checked the weather beforehand to figure out packing and it said snow. And more snow. And boy was it beautiful snow.

Here's the watered down recap. First up - these creepy fellers:

What's a trip to Jackson Hole without feeling like you're being stalked in each and every store? I suppose it's not their fault. I wonder if stores ever think about putting surveillance cameras in their eyes in order to catch shoplifters. If I owned a store I'd totally do that ... and then jimmyrig their eyes to move back and forth to freak people like me out. I'd probably pass out. Puuuurfect.

Anyway. Jackson was beautiful and the cold wasn't so bad as long as we were covered on nearly every square inch.

Turns out it was "Winter Fest" up there that same weekend. They were doing these ski jump shows each night which were pretty entertaining. There was even some punk tween kid who was keeping up with the rest of them. Start 'em young when they have no fear, I suppose. These are his friends (that's not him jumping, though):

Looks terrifying, right? My thoughts exactly. I'm real glad that we're all different and that some people get a thrill off of this so they can entertain the rest of us .... the ones who'd much rather get down that hill by sliding on a garbage bag.

We also took a sleigh ride out to the elk reserve. While heading to the sleigh we were told that our guide would be Meredeth. For some reason I was a bit disappointed since I had imagined some sort of authentic cowboy as our guide. Which seemed entirely unlikely with a name like that. But looky here - Meredeth was a man! A cowboy (see: bandanna), just minus the hat. And he knew his stuff, too. I've never been so fascinated with elk in my life. Good work, Cowboy Meredeth.

Elk. Lots and lots of them. Their antlers are made of calcium. Did you know that? Neither did we until Meredeth came along.

The snow was beautiful during the entire ride. The white against the black of the horses was really great.

Sidenote: this horse had mega gas. Try sitting towards the front of the sleigh right in the line of fire. Fail.

One of the restaurants we tried was the Silver Dollar. It was super loud because there was a live band (and the only table that could fit us all was right next to them), but that's also what made the atmosphere fun. And then there was this couple:

They danced EVERY song. And not the LDS singles swing dance kind -- the real kind. Which was really fun to watch. Not to mention that fact that the man was giving Wilford Brimley a run for his money with that mustache.

And of course - snowshoeing:

This was fun, I only wish we could have ventured a bit more away from the pack. But I have a feeling we would have gotten carried away and gotten ourselves lost so maybe it's all for the best.

So. Ski jumps, elk stalking, snowshoeing, trying new restaurants, movies, art galleries, HOT CHOCOLATE, hot tubbing ... yeah. Not bad at all.