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TR - Teton Crest Trail in Grand Teton NP (Aug 24-27)

Posted: Thu Sep 06, 2018 5:09 pm
by jartelt
Aug 24-27 I hiked a loop through Grand Teton National Park that included much of the Teton Crest Trail. This a bucket list hike for me because I have really wanted to backpack in the Tetons for several years! I finally convinced my wife to go to WY with me and backpack in the mountains...

We had a great hike for the first 3 days and were treated to some great scenery. On the 4th day, there was a snow storm and we were not able to over the Paintbrush Divide pass. The visibility was just too bad to attempt to make it over the pass. We ended up just leaving the park a day early because we were tired, wet, and cold. Overall we really enjoyed the hike though. We had great weather for the day we hiked over Hurricane Pass, which provides awesome views of the Tetons. If given the opportunity, I would totally do the hike again, though I would try to go in the first or second week of August to avoid snow.

The rough itinerary was as follows:

Day 1: Taggart Lake Trailhead to Lower Granite Canyon
Day 2: Lower Granite Canyon to Death Canyon Shelf
Day 3: Death Canyon Shelf to South Fork Cascade
Day 4: South Fork Cascade to Lake Solitude and then back to Jenny Lake (aborted attempt to get over Paintbrush Divide)

I wrote up a full trip report with tons of pictures, maps, and other trail info. It can be found here: https://backpackers-review.com/trip-rep ... est-trail/

Here are some pictures of a few highlights:

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Re: TR - Teton Crest Trail in Grand Teton NP (Aug 24-27)

Posted: Thu Sep 06, 2018 9:04 pm
by Wandering Daisy
Great photos! I drove through Jackson on the 24th and the smoke was thick. It looks like the smoke was not that bad up where you were. I had heard about the snow from friends in Lander. Great route- I will have to do that some day.

Re: TR - Teton Crest Trail in Grand Teton NP (Aug 24-27)

Posted: Fri Sep 07, 2018 7:31 am
by jartelt
There was a decent amount of haze on the first and second days of the trek. It rained the second night though, so it cleared up a bit. The air was pretty good on the 3rd day and then it was cloudy/stormy the 4th day. The haze at the beginning definitely lessened the views. You could see the peaks nearest to you, but couldn't really make out the peaks further behind. Thankfully it cleared up by the time we got to Hurricane Pass!