The Teets!

Oh good golly miss Molly, this is our fourth day in Grand Teton National Park and I think I have found my favorite site of the trip. The Tetons still have snow on them giving them a Swiss Alps sort of vibe that makes me feel like I am in Frankenstein. There are 5 main peaks to the Grand Tetons going from right to left: Teewinot, Mt. Owen, Grand Teton, Middle Teton, and South Teton. I only know this because the name Teewinot is awesome and I wanted to learn which one it was. I love being here because it is exactly what I had in mind when I thought about the Rocky Mountains. Prior to the trip, I had no idea what the Badlands where, so I had no idea what to expect and I was pleasantly surprised. The Black Hills were good, but they never blew me away. The Tetons are exactly what I was hoping for when I signed up for the May X and it is so surreal to be here now. It's funny how I applied to come on this trip months ago and the trip seemed like a far off thing that was never going to get here, but now I'm finally here and it's like I'm in a dream. Although I don't remember much of my dreams so I hope I can make these memories last. 

We arrived at 5 the first day so the majority of our day was spent in the van that Elly has nicknamed the Geologic Van of Discovery. I am neither a fan of long car rides nor of being close to other people so my uncomfortableness is not looked back on with fond memories, but I'm here to talk about the good things. The views of the range got better and better. The Rockies started to form ten million years ago, but they are very young compared to the age of the earth, which is around 4.6 billion years, and the Appalachian Mountains are much older. The Tetons are very steep and jagged due to erosion by glaciers and water. Basically glaciers formed on the Tetons during the ice age and then when the earth started to warm the glaciers slid down the mountians, this is called glacial advance. While the glaciers advanced from their resting places they brought massive rocks with them, and the rocks grinded against the bigger rock of the mountain and eroded it. People give a lot of credit to glaciers for forming the mountains, but the ice age started 2 million years ago meaning that there are 8 million glacier-free years that were open to water erosion. 

We are staying in a place called Gros Ventre ( pronounced grow vant) and between us and the Tetons is a smaller formation called Blacktail Butte that is about a mile away. Don't worry the e is not silent so it's not pronounced butt, believe me, I tried and have gotten corrected many times. Since we have developed a mutual exploring interest, Kelsey and I hiked to the top of the butte at 7 o'clock one morning. I was worried that I would not be up to do it so early because I stayed up till 12 the night before watching a meteor shower (I saw 5!). The butte looks like a little hill, so we thought it would be very easy, but size is very deceiving out here in the west. Us being the smart people we are decided it would be quickest to go straight up the almost vertical part of the butte because it was shorter and had less vegetation. That was a silly decision. We made it to the top! Kelsey almost had an asthma attack and I was dehydrated because I didn't bring water, but we made it. The view of the Tetons is basically the same everywhere you go, so we had already seen the view before at an overlook. Despite the view not being better, it's still the Teton mountains. It's 70 degrees every day and they still have snow on them. When we got to the top we took pictures, Kelsey's were of the landscape and mine were of Kelsey struggling to get up the butte, but no picture could really capture our experience. It was beautiful to start our day off accomplish something. It was a great confidence booster and it was also mediative process since it was just us and the land.

For those who have not had the pleasure of meeting Kelsey this is her.

Later Skater