Location Taken: Jackson’s Hole, Wyoming
Time Taken: June 2010
There are some parts of the world that get very… popular in the summer.
The area just south of Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks is one of them. We just drove through the area, didn’t even consider stopping at Yellowstone, and we still hit heavy traffic.
We did stop briefly at Grand Teton’s main visitor center. Partly to hit the restroom, partly to see how much it would cost us to just drive through the pretty parts of the park. The answer? Far too much. They only offered a multi-day pass, priced accordingly, and you had to buy it to get in the gates, even if you were going to leave the park in an hour or two.
So we left on the main highway through that area, which was still full of traffic. At least they can’t block off the view of the mountains behind a paywall. And I did find a really good geology book and a really good CD of mixed traditional Native American folk and modern musical sounds (We the People by Brulé, here’s a sample, my favorite from the album), so it wasn’t a complete wash.
Still, visiting places of natural beauty at the same time as thousands of other people somehow strips away half of the natural part of the beauty. Sure, it’s still pretty, but you miss out on the feeling of connecting with the natural world that you get from being alone in the wilderness.
I think it gets lost somewhere between the gas fumes from sitting in traffic and the constant chatter of teens around a fireplace the next campsite over as you try to sleep.
