Day 13: To Jenny Lake

September 9, 2004

I got up at 7:10 AM, made breakfast, then biked 2 miles to the trailhead behind Flagg Ranch. The trail crosses Polecat Creek which is knee deep but not very cold because of hot springs upstream. After a 10 minute walk I got to Huckleberry Creek. In the cold morning I could see steam rising from many places along the creek. Wit hot water in so many places it took me a few minutes to find the man made soaking pool called Huckleberry hot spring. I checked the water temperature, stripped down, and got in.

I had an early morning soak at Huckleberry hot spring.

The water temperature was very pleasant after the cold night-about 104F (40C). The pool has very little algae buildup because the flow is large enough to flush out most organic matter that grows in the water. The hot waterfall is nice, but too hot for me to stay under for more than a few seconds. I grabbed my camera and stepped into the creek to take the photo above. To my surprise, I nearly scalded my feet when stepping into the creek. The creek is hotter than the hot spring! The water flowing into the pool flows through a cooling pond to produce a tolerable temperature. But the creek had so many hot springs flowing into it that it was even hotter. I've been to many hot springs and several creek side hot springs. But never soaked in a hot pool that flows into an even hotter creek.

After a long soak I got dressed and hiked around the area. I hiked back to Polecat hot spring which was only a 15 minute walk away. Polecat has a larger pool with less water flow. Consequently it has algae on the bottom. A lot of muck is stirred up when you step into Polecat hot spring. It's not what hot spring enthusiasts would consider a primo soak. I hiked back to Huckleberry hot spring and had another short soak at about 11AM. But by then the pool was too hot for me to stay in more than a few minutes. I had read that Huckleberry is too hot most of the time during summer. But it was great early in the morning after a typical near-freezing late summer night.

I hiked back to my bike and returned to the campsite to leisurely break camp. I was in no mood to hurry because the hot soak got me very relaxed, and because today's ride should be easy. It was past noon by the time I finished packing up the tent and putting away all the laundry that was hanging to dry. So I biked across the road to the fancy restaurant at Flagg Ranch for lunch. I finally got to the highway at 1:30 PM, then waited 5 minutes for a southbound pilot car to take me through a 1/2 mile section of road construction. Finally I was free to ride south, thinking it was the last of the road construction for this trip.

After a 500 foot climb the road enters Grand Teton National Park. Shortly afterwards I was forced to ride a pilot car one more time through a 2-mile section that wasn't under construction when I passed by 11 days earlier. The pilot car took me past a fascinating convoy of repaving equipment. One giant machine grinds up the old pavement. Then another giant machine mixes oil with the ground pavement and puts down new recycled pavement. The oil was supplied by a daisy chain of 3 tanker trucks behind the paving machine. Behind the tanker trucks were two giant roller machines that packed down the new pavement. The total string of machines was at least 500 feet long. Old road goes in the front, and new recycled road comes out the back! Of course it would be easy to bike past all the machines. They're lined up on one side of the road going in a very straight path, moving only 1/2 mph. It was my last time to ride a pilot car on this tour. 5 times for a total of 8.5 miles.

Today's route has many views of Jackson Lake, or at least views of what is supposed to be Jackson Lake. The Lake is always drained some during the summer to maintain flow in the Snake river to irrigate crops downstream in Idaho. But the last 5 years of drought caused the lake to get even lower than usual for late summer. The northern half of Jackson lake was just mud flats.

The north end of Jackson lake isn't much of a lake this year.

I took the Colter Bay turnoff and went 1 mile to the end of the road to stock up on groceries. Colter Bay marina is behind the store. This was the first year ever that the marina never opened. In the previous four drought years there was still enough water to open the marina for a few weeks early in the summer. But now the water isn't even visible in the distance. Colter Bay is the main visitor area for Grand Teton National Park, with a lodge, restaurant, grocery store, marina, and large campground. It has less appeal when the lake is dry.

This was the first year ever that Colter Bay Marina never opened.

Continuing south the road passes the widest part of Jackson Lake near the dam. Here the lake looks more like a "real" lake but I could clearly see that the water level is very low.

The south end of Jackson Lake looks more like a lake.

Plenty of room for more water in Jackson Lake.

I arrived at Jenny Lake campground, elevation 6800 feet (2060m), at 6:45 PM. Jenny Lake is a popular place, the main hiking trailhead for the Grand Teton mountains. The Jenny Lake campground is small and only tent camping is permitted. No motor homes or trailers allowed. The drive-up tent campground is always full but it has a large hiker/biker camping area that is more formally "developed" than the hiker/biker campgrounds at Yellowstone.

Entrance to the Jenny Lake hiker/biker campground.

Registration board for the Jenny Lake hiker/biker campground.

Tents must be on a numbered tent pad. The bicycle rack isn't really needed with so many trees around.

The hiker/biker camp has a large supply of bear lockers.

My campsite had a view of 12,325 foot Teewinot mountain.

Tonight there is one other party of backpackers but no other bike tourists. I liked the fact that the hiker/biker area is separated from the drive-up camping area. From my campsite I couldn't see any cars and had a fantastic view of Teewinot mountain. I arrived late but still had time for a warm homebrew shower before temperature got too cold. It was dark by the time I finished making dinner.

Today I saw 4 other touring cyclists going north while I was going south. A young couple and a pair of middle aged men with Danish flags on the back of their bikes. I never talked to any of the touring cyclists I saw on the road going in the opposite direction. I'm just not that sociable and none of them made an effort to talk to me either. Sometimes the traffic conditions aren't conducive to spontaneously crossing the road for a chat. And sometimes one of us is going down a steep hill that makes it inconvenient to stop.

Today was mostly sunny with a high in the low 70's (about 22C). Because of the late start I wore short sleeves for only the second time on this trip. Today I didn't feel very strong. My right knee was a little sore-the first time I had any soreness during this trip. I also had a headwind all day and was going into the sun all day. The Tetons were almost always visible to my right but I couldn't see them very well because it was looking into the sun. None of this really mattered because it was a short (mileage) day with minimal climbing.

Distance: 40.4 miles (64.6 km)

Climbing: 1420 feet (430m)

Average speed: 9.7 mph (15.5 km/h)

Maximum speed: 41.7 mph (66.7 km/h)

Hiking: 3 miles (4.8 km)

Today's ride: 40 miles (64 km)
Total: 607 miles (977 km)

Rate this entry's writing	Heart	1
Comment on this entry	Comment	0