Solitude Lake Kicks Bob's &#@ and a Moose Nearly Finishes the Job

Thursday, August 20 - Grand Teton National Park.



A view of the Tetons early in the morning on my drive from Signal Mountain to Jenny Lake. I had talked with one of the Rangers at Jenny Lake the day before about a hike that would get me up about 2000 feet. They suggested I hike to Solitude Lake, which is nine miles one way and an elevation gain of about 2250 feet. Much longer and higher than anything I had done so far, but I thought I would give it a go. The first two miles took me back over what I had hiked the day before - two miles around the lake and then up 400 feet to Inspiration Point. From there, you walked up a beautiful canyon following a really nice creek. It gently climbed through the canyon, but when I had about a mile to go and about 800 feet of elevation left, I knew the end of the hike would be tough. It was. At that elevation and after walking nearly eight miles already, my legs and lungs were not liking that last mile. But I would take short thirty second power rests and then walk another hundred feet and eventually I got to the lake. I have never been so happy to see a body of water in my life!


As you can see (left and below), the lake is absolutely pristine. It doesn't look very big in the pictures, but some other visitors (for a lake named Solitude, there were quite a few people there) walked around to get on one of the snow glaciers that came all the way down to the lake. At the other side, you could barely see them they were so small, so the lake was larger than it looked.

I had to wait a few minutes after arriving for this picture so that the pain had left my face. After having some lunch of jerky, cashews and a Cliff Bar, I layed on the rocks and soaked up some sun (too much, my sunscreen must have faded by then). Between the warm sun and the cool mountain breeze, it was glorious and I could have layed on that rock for hours and been perfectly happy. Unfortunately, I had nine more miles to hike back, so after about forty five minutes of rest, I headed back down.

I just loved all the little snow glaciers that were right there at the lake, including this one that actually kisses the lake - awesome in August!

The first seven miles of the hike down felt great and I was moving right along. I think I can walk forever - its the climbing that I have to get better at.

Near the bottom of the canyon, I was thinking how I was a bit disappointed that I hadn't seen much of any wildlife. I was at a place where the trees opened up for a nice view of the mountains, so I decided to take a picture. I'm glad that I paused there a minute.

Right as I finished taking my last picture, I heard a crack to my left and turned around and there crashing down the hill toward me was this moose. This picture is not zoomed in any way - it was live action. He did stop about five feet from hitting me to eat something off a tree just off the trail. Two other hikers (Spain and Argentina) who I had met up with and chatted along the trail came up at that moment and we all were snapping pictures of this giant creature. He was so close I was a bit worried that he would swing around and his antlers (or whatever a moose rack is called) would probably have knocked me over. Amazingly, we all stood there taking pictures and Mr. Moose was oblivious to us for about thirty seconds and then he gets this starttled look and heads down the trail (below) causing other hikers to get off the trail and start taking pictures. Simply amazing to see one of these things up close.

After the moose encounter, I got to the bottom of the canyon at the lake. I only had two more miles to go and everything to that point had been downhill. I had forgotten a bit how much up and down there was on that lake loop trail and I must say my legs had very little "up" left in them, so those last two miles were killers. I was also a bit sun baked, so when I got to my car, I headed back to camp and promptly sat myself down in my camp chair and had one beer (yes, one from the Snake River Brewing Company). I must admit I did little else the rest of the afternoon and evening I was so wiped out from that hike. All together, 18.2 miles and 2250 feet of elevation. Its roughly the length of the first epic hike I am planning - Half Dome at Yosemite, but its only half the elevation, so I have a lot of work to do to get ready for that.