There are a total of 12 permits available, but the trip is currently capped at 8. If we get all 8 spots filled and you want one of the other spots, e-mail me directly and we can discuss.



***Forgot the topo map/route! Here ya go! http://hikearizona.com/map.php?MY=5759&M=6



Mountains of the Imagination



“Rising above a scene rich with extraordinary wildlife, pristine lakes, and alpine terrain, the Teton Range stands monument to the people who fought to protect it. These are mountains of the imagination. Mountains that led to the creation of Grand Teton National Park where you can explore over two hundred miles of trails, float the Snake River, or enjoy the serenity of this remarkable place. “ – NPS website.



Our journey has us backpacking. I was lucky enough to score some of these coveted permits and have designed an awesome, epic trip for us to enjoy. We will be camping in 3 different spots in the backcountry and get to see some truly, truly wonderful things.



Lions, Tigers, and Bears…Oh My! - ok wait, it’s just bears…



Black and grizzly bears thrive in the park and parkway. No, that’s not a typo at all…I really did write “grizzly”. I told you this trip would be epic, didn’t I? Anyways, there are detailed guidelines listed in the backcountry trip planner that will keep us safe. I’ll be frank…with bears there is no guarantee of safety…but as long as we are smart, as long as we follow the rules, we will be just fine. Oh, and all of the group sites have bear-boxes near them for our use…so that will help take care of that! ***Also please note that we will have to hike with bear cans. We can pick them up from the rangers when we grab our physical permits.



Travel Info



Because of the distance away, and to simplify the logistics of having 12 people for this trip, I am planning on renting a 15-passenger van. There will be plenty of room for all of our gear. Anyways, the drive is right around 1000 miles from Phoenix…or 15 ½ hours of drive-time. We will meet in Phoenix at 9:00am Thursday, jump in the van, and head north. There a ton of great camping sites on the way to the park, but a few in particular are near (but still outside) of the park itself. As of now, I planning on driving to one of those campsites in one straight shot…of course we will be stopping for lunch, dinner, restroom breaks, gas, etc. along the way. We should get to the campground outside of the park around 1:00am or so...(probably more ‘or so’). We’ll get in to camp, we’ll setup, crash out, then wake with one of the most majestic mountain ranges in the country as our morning backdrop. Friday morning we will head to the park, grab our physical permits and bear cans, and start off on our trip.



July Weather



Bring rain-gear. You would be wearing it this time of year anywhere in Arizona, and here in the Tetons, it’s no different. You can expect periods of rain most likely every day, but from what I have heard they are just like the rains in the San Juans…so they build in the late mornings, release in the afternoons, and dissipate by the evenings. Even without rain, there will be a TON of water in these mountains…you’re bound to get wet somehow!



Average Daily High – 81°



Average Daily Low – 42°



Record High – 97°



Record Low – 26°



Days above 90° – 3



Days below 32° - 1



Itinerary (exact trail information and routing to come)



Day 0 – Thursday night/Friday morning at TBD



Day 1 – Friday night camping at Granite Middle/South Fork Group Site - ( http://www.nps.gov/grte/planyourvisit/upload/granopen.pdf )



Day 2 – Saturday night camping at Death Canyon Shelf Group Site – ( http://www.nps.gov/grte/planyourvisit/upload/DC.pdf )



Day 3 – Sunday night camping at South Fork Cascade Group Site – This is the one I’m most excited about…we will have Grand Teton (and the other 2) directly in our view and almost spittin’ distance from some of the glaciers. We will probably do most of our exploring of this area on Saturday, but this will also be camp for the night. ( http://www.nps.gov/grte/planyourvisit/upload/cascsf.pdf )



Day 4 – Out and drive back.



RSVPing



Costs - The cost of the trip is $123.88 per person. With 12 people going, this amount had everything factored in. The RSVP fee is going to cover all permit costs, all park costs, all camping costs, all vehicle rental cost contributions, and all fuel costs. So when you look at what your costs are covering, we’re really all getting a smoking deal!



Guests - Please note that there are no guests allowed on this trip. Because of the rareity of the trip, I am limiting the attendance to group members only. If there’s someone you want to go with you, have them signup for the group… If you want to take a guest, and they do not want to join the group itself, please contact me with the reasons and that you still want to go (I will evaluate this on a case-by-case basis).



Information



Grand Teton Park Site - http://www.nps.gov/grte/index.htm



Grant Teton Park Map - http://www.nps.gov/grte/planyourvisit/upload/GRTE_park_map_2011.pdf



Backcountry Trip Planner - http://www.nps.gov/grte/planyourvisit/upload/Backcountry13_web.pdf



The only thing remaining for this trip will be to select a campground near/in vicinity of the park that we can camp at Thursday night (Friday morning really). I will work on that component soon. For now, everything else is in place…



To make the most of our experience in the 3 short nights we will be in the park, we will be making use of the park shuttle. I am basing everything on the current shuttle provider in the park, Alltrans. The shuttle isn’t too bad at all at $14 for a day. That said, there is no point in having all of us take the shuttle…we will just have one or two people take the shuttle back to the van and then they can bring it up to the rest of the group at that point.The shuttle segment one or two of us will have to take runs from the visitor center at Jenny Lake, which is very near where we will come out of the Tetons via Cascade Canyon, back down to the van at the Craig Thomas Discovery and Visitor Center in Moose. Upon arriving back at the van, we will load up and start the journey back to the valley.



Friday



Friday morning is when we will be first entering the park. We will start by getting our permits at the Craig Thomas Discovery & Visitor Center. The earliest we can pick up the permits is when the office opens up, which is at 8:00am. We will also plan on parking here at the center so this will be our starting point of the trip. After getting our permits at the visitor center in Moose, we will be hiking to the trailhead we’re using for the Granite Canyon trail that we are taking up to our Day 1 campsite. Although not necessarily as remarkable as it will be once we enter the backcountry, we will still be enjoying some excellent views of the park and the Teton Range from the road.



From the center, we have just shy of 6 miles that we need to hike to the trailhead. We should make a pretty good pace as the total elevation gain of this segment is 161ft. If we get our permits at 8 and leave the center by 9, I figure this puts us at the trailhead right around 11:30am.



Friday afternoon we will be hiking our way from the trailhead up Granite Canyon. After approximately 5.9 miles, we will reach one of the Park Service’s patrol cabins. If we haven’t eaten lunch yet, we can definitely do it here…though I anticipate that we will have eaten prior to this point. Total elevation gain for this 6 mile stretch is 1,614 ft.



From the patrol cabin, we will be turning south on the Rendezvous Mountain Trail, which we will continue on for a total of 1.6 miles. At this point we will arrive at a trail junction with the Middle-Fork Cutoff trail, and we will be turning right (west) to continue on the Middle-Fork Cutoff trail. The cutoff trail goes for .6 miles before intersecting with the Teton Crest Trail. Total elevation gain for this 2.2 mile stretch is 1,007 ft.



At the junction of the Middle-Fork Cutoff trail and the Teton Crest trail, we will turn right (north) for .4 miles until arriving at our Friday night group campsite. This last segment of trail Friday will have a total elevation gain of -108 ft.



Day 1 Totals – 14.48 miles – 2,564 ft. elevation gain - 6,454ft. low point – 9,016ft.high point



Saturday



Saturday morning we will break camp and leave our first night’s campsite and head to where we will be staying on night 2. If there is an ‘easy’ or short day to this trip, Saturday is the one, so we should be able to really, really enjoy this one. That said, this still won’t necessarily be an ‘easy’ day, as if there is a time when we are going to need our ice axes, I suspect that this will be the day.



Our destination for the day is the Death Canyon Shelf Group Site. From our first day’s site to our second day’s site, we only have 5.2 miles to hike. Saturday we will spend the entirety of the day on the Teton Crest Trail.



Day 2 Totals – 5.2 miles – 786 ft. elevation gain – 8,898 ft. low point – 9,734 ft. high point



Sunday



Sunday morning we will break camp and make our way from the Death Canyon Shelf to what I consider to be the true crown jewel of our trip…the South Fork Cascade group site. Sunday presents us with a nice, full day, but shouldn’t be anything to worry about as we will have had a nice and easy Saturday behind us (ideally Saturday is our big recharge day) and we will be well acclimated to the elevations at this point.



Sunday finds us with a just shy of 10 mile day. This day also has us on the Teton Crest Trail for the majority of the day. During the 10 miles we have to do on Sunday, along the Teton Crest Trail, we will be going down the Sheep Steps, passing through Alaska Basin (which oddly isn’t actually in Grand Teton National Park), and making our way over Hurricane Pass, just before beginning to drop down to the South Fork Cascade Canyon and on to our campsite.



Day 3 Totals – 10 miles – 1,052 ft. elevation gain – 8,640 ft. low point – 10,540 ft. high point



Monday



Monday morning we will try and get as early start as possible by breaking camp and starting our way down to the main park road and, ultimately, back to the van so we can begin the long drive back. Remember that the drive is right around 1,000 miles, so we have a good 15 ½ hours just to get back to the valley once we start heading back. This means a couple of things… 1, we want to get on the road as early as we can on Monday. 2, there is a good chance that we will not make it back to the valley by the listed 10:00pm end time. 3, we will take turns driving in whatever way we have to in order to not put all of the responsibility on one person. 4, we will be able to rest when we aren’t driving or doing shotgun duties, so none of us should be in too bad of shape when we do get back to the valley.



Monday will be a bit of a whirlwind…but our trek out is really straight forward. From our South Fork Cascade campsite of Sunday night, we have a just under 8 miles hike to get to the Lake Jenny visitor center. We stay straight down Cascade Canyon while hiking, until we get really close to the lake and then we work our way around the southern end. From the Lake Jenny visitor center, we’ll pick two people that will take the Alltrans shuttle down to Moose to pickup the van and head back up to Lake Jenny to get the rest of the group. After everyone is all accounted for and loaded up in the van, we’ll start our long drive back to the P-h-X.



***Remember*** Because of our travel distance and time constraints, we need to break camp on Monday morning EARLY…as much as I hate to say it…as much as I cringe by saying it…and as reluctant as I am to say it…we need to shoot for leaving camp by 6:30am. If we hit the 6:30am camp departure time on Monday, we will be in overall pretty good shape. I figure that we can cover the 8 miles, all of which are downhill at this point, in just over 2.5 hours. This isn’t as hard as it may sound, as 3.2 mph is VERY achievable, even when not in all-out full-speed mode, when you are going downhill.



If the above holds true, we’ll get to the Jenny Lake Visitor center right around 9:00am, and presumably be all loaded up and in the van, heading out of the park by 10:00am. Keeping this timeline, we will arrive back in Phoenix at 1:30am Tuesday.



Any delays or cases where we spend more time than expected, will just put us back in Phoenix that much later. I do apologize for the tightness of this all, but it is really just a side-effect of planning a trip to a destination 1,000 miles away when we aren’t flying. I’m not worried though, because I just consider things like this a part of the cost of a truly epic trip.



Day 4 Totals – 8 miles - -1,877 ft. elevation gain (loss) – 8,665 ft. high point – 6,803 ft. low point



***Forgot the topo map/route! Here ya go! http://hikearizona.com/map.php?MY=5759&M=6