Last Day in Yellowstone Part 4

Canyon Lodge Inn restaurant

Day 4....We are on our last day in Yellowstone, October 24th. The inn closes in just a few days, on the 31st, to get ready for a changeover in tourists from fall to winter, then the park and the inn will reopen. The night before, we ate at the 50's style restaurant in the inn as it was the only place open. We tried both breakfast and dinner there the two days we stayed. The food was meh, some of the items were cold on the buffet and Sparky got food poisoning that night. It was touch and go whether we would be able to explore on our last day in the park, but Sparky was determined to get out for one last drive to see Grand Teton National Park. We had never visited there. After popping some immodium AD, she was good to go the next morning, despite being up half the night.....She was bound and determined we were going to visit Grand Teton National Park!

the porch

Canyon Lodge-Rhyolite section of the hotel

As an aside...the lodge was beautiful. We picked a nicer room with a porch that we thought would be a nice addition. If you get a ground room, the porch has such a big overhang, it's very dark. We were disappointed in that part, but the room itself was gorgeous. We think an upstairs room would have a prettier porch based on some web photos we saw.

Off we went.....our wildlife tally for our last day in the park was: 5 elk along the river, and 4 separate bison sightings of lone ones out in the fields. The low last night was 20 degrees so it was frosty cold out there! It's a 1.5 hour drive from Canyon Lodge to Grand Teton National Park which is worth a trip while in the area. We stopped at beautiful viewpoints along the road into the park, (route 89/191/287 South) but nothing was open, everything was closed due to the government shutdown. The road through the park is a loop of about 42 miles and takes about an hour to an hour and half to drive if you are stopping here and there.

T.A. Moulton Barn

Sparky wanted to see one of the most famous sites in Grand Teton National Park and that was the Moulton Barns on Mormon Row. These are two iconic barns constructed in 1908, by John Moulton and T.A. Moulton, and they are close to Jackson Hole, in an area called Antelope Flats between the towns of Kelly and Moose, Wyoming. The John Moulton Barn has a four sided roof, and the T.A. Moulton Barn has a triangle shaped roof. Because of the setting of the Tetons in the background, it's a VERY popular place for artists, photographers and tourists who try to capture THE perfect photo of the setting. Note: the roads into Mormon row are full of potholes and just dirt road. The barns are closed so you can't go inside.

John Moulton Barn

After exploring Mormon Row and the barns a bit, we headed into the town of Jackon Hole. Sparky loves the antler covered arches in each corner of the park in the middle of the town. 

Such a cool town with unique shopping and stores galore. Sparky loved a store that was loaded with mostly cowboy hats and boots. We were hungry so we stopped at the Roadhouse Pub and Brewery and had a great lunch. Eldy had fish and Sparky had Chicken Tingo Tacos. Yum!

There was a National Museum of Wildlife that Sparky REALLY wanted to stop at, on the outskirts of Jackson Hole, but it was late in the afternoon and we were running out of time...Next time, for sure! The outside of it was very very cool. Also for next time, we hope to see three other famous landscape photo op sites. They are: Schwabacher Landing, Snake River Overlook, and Oxbow Bend. 

By the time we arrived back at the inn, it was snack time and we headed to the bar area of the restaurant. There we met some great people and had a wonderful converstation with a fireman who now does snow removal and readiness for the winter season of the park and a couple from Hawaii with whom we shared RV information and travels. The fireman told us some great stories about winter rescues, animal sightings, and how the park gets ready for the influx of winter tourists with the use of special snow machines that level and pack the snow to establish a base layer for snow machine and snow mobiles. There is about a six week interval between the fall closure of the park and the winter opening. We thoroughly enjoyed meeting other people and conversing with them that night!

We left the next morning at 8:00 AM for Bozeman. We saw a lone bison with a very frosty back laying in the field waiting for the sun to warm him up. We saw more elk by the road. We had a wonderful trip with wonderful weather and think mid October is a great time to visit the park. The number of tourists was WAY down. There was never a time where we had trouble finding a place to park nor were any sites too congested. It was really great! We really lucked out on the weather, nasty winter weather was predicted and arrived about two days after we got back home to Indiana. 

Thank you for following along with our travels and best wishes for a Happy New Year!

Bozeman to Dallas to Indy-this is Dallas at night