Jackson Hole Magazine // Summer 2022

Jackson Hole SUMMER 2022

YELLOWSTONE AT 150 Looking at the park’s past and future.

[COMPLIMENTARY COPY]

ANSEL ADAMS

DOG HEAVEN

DECK DINING

A life lived wild is a life well lived.

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Teton Pines Country Club offers our members a place to connect with friends and family, savoring each experience one moment at a time.

We invite you to your home away from home in Jackson Hole.

This summer our members are looking forward to a completely renovated Arnold Palmer Design golf course, new, state of the art, outdoor racquet sports facilities featuring two tennis and four dedicated pickleball courts as well as a dedicated adult lap pool and family pool facilities.

Teton Pines Country Club currently maintains a waitlist for membership.

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FEATURES JACKSON HOLE SUMMER 2022

ON THE COVER: German-American painter Albert Bierstadt traveled to Yellowstone National Park in 1881 and painted Yellowstone Falls (ca. 1881) based on sketches from that trip.

Today the painting hangs in the Whitney Western Art Museum in Cody, Wyoming. See other Bierstadt paintings at the National Museum of Wildlife Art here in Jackson.

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JACKSON’S UNSUNG MOUNTAIN ATHLETES Some of the valley’s best athletes don't advertise their adventures.

BY MOLLY ABSOLON

120

WHEN DID CAMPING GET SO HARD? More people discovering the joys of car camping means campsites are getting harder and harder to come by.

BY MOLLY ABSOLON

132

PHOTO ESSAY: ANSEL ADAMS

BY BRADLY J. BONER PHOTOGRAPHY BY ANSEL ADAMS

YELLOWSTONE AT 150: A TIME FOR CELEBRATION AND REFLECTION Yellowstone’s resources are as healthy now as they’ve been since the park was founded, but that wasn’t always the case, and we have work to do to ensure they stay that way for future generations.

BY MIKE KOSHMRL

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SUMMER 2022 | JACKSON HOLE

B R A D LY J . B O N E R

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CONTENTS JACKSON HOLE SUMMER 2022

BY JIM MAHAFFIE

32

BY DINA MISHEV

36

Wild Things

BY DINA MISHEV

44

Hats

BY BRIGID MANDER

50

HELLO

58

BLAST FROM THE PAST

Meet Ponteir Sackrey and Cam Sholly Night of Havoc

BY JIM STANFORD

20

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SUMMER 2022 | JACKSON HOLE

Snake River Roasting TASTE OF JACKSON HOLE

Bubba’s Worker’s Special ART

Art Evolution

BY JIM MAHAFFIE

82

CULTURE

Tim Sandlin

BY WHITNEY ROYSTER

86

DESIGN

Insider Eye

BY MAGGIE THEODORA

96

JACKSON HOLE ICON

Top of the World

JH PANTRY

BY SAMANTHA SIMMA

GO DEEP

BY SAMANTHA SIMMA

46

74

ALL YOU NEED

On the River

The Valley’s Best Outdoor Dining

BY SAMANTHA SIMMA

MY JACKSON HOLE LIFE

BY HELEN OLSSON

42

72

ANATOMY OF

Snow King’s Expansion

FOOD

BY SAMANTHA SIMMA

BOOKS

Read These

68

HEALTH

Move On

BY LILA EDYTHE

100

CHOOSE YOUR

OWN ADVENTURE

Why Does My Body Hurt?

BY WHITNEY ROYSTER

148 148

Dog Heaven

154

Highpoint

158

Walk and Learn

162

Wild & Mild

168

Do Yellowstone Differently

172

JACKSON HOLE MAP

174

CALENDAR

176

AS THE HOLE DEEPENS

BY SAMANTHA SIMMA

BY SUE MUNCASTER

BY KELSEY DAYTON

BY LILA EDYTHE

BY SOFIA MCGULICK

BY TIM SANDLIN

ELISE MAHAFFIE

BY MIKE KOSHMRL

31

68

LOCAL KNOWLEDGE

Kate Wilmot

EXPLORE

L ATHAM JENKINS

30 30

ENJOY

B R A D LY J . B O N E R

LOCAL LIFE

HOWDY

DEREK STAL

EDITOR'S LETTER

I

’m writing this on a mid-March day. Last week, it had been almost two months since we’d had significant snowfall, and there were a couple of days when the temperature got to almost 60 degrees. I walked around downtown in a t-shirt and flip-flops. This morning, it was minus-5 degrees and the surrounding mountains sparkle with 20 inches of new

the wedding ceremony. And, after the tram at Jackson Hole Mountain Resort was closed last summer for maintenance, I cannot wait to hike up to the Top of the World (“Jackson Hole Icon,” p. 46), enjoy a waffle at Corbet’s Cabin, and make my knees happy by riding the tram down.

Writer Samantha Simma’s story “The Valley’s Best Outdoor Dining” is like a challenge: How many of the decks she covered can I hit? And which ones do I need to visit multiple times to make sure I try everything I want on the menu? (The answer: all of them.)

Because it’s not every day that a national park celebrates its 150th birthday, we’ve dedicated a substantial portion of this issue to Yellowstone National Park. There’s a profile of the park’s superintendent, Cam Sholly (“Hello,” p. 54) in which the Gardiner High School (which is at the park’s northern entrance) grad shares some of his favorite things about the park. It’d take a book to present a moderately thorough guide to Yellowstone, but in the “Explore” section of this issue, our “Ultimate Guide to Yellowstone” (p. 166) focuses on some of the park’s highlights, both well- and lesser-known.

In the feature well, we’ve got a Yellowstone article by journalist Mike Koshmrl (“Yellowstone at 150: A Time for Celebration and Reflection,” p. 138). In this, Koshmrl, the former environmental reporter at the Jackson Hole News&Guide who now covers issues across the state of Wyoming for the nonprofit WyoFile, looks back at the park’s first 150 years and what the future might look like for it as visitation continues

Because it’s not every day that a national park celebrates its 150th birthday, we’ve dedicated a substantial portion of this issue to Yellowstone National Park. snow. Usually I love winter, but between last week’s warm weather and editing all of the stories about how great summer is in Jackson Hole for this issue of the magazine, I’m ready for the snow to end and melt. As quickly as possible.

I’m ready to try the new zip line at Snow King—it’s the steepest one in the U.S.; you can reach speeds of 60 mph (“Anatomy Of,” p. 32). In mid-June, my boyfriend and I are getting married on the summit of the King and are only half joking when we say we should take the zip line down after

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SUMMER 2022 | JACKSON HOLE

to climb. “In the 150 years of Yellowstone, the National Park Service has done a great job of managing and recovering wildlife and natural resources, but how are we going to manage ourselves?” he asks.

As always, I hope you enjoy reading this issue of Jackson Hole magazine as much as I’ve enjoyed editing it.

— DINA MISHEV

@JACKSONHOLEMAG

@MYSPIRITANIMALISATREX

More than a branch, our roots are decades deep.

P R OUDLY S E RV I NG TH E JACKS O N H O L E COM M UNI TY FOR 4 0 Y E A R S .

307•732 • BOJ H | BOJ H .CO M

Jackson Hole S U M M E R 2022 // J A C K S O N H O L E M A G A Z I N E.C O M

How are you celebrating the 150th anniversary of Yellowstone National Park?

PUBLISHER Kevin Olson By reading all of Yellowstone winterkeeper Jeff Henry’s books about the park.

Finally springing for the Pendleton Yellowstone coffee mug I’ve been coveting forever at the Fishing Bridge General Store.

Reading Empire of Shadows: The Epic Story of Yellowstone

by George Black—so many cool bits of lore and stories that I never knew.

By disappearing into an obscure, quiet corner of it.

In the spring, I rode my bike on the roads after they were plowed but before they opened to cars. It’s a different and special experience to enjoy Yellowstone with so few people and no cars.

With a drive to Cody to enjoy views of steam rising around Yellowstone Lake and the gorgeous Sylvan Pass.

ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER Adam Meyer EDITOR Dina Mishev ART DIRECTOR Elise Mahaffie PHOTO EDITOR Bradly J. Boner COPY EDITOR Bevin Wallace CONTRIBUTING WRITERS Molly Absolon Kelsey Dayton Lila Edythe Mike Koshmrl Jim Mahaffie Brigid Mander Sofia McGulick Sue Muncaster Helen Olsson Whitney Royster Tim Sandlin Samantha Simma Jim Stanford Maggie Theodora Rachel Walker CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS David Agnello Louis Arevalo Cheryl Callen Price Chambers Ryan Dorgan Audrey Hall Kaare Iverson Latham Jenkins Rugile Kaladyte Aaron Kraft Sankar Raman Andrew Schrum Karen Wattenmaker Kathryn Ziesig ADVERTISING SALES Alyson Klaczkiewicz

Taking my kids camping in the park for the first time.

Hoping to spend a long weekend in the Yellowstone backcountry, plucking cutthroat trout from the Snake River headwaters.

Getting new bearproof trashcans to protect the roving grizzly #399 and her cubs, and waiting for late September to explore the Becher Area.

By checking out Brad Boner’s photos from then and now in the book Yellowstone National Park Through the Lens of Time.

Toasting with the specialty beer Snake River Brewing made in honor of the park’s birthday.

Supporting Yellowstone Forever, an organization that funds many programs, research, and education opportunities.

DIGITAL CAMPAIGN MANAGER Tatum Mentzer AD DESIGN & PRODUCTION Sarah Wilson Lydia Redzich Heather Haseltine Luis F. Ortiz Chelsea Robinson DISTRIBUTION Jayann Carlisle Oscar Garcia Perez

© 2022 Jackson Hole magazine. All rights reserved. No part of this production may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher. No responsibility will be assumed for unsolicited editorial contributions. Manuscripts or other material to be returned must be accompanied by a self-addressed, stamped envelope adequate to return the material.

Jackson Hole magazine is published semiannually. Send subscription requests to: Jackson Hole magazine, P.O. Box 7445, Jackson, Wyoming 83002. (307) 732-5900. Email: dina@jhmagazine.com. Visit jacksonholemagazine.com.

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SUMMER 2022 | JACKSON HOLE

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JIM MAHAFFIE (“Art Evolution,” p. 76) first came to Jackson in the 1980s and stayed in a Dodge van in the Mangy Moose parking lot with a couple of other guys. He has upgraded since then, in both company and accommodations, and now lives in Teton Village with his wife, Elise, and Boomer and Vivian, two Bernese mountain dogs.

He still wonders how he ever got so lucky that he could live in the Tetons and write for a living.

DAVID STUBBS

ELISE MAHAFFIE

CONTRIBUTORS JIM STANFORD (“Night of Havoc,” p. 58) moved to Jackson in 1992 after studying history, English, and basketball at Duke University. He spent nearly a decade on the staff of the Jackson Hole News and later the Jackson Hole News&Guide before serving eight years on the Jackson Town Council.

Each summer he rows the Snake River in Grand Teton National Park as a guide for Barker-Ewing Scenic Trips.

YOUR GUESTS WILL LOVE BEING OUR GUESTS.

Like you, we look forward to visiting family and friends, but it can be overwhelming.

Let us help by designing a custom, private excursion. Whether it’s a national park tour, a day of activities and adventure, or a unique family celebration, your guests are our guests. LET US BE THE GUIDE.

307-222-0412 G REAT W EST ERNEXPEDIT IO NS.C O M DESIGN YOUR OWN ADVENTURE GROUPS FAMILIES EVENTS

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SUMMER 2022 | JACKSON HOLE

HELEN OLSSON (“My Jackson Hole Life,” p. 36) is the author of The Down & Dirty Guide to Camping with Kids and the editor-inchief of the newly launched Peak magazine, covering all things luxe and fabulous in the Western U.S. She’s been an editor for Epic Life, Skiing magazine, and Outdoor Retailer’s The Daily, and her stories have appeared in Elevation Outdoors, pbs.org, and AARP The Magazine. In 2009, she wrote about JHMR’s new tram for The New York Times.

MADYSON PULASKI

CARLO NASISSE

CONTRIBUTORS BRIGID MANDER (“Jackson Hole Icon,” p. 46) is a skier and writer based in Jackson and a regular contributor to various ski, bike, and outdoor magazines who has lived in three countries for skiing and traveled to many more. She is entirely convinced that, in addition to the excellent views at the Top of World above the JHMR tram, nearby Corbet’s Cabin offers the best hot chocolate in the Western hemisphere.

PUB-JHM22

JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

27

LOCAL LIFE PEOPLE AND PL ACES THAT ARE JACKSON HOLE

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SUMMER 2022 | JACKSON HOLE

B R A D LY J . B O N E R

YELLOWSTONE LAKE is the largest lake above 7,000 feet in elevation in North America. The lake’s Flat Mountain Arm is one of three sections on which only hand-propelled watercraft are allowed (motor boats are allowed on the majority of the lake). The lake, which is in Yellowstone National Park, is roughly 20 miles long and 14 miles wide, with 141 miles of shoreline.

JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

29

LOCAL LIFE LOCAL KNOWLEDGE

Kate Wilmot

Jackson Hole. In the spring, she cherishes marveling at megafauna’s wondrous migrations. “One of my favorite things to watch is elk coming off the refuge, tailing a lead cow,” she says. “It’s inspiring for me to see that.” In the summer, she sometimes turns her attention to the less-heralded species that call GTNP home. Last year she was out looking for a conflict black bear at Phelps Lake and was biding her time on the lakeshore. Fish fins kept breaking the surface. “They were Utah suckers spawning,” Wilmot says. “It was so cool.”

Wilmot was a city girl decades before she was a branch manager leading a team of biologists in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. She was born and raised in New York City, the daughter of an attorney father and psychologist and university professor mother. Her family was not particularly outdoorsy, and her lone sibling, a younger brother, followed a more conventional path; he lives in the Big Apple and works for Google. But early on, Wilmot found herself drawn to the natural world. Living in one of the largest metro areas in the world, she took what she could get; Long Island bike rides to look for whitetail deer were one pastime.

Wilmot’s introduction to working with bears and people in Grand Teton National Park roughly coincided with B R A D LY J . B O N E R

Longtime Grand Teton National Park bear manager is loving her new role leading the park’s fish and wildlife divisions. // BY MIKE KOSHMRL

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SUMMER 2022 | JACKSON HOLE

I

n early 2021, longtime Grand Teton National Park biologist Kate Wilmot pivoted professionally. For the nearly 15 years prior, the 47-year-old mother of two had staffed roadside grizzlyinduced traffic jams and policed the crowds in her role as leader of the park’s wildlife brigade. She took a promotion and now manages Grand Teton’s fish and wildlife divisions. She oversees all animal management and research at the United States’ 18th busiest national park, which is one of the few national parks that is home to its full suite of native species—from grizzly bears to snowshoe hares to Utah suckers. “I am in learning mode,” Wilmot says. “I was so bear-centric, it was just my world. It’s challenging, but I love it.”

In her new gig, Wilmot’s in charge of managing the wildlife that make her excited to live in a wild place like

Kate Wilmot led Grand Teton National Park's Wildlife Brigade for 15 years and now manages the park's fish and wildlife divisions.

LOCAL LIFE BOOKS

Read These

In her new job, Wilmot is in charge of managing the wildlife that make her excited to live in a wild place like Jackson Hole.

// BY JIM MAHAFFIE

GRAPHIC NOVELLA The Ski Town Fairytale Sam Morse & Ryan Stolp Burnt-out vet student Sophie follows a dream to stop “adulting” and move to Jackson to live the life and ski bottomless powder. She quickly bumps into some harsh realities. Stolp is creator of the “Lift Lines” comic, which appears in the Jackson Hole Daily. Morse is an editor-at-large for Teton Gravity Research.

B R A D LY J . B O N E R

PHOTO COLLECTION There and Back: Photographs from the Edge Jimmy Chin

As the head of the Wildlife Brigade, Wilmot was in charge of managing the human crowds that gathered to watch the park's willdlife.

the arrival of an animal that’s become as well-known as any in Jackson Hole history: Grizzly 399. It was in 2006 that the now-26-year-old sow first strolled out of the den with a litter of cubs that she then raised within view of roads in the northern part of the park. The next summer, GTNP launched a pilot version of its volunteer-based Wildlife Brigade, hiring Wilmot to lead the corps. “The rest is history,” she says. “I was really the bear manager. The brigade grew really quickly.”

Over the next dozen-plus years, Wilmot was a roadside fixture, often corralling the congregations of people that have grown considerably in conjunction with Grizzly 399’s fame (follow her on Instagram @grizzlybear399). Those day-to-day duties could be chaotic and occasionally aggravating. But the position exposed Wilmot to countless tender moments, both observing the intelligent ursine animals and also her fellow humans’ reactions. “Seeing the American public crying on the side of the road because they’ve come this far to see a grizzly bear is pretty special,” Wilmot says. “It’s like, ‘this is why we’re here.’” JH

This is the Wilson-based adventure photographer, filmmaker, and mountaineer’s first collection, with more than 200 amazing pictures of people, places, and some of the most accomplished climbers and outdoor athletes in the world.

CLASSIC JACKSON HOLE The Diary of a Dude Wrangler Struthers Burt Founder of the Bar BC Ranch, Burt chronicles what it was like to build, live on, and entertain visitors at the now-historic dude ranch in Jackson Hole. Originally published in 1924, this book is a fascinating glimpse into Wyoming life back in the day.

BIOGRAPHY Cockeyed Happy: Ernest Hemingway’s Wyoming Summers with Pauline Darla Worden Self-proclaimed to be Hemingway obsessed, Sheridan-raised writer Worden tells the story of Ernest Hemingway and his second wife, Pauline Pfeiffer, during their Wyoming and Jackson Hole summers from 1928 to 1939. A photo of Hemingway at the Last Chance Saloon in Big Horn, Wyoming, first piqued Worden’s curiosity—and began this book. JH

JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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LOCAL LIFE ANATOMY OF

A

fter years of planning, Snow King is heading into its second, and last, summer of construction, adding facilities, activities, and amenities to the Town Hill. Most of these are concentrated at the resort’s 7,808-foot-high summit. Here’s the breakdown.

“You can go 60 miles an hour under the right conditions,” says Ryan Stanley, Snow King’s mountain manager about the resort’s new Zip Line. “It is the steepest zip line in North America.” Almost 3,000 feet long and with a vertical drop of 1,000 feet, the zip line’s average grade is 36 percent. “But that’s the average,” says Stanley, who was among the zip line testers last fall. “It definitely gets steeper than that.”

The Alpine Slide, which has wound, unchanged, down Snow King’s lower eastern slopes since 1978, is going underground. So that the new summit road can connect to both base areas, a portion of the Alpine Slide will be routed through a 200-foot-long tunnel that is seven feet in diameter. “It will make it a different experience for sure,” Stanley says.

Opened last December, the new eight-passenger Summit Gondola ascends the 1,547 vertical feet from the King’s main base area to the summit in about five minutes.

This summer, a new road built last summer from the mid station of the Rafferty ski lift to the summit will be extended to both base areas. The new sections of road will allow beginning skiers to lap the gondola, Stanley says. (The stretch of road built last summer was a favorite ski run with beginners last winter; it’s called “Way Home.”) In summer, it will also allow for a much-less-steep hike to the summit than any prior routes on the mountain.

Early this summer, about one-third of the King’s parking lot was ripped up and replaced by grass. “The idea is to have the ball fields connect to Phil Baux Park via green space,” Stanley says.

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Snow King’s Expansion // BY DINA MISHEV

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Teton Literacy Center Laura West Soltau, Executive Director

Photo credit: Lina Collado García

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There’s a Civilian Conservation Corps-constructed log cabin tucked into aspen trees between the top of the gondola and where the observatory will be. “It was built when they were doing trail work in the area in the late 1930s,” Stanley says. The cabin is in a pretty serious state of disrepair now but will eventually be shored up, although it’s unlikely that it will be a historic-preservation project. “The effort it would take to restore it following [National Park Service] standards would be fairly heroic,” Stanley says. “It would be cool to do something like that, but that’s not the plan right now.”

To be finished next summer, a new observatory on the south side of the summit will have a 24-foot AstroHaven dome and a telescope with a 1.0-meter mirror. “This will be one of the largest state-of-the-art telescopes in the world dedicated primarily to public outreach,” says Dr. Samuel Singer, the founder of Wyoming Stargazing, which will partner with Snow King to offer educational programs at the observatory. (Most telescopes of this size and caliber are used for research.) “With the large size and research-grade optics, the telescope on Snow King will allow Wyoming Stargazing to blow people's minds with what they will see—stunning details in the sweeping arms of spiral galaxies, exquisite cloud layers in the atmosphere of Jupiter, gaps between the rings of Saturn, and the Moon like they have never imagined it before.” The observatory will also have a 30-seat planetarium with an eight-meter dome onto which can be projected real-time images from the telescope.

An ADA trail will be built from the top of the gondola to the new observatory. “We want as many people as possible to experience what will be an amazing activity,” Stanley says.

There are no plans to demolish the Panorama House, which, since the 1960s, has offered snacks and refuge from the elements (but no bathrooms or running water).

This summer it serves beer, wine, an assortment of snacks, fresh-made sweet and savory crepes, and, during the peak months, BBQ.

B R A D LY J . B O N E R

Last summer, construction of a new 10,000-square-foot summit lodge got as far as its foundation being poured.

The idea is to finish the space, which includes an area for the maintenance of gondola cars, a coffee shop, ski patrol base, a rental shop, and ski school on its ground floor; a restaurant with a 5,000-square-foot deck (that looks out on the Tetons) on the second floor; and a rooftop deck at least as big as the one below it. This building also includes bathrooms with flush toilets and running water, a first for the King’s summit.

Snowmaking, sewer, and gas lines will be installed on looker’s right of the Exhibition run this summer. This means that the challenging hike up the Bootpack trail is closed, but that next winter all eight snowmaking guns on the backside of the mountain can be used. (Last winter, the mountain could only pump enough water to that area to run three guns.) Also, for the first time in its history, Snow King will be able to make snow all the way down Exhibition. “That’s something we’ve talked about for years,” Stanley says. JH JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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LOCAL LIFE MY JACKSON HOLE LIFE

WILD THINGS // BY HELEN OLSSON

I

f a name is a destiny, artist Carrie Wild was meant to connect with nature. She grew up on a horse farm in southern Michigan and spent time at the Michigan State University vet clinic where her parents worked.

“Animals have always been part of my life,” she says. A painter, she traveled to Jackson to explore the art scene and sold a few pieces to Turpin Gallery. “The colors I use in my paintings are inspired by the West—the sunsets, the sunlight, even the dust in the air,” she says. Wild was showing her art on the Town Square in 2011 when she met Jackson Hole Wildlife Safaris owner Jason Williams. “He was telling me how to find wolves, and I said, ‘Well, why don’t you just take me?’”

COURTESY PHOTO

Artist Carrie Wild and photographer Jason Williams are inspiring a love of nature through art at their Jackson gallery.

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SUMMER 2022 | JACKSON HOLE

Carrie Wild painting at the National Museum of Wildlife Art during the annual Plein Air Fest.

LOCAL LIFE They married in 2017 and two years later opened Gallery Wild, now located on the corner of Broadway and Glenwood. Before the gallery, Williams served as a river guide in summer, a snowmobile guide in winter, and in 2007, he launched the safari business. It took off despite the recession. “There was a hunger for this kind of service,” he says. Last December, he sold the business to focus on his fine art photography and Gallery Wild, which is expanding with a new outpost in Santa Fe in June.

Williams started making photos in high school with a Pentax K1000 and honed his skills shooting in Yellowstone. The safaris were a way to educate guests about wildlife, and the gallery—which features nature-inspired contemporary art—has a similar mission. “Our passion really revolves around wildlife and conservation,” Williams says. “People can take a piece of art home and hang it in an urban space. It’s a way to inspire people to protect wildlife and wild places.”

COURTESY PHOTO

MY JACKSON HOLE LIFE

Jason and Carrie riding horses.

WILLIAMS AND WILD SHARE SOME FAVORITE THINGS ABOUT LIFE IN JACKSON WITH US.

LOOSE LIPS

COURTESY PHOTO

We don’t like to give exact locations for spotting wildlife. The park has seen a pretty significant increase in hiking to Delta Lake as a result of Instagram. People geotag their pictures [of sensitive places], and then thousands of people go. Really, this entire area is a great place to see wildlife. Basically, we’re living in the middle of a big National Geographic video.

GATHERING SPOT Part of our concept [for Gallery Wild] was to have an art studio where Carrie or other artists are working so people can get a glimpse into the process. There’s always something happening. We’ve had high school kids come in on dates. We don’t have salespeople hovering on the floor. Our team includes an art teacher, an interior designer, and a wildlife biologist.

passion really revolves around wildlife " Our and conservation.”

ELISE MAHAFFIE

WILDLIFE WATCHING 101

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Get up with the sun and bring binoculars or a spotting scope. Stop at a pullout somewhere and just take a moment. Your car is the perfect blind where you can sit and watch without altering an animal’s behavior. Things will start to emerge from the landscape. People drive all over God’s creation and don’t see anything. But they’re doing about 10 mph over the speed limit. You’re not going to see anything doing that. When you’re watching wildlife, you are part of the environment. Humans have this sort of insane perspective that we’re somehow different. But we’re animals. Your puffy jacket and your stocking cap don’t make you separate from the natural world.

CHOCOLATE FIX Our friend Oscar Ortega is a world-famous chocolatier and a champion gelato maker. He owns CocoLove, right across from the Wort Hotel. It’s unique to have a chocolatier of his caliber in a small town. They have really good coffee drinks, and we always leave with a couple of salted caramel truffles.

FAVE RESTO At the risk of ruining a good secret, we’re eating at Gather a lot.

The kids like the elk bolognese.

(They’re known as the “Bolo Girls.”) They have the best burger in town and Jackson Hole Winery Zinfandel on tap. JH

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JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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A Once-In-A-Lifetime Snake River Retreat

E X P E R I E N C E T H E W U L F F LO D G E S

( 8 4 4 ) 2 1 6 - 0 4 0 4 · T H E C L E A R C R E E KG R O U P.C O M

LOCAL LIFE ALL YOU NEED

On the River // BY DINA MISHEV

On the water, lash Stoic’s Hybrid Backpack Cooler to your raft or SUP. On land, wear it as a backpack. Either way, the 28-liter soft-sided cooler has an attached bottle opener and holds up to 24 cans, which it will keep cold for hours. $150; backcountry.com We didn’t think Yeti’s Hopper Flip 18 soft cooler could be improved upon … but then we met the brand’s SideKick Dry Gear Case, a small waterproof gear bag designed to attach to the Hopper’s gear loops, or your belt. Hopper Flip 18, $300, SideKick Dry, $50; yeti.com Red’s Long Sleeve Pro Change Parka EVO looks like overkill for on-water or post-paddle warmth in the summer. And with its super, super fleecy interior, it is. But when we get cold on the water, we get really cold, so we appreciate all the fuzziness. It’s also waterproof and breathable and cut big enough to allow for you to change underneath it. If you don’t bring it with you, stash it in the car at the take-out. $229; red-equipment.us Why do we feel like we’ve been waiting our entire lives for sunglasses that float? Finally, Dragon Alliance has a line of sunglasses with H2O Floatable technology. We love the polarized Flare LL model for its large lenses. $209; dragonalliance.com Dermatone’s Sport Sunscreen Lotions include the only SPF 50 lotion we’ve used that feels light enough to use every day. If you don’t need quite that much protection, the SPF 30 is even lighter.

Both are water resistant for 80 minutes and moisturize while they protect. From $17; dermatone.com When you want maximum sun protection, consider Ibex’s Sun Hoodie. Made from the brand’s lightest-weight fabric, the merino wool top features an anatomical hood for full coverage and thumb catches to keep sleeves in place, and is odor-resistant. $140, ibex.com

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ESSENTIAL GEAR TO MAKE YOUR RIVER ADVENTURE A SUCCESS.

When you don’t want to worry about electronics getting wet, go for a Sea to Summit dry bag.

The brand’s Big River dry bags are super burly—abrasion resistant and with double-stitched, fully taped seams. The company’s Clear Stopper dry bag, is our pick when we need to see our gear quickly and easily. From $28; seatosummit.com We thought summer was hot enough and a neck gaiter would only make us hotter, until we met Buff’s Coolnet UV Neck Gaiter, which uses a fabric designed to keep you cool and that also includes SPF 50 sun protection. $24; buff.com SKI Magazine said Stio’s Eddy Shirt is “the greatest shirt ever made.” We could not agree more.

As perfect for a spring ski day as a trip down the river, the Eddy (available in men’s, women’s, and kids’ styles) protects you from sun and wind and is quick-drying. $129; 10 E. Broadway Ave., stio.com Available in 12 ounces in two different shapes— one that accommodates a can of beer, the other a can of hard seltzer—HydroFlask’s Cooler Cups are dishwasher safe, BPA- and toxin-free, and work as can coolers or beverage cups. From $25; hydroflask.com We’ve never thought much about the hats we wear on the water. Thankfully, Dakine has. Its Kahu Surf Hat has an extended front brim (with a foam insert that makes it float!), a removable chin strap, and a soft interior lining that wicks away moisture. $50; dakine.com

Stio’s CFS Board Pant (for men and women) is as stretchy as it is durable (and it’s super stretchy thanks to a blend of polyester and spandex), dries quickly, and has a zippered back pocket. $99; 10 E. Broadway Ave., stio.com JH

JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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B R A D LY J . B O N E R

The closed-toe construction of Chaco’s Odyssey protects toes. The shoe’s sole uses super-grippy rubber and features a tread design optimized for wet traction to protect the rest of you from a slip and fall. $100; chacos.com

LOCAL LIFE GO DEEP

Hats

IN THESE PARTS, HATS COME IN ALL SHAPES AND SIZES. FIND YOUR PERFECT FIT. // BY SAMANTHA SIMMA

BEAVER FUR COWBOY HAT

2 Jackson Hole Hat Company specializes in custom, handmade beaver fur cowboy hats that are designed and crafted based on techniques that are more than 100 years old. Orders start with a basic shape preference; from there you’ll choose from a menu of customizations that include brim width, color, edging, and hatband options.

Combat the increased UV exposure experienced at higher elevations in and around Jackson Hole with a hat that extends the wearer’s personal sun protection to include a six-inch neck cape.

STRENGTHS

In a sea of cowboy hats, know that your custom order will likely be the only of its kind in the crowd. From the rodeo to a Wyoming wedding, these hats are the crown jewel of any Western look.

Beyond its sun protection, the Ultra Adventure Hat has a moisturewicking sweatband, a sunglasses lock, and is water-resistant—making it a versatile adventure partner.

WEAKNESSES

Above and beyond the initial investment, a hat of this quality requires more upkeep. Meanwhile, the tradeoff for its durability is a cowboy hat that’s heavier and less breathable than straw.

Even with its crown ventilation vents, the neck cape causes the hat to be less breathable when compared to brim-only sun hats.

BEST FOR

ENCOUNTER HAT CO. CUSTOM FELT HATS

Spectating or bronco riding at the Jackson Hole Rodeo.

Multiday backpacking trips in Grand Teton National Park.

Place a custom order online at jhhat-co.com or by calling 307/733-7687; hats start at $325.

With medium and large size options in the color gray, purchase instore or online at rei.com; $42.

WHAT IS IT?

In a rainbow of colors, Encounter Hat Co. leans into the option of making a statement out of your headpiece.

Their flat-brimmed felt hats are custom shaped and molded, and then Westernized with hatbands, beading, stitching, and feathers.

STRENGTHS

Your experience with Encounter Hat Co. isn’t complete without the fitting session, which ensures your hat stays steady and secure on your head, even during planned or impromptu dance parties.

WEAKNESSES

The lack of versatility in terms of the functionality of these fashion pieces might limit the number of instances you’d wear it.

BEST FOR

Attending a wedding at Snake River Ranch.

WHERE TO GET IT

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WHERE TO BUY

Men’s and women’s styles can be purchased in store (125 N. Cache St.) or online at encounterhatco.com; hats start at $170; fitting appointments in Jackson or Denver, Colorado are $45.

3

WHAT IS IT?

1

SUNDAY AFTERNOONS ULTRA ADVENTURE HAT

CODY JAMES PONDEROSA STRAW HAT

4

ADIDAS SUPERLITE VISOR

ABBY PAFFRATH TRUCKER HAT

5

6

ORVIS OUTSMART SUN HAT

7

Representing the traditional Western style of straw hats, this 100 percent straw hat has a four-inch brim, eyelet vents, and a classic cattleman crease.

While this particular model has a simple black-tie hatband, a variety of styles, featuring various accents, are available at Jackson’s local Boot Barn.

Constructed with partly recycled content, this lightweight visor is made even more so thanks to mesh side panels for optimum air flow.

Its nonglare under-visor minimizes reflections off water and tennis court surfaces.

Show off your affinity for Jackson’s local artists and support their work by purchasing a wearable art piece like one from Abby Paffrath’s line of headwear. From flat-bill trucker hats to classic baseball fits, these caps feature local and travel-inspired landscapes and wildlife.

Lightweight and breathable, this nylon sun hat is purpose-driven and easy to pack along on your adventures. An adjustable, removable chin strap secures the hat on breezy afternoons, while an elastic cinch cord on the crown customizes its fit.

An inexpensive entry into the Western cowboy hat style, this hat provides protection from the sun’s glare while still being lightweight and breathable.

This is one of the few headwear styles that won’t interfere with a ponytail or similar updo.

Equal parts Jackson Hole souvenir and unique style statement, these hats make it easy to support local artists without breaking the bank.

Besides its broad brim, this hat is rated UPF 50 for sun protection.

Meanwhile, its fibers have been treated with OutSmart Insect Shield—an odorless and long-lasting insect repellent.

Less durable than felt, this hat’s longevity may not extend much beyond your visit to Jackson Hole.

Also, it won’t protect you much during the occasional mountain rainstorms we get.

While the hook-and-loop back closure increases adjustability, errant hairs may become caught in the Velcro.

With over 50 styles featured on the artist’s website, it can be difficult to choose just one.

Simple in style and only available in one color—khaki; be wary of the shadows created by this hat’s brim when taking photos.

Scenic trail rides in Buffalo Valley.

Afternoon tennis matches at Jackson Hole Golf & Tennis Club.

Assimilating with the dancing crowd of locals at Music on Main.

Hikes and Aerial Tram rides to the top of Rendezvous Peak.

Available at the Boot Barn (840 W. Broadway Ave.) and online at bootbarn.com; $35–$90.

Available in men’s and women’s in up to six different colors at adidas.com; $20.

Unisex youth and adult hats are available direct from the artist at art4allbyabby.com or at local stores like JD High Country Outfitters (50 E. Broadway Ave.); $30-$32.

Unisex and one size fits most; available in store (485 W. Broadway Ave.) or online at orvis.com; $59. JH

JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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LOCAL LIFE JACKSON HOLE ICON

Top of the World // BY BRIGID MANDER

IN 1966, THE JACKSON HOLE TRAM opened up a new world for skiers in North America, swiftly carrying them up more than 4,000 feet from the valley floor to 10,450 feet—an elevation well into the high alpine of the Teton Range. Today, it’s not just snow lovers who get a ride to the “top of the world.”

Of course, this spot is not actually the top of the world—it’s not even the highest point in the Tetons; the summit of the Grand Teton is more than 3,000 feet higher—but it feels like it.

Here you have 360-degree views that, on clear days, stretch into three states (Wyoming, Idaho, and Montana) and include almost one dozen different mountain ranges, from the Tetons to the Gros Ventres, the Lost River Range, the Big Hole Mountains, the Absarokas, the Wind River Range, and the Snake River Range, among others. You’ll also see, to the east, the Snake River and almost the entirety of the valley that is Jackson Hole. To the west are the orderly agricultural lands of Teton Valley. It’s worth dropping a quarter into the mounted binocular set here so you can zoom in on the views. Point it at the Grand Teton’s summit and you might even see climbers. And then go into Corbet’s Cabin and enjoy a waffle. JH

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B R A D LY J . B O N E R

Summer tram riders depart a warm, verdant valley and, 12 minutes later, disembark into a rocky, chilly moonscape where harsh weather and the altitude keep wildflowers from growing to be much bigger than the size of a dime. While you might be tempted to make a beeline for cozy Corbet’s Cabin, the highest, and only, mountain hut in the Tetons, and its fresh-made waffles, don’t. A tram ride isn’t complete without a short hike—and we really mean short, it’s about 50 feet in distance and a 30-foot vertical climb from the tram dock—to a rocky, windswept outcrop known as the “Top of the World.”

Made for

MOUNTAIN PASSION

Shop Elevenate at Teton Village Sports providing high quality brands since 1965.

TETONVILLAGESPORTS.COM

At this historic camp, kids learn wilderness skills and life lessons.

Every summer TVRC has two 30-day camp sessions. The first session is for campers who identify as boys and the second session is for campers who identify as girls.

Campers range in age from 11 to 16 and grow with the program.

We do not require any prior backpacking or horseback riding experience for campers to attend TVRC. All we ask is that campers have the will to take on new challenges and work hard to learn.

Our expert counselors assess each new camper and help them improve every summer as they develop the skills to be “Ready to Ride.” tvrcamp.org

(307) 733-2958 • www.tvrcamp.org •

@tvrcamp

TVRC is an authorized permittee of the U.S. Forest Service, an authorized concessioner of the National Park Service, and an equal opportunity employer and service provider.

At Teton Valley Ranch Camp kids sit tall in the saddle, and walk a little taller, too. The camp, which was founded in the 1930s for boys and girls ages 11–16, is based on the core values of resilience, self-confidence, teamwork, and stewardship—and campers learn all of these things while making life-long friends and gaining experience in the wilderness.

“I remember every single backpacking trip I went on at Teton Valley Ranch Camp,” says Holly Hancock von Guilleaume. “Even though it’s been almost 40 years since I was a camper, I remember it all like it was yesterday. It was fun and, although I didn’t realize it at the time, I was learning so many important life lessons, and making friends for life.”

The learning of life lessons and forging of friendships is no accident. “TVRC is loosely founded on the cowboy way of life–working hard, determination, grit, challenges, and then success,” says Jim Ligori, Camp Director and a former camper himself. “If you get knocked down, you get back up. Climbing a mountain is hard, but when you get to the top, it is worth the effort.”

Today’s TVRC campers climb the same mountains and explore the same wilderness areas on foot and horseback as did its first campers almost nine decades ago. The earliest TVRC campers climbed the Grand Teton and backpacked in the Tetons when Grand Teton National Park was still in its infancy. “We were backpacking and horsepacking in the Gros Ventre Wilderness before it was even a wilderness area,” Ligori says.

Holly Hancock von Guilleaume was named after Holly Lake in Grand Teton National Park which her parents visited while working as staff at TVRC in the 1950s and 1960s. She visited the same lake in the 1980s. Two of her three kids, all of whom have been TVRC campers, have hiked to Holly Lake, too, and the third will join the family tradition this summer. “The unchanging wilderness that our campers explore crosses generations of past, current, and future campers and families,” Ligori says.

While adventures in the wilderness are a defining part of TVRC, campers can also enjoy arts and crafts, archery, riflery, fly fishing, and lapidary, among other activities.

Here, kids sign up for what they want to do and get to take ownership of their time.

The only “technology” at camp are flashlights, so campers leave other electronic devices at home. Scott Kuhnle, a second-generation TVRC camper and now on seasonal leadership staff at the camp, says that this is one of the best things about TVRC. “If you put away your phone and other things that distract you from being present and being intentional, your experience of life becomes quite a bit more impactful, memorable, and intense, in a good way,” he says.

Being present opens campers to the full TVRC experience. Nine members of the Proops family, including Tamah Proops’s three kids and several nieces and nephews, have come to TVRC. “Camp has been a very different experience for each of them, but I’ve seen them all blossom there. You can say ‘good-bye’ to a kid who’s already confident and then four weeks later, be presented with a different kid and it’s amazing,” she says. “They’re filthy and dusty and they throw their arms around you and can’t wait to show you all the stuff they’ve done and learned. As a parent, I like to see my kids experience independence and feel like they can try new things and it’s not so scary. Teton Valley Ranch Camp is magic.”

HELLO

LOCAL LIFE

HELLO PONTEIR SACKREY

Ponteir Sackrey PROFILE

Following curiosity to help the Jackson community.

// INTERVIEW BY MAGGIE THEODORA

KATHRYN ZIESIG

P

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onteir Sackrey arrived in Jackson October 29, 1990. She made the drive west from Boston in Ruby Tuesday, a red four-door Hyundai named after her Aunt Ruby. Ruby Tuesday was so packed with stuff that Sackrey didn’t dare open anything but the driver’s door until reaching Jackson for fear of something falling out. She was 29 years old at the time and had recently graduated with a masters of business administration from Simmons College. As part of this degree, she interned at Wachusett Mountain in Massachusetts and helped the family-owned ski area with financial analysis. “Working there with the family was such a rewarding experience that I decided to fling everything away and move West and work at a ski resort,” she says. Lucky for Jackson Hole, no one took Sackrey’s calls except for Jim Sullivan, who was then the mountain manager at Snow King.

Sackrey later learned that her mother was heartbroken that she was moving so far away. “But she never told me that then,” she says.

“She said, ‘Follow your dreams.

We’ll miss you, but go and live a cool life. Be original.’” Sackrey didn’t have a plan, but she thought at the time that she’d stay in Jackson for a couple of years and then maybe move back to Massachusetts and try something different.

“I had two roommates, a contact with Barbara Knobe, whom I had connected with because she was a member of a group that is no longer in existence, Business Professional Women, and Jim Sullivan,”

COURTESY PHOTO

she says. “I knew no one else and had never been here. But, thanks to Barbara’s and Jim’s good graces, they helped me land.” As did the general attitude of the locals. Sackrey says one of the first things she noticed here was, “People look you in the eye when they say ‘Hi.’ It was a different way of relating. I liked the wide-open, friendly people.”

She found the friendliness didn’t stop with saying hello. That Christmas—her first away from her family— the Knobes invited her to spend the holiday with them. “That’s something else that is so special about Jackson that I love; so many of us are not from

TOUR DE WILSON “I love to road bike and ride my bike to work two or three days a week,” Sackrey says. “But when I want more miles, there’s a ride I call ‘Tour de Wilson.’ We have an amazing pathway system, and this is all on pathways. I leave town and get on the pathway section by Albertsons that takes you along Highway 22.

I ride that to Emily Stevens Park, across the Snake River, and to Teton Village. In Teton Village, I’ll get a drink at Bodega and then ride back toward Wilson and take the Stilson pathway into Wilson. There at Pearl Street Bagels, I’ll sit by the river and have another drink. If I have time, I’ll ride down Fish Creek Road. That’s not a pathway, but there’s very little traffic. I like breaking longer rides up with coffee stops. Persephone Café on the West Bank, between Wilson and Teton Village, is another great place to stop.”

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JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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LOCAL LIFE

HELLO PONTEIR SACKREY

here and don’t have families close by so we invite friends over. My first Christmas here was one of abject shock at the cold—it was minus-57 degrees that day—but also of great gratitude for the Knobes, who invited me in so I didn’t feel unattached, lonely, or devastated to be away from my family.”

It wasn’t wholly intentional, but from Snow King, Sackrey went on to work for the two other ski resorts in the area, Grand Targhee (1991–1992) and Jackson Hole, then still Jackson Hole Ski Corp

Huntington Beach, California, to Vail, Colorado, so I wrote to him that I was moving to snow country myself.” It wasn’t until four years later that Sackrey heard anything back. “One day at work at Jackson Hole on the Warren Miller movie, I got this letter, and it was from Warren Miller himself,” she says.

“He asked how my move to snow country turned out.” This was the beginning of a correspondence between the two. (They did eventually meet in person, in Boulder, Colorado, at the premiere of the

museum just received an incredible painting " The

by Thomas Moran of Mt. Moran from the western

(1992–1996). At Targhee and Jackson Hole, she oversaw public relations initiatives including, at the latter, working with a team from Warren Miller Entertainment to film segments for a movie. While still back in Boston, Sackrey had written a letter to Warren Miller (the person, not the larger production company) after reading an editorial he had written in SnowCountry magazine. “He wrote about his family relocating from

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SUMMER 2022 | JACKSON HOLE

film Sackrey had worked on.) “It was one of those valuable lessons in life: you never know how something you do is going to turn out,” she says.

“You might just have to wait four years.”

After she felt like she had done what she wanted to at the area ski resorts, she moved on to work at nonprofits. “The ski industry was so much fun, but the arts—performing and visual—are very much who I am,” says Sackrey, who started college studying music and dreamed of one day playing trombone for the Chicago Symphony. “I love to be outdoors and recreate, but that’s not who I am at heart. I enjoy the arts.”

Over the next two decades, she worked at the National Museum of Wildlife Art (on two separate occasions), the Center for the Arts, the Jackson Hole Com-

KATHRYN ZIESIG

KATHRYN ZIESIG

side, Eternal Snows of Mount Moran, Teton Range. I have to go and look at it every day.

It makes me want to become a climber.”

munity Housing Trust, and the Grand Teton National Park Foundation. She took a brief break from nonprofits to be the public relations director of the Four Seasons Jackson Hole prior to its opening. “All of the jobs I’ve had here have been me following a thread of curiosity,” Sackrey says.

Since 2020, Sackrey has been the chief advancement officer at the National Museum of Wildlife Art. She was previously the museum’s marketing director for six years and its development and marketing director for eight years. “Coming back to the museum is like coming home. My kids learned to walk in these beloved halls,” she says. “I have been the lady of many hats and had many jobs in Jackson Hole. I have worked many places, and I consider it a great privilege to have been employed by them and to feel like my jobs allowed me to make a difference in this community I love so much.”

Enjoy a scenic float trip IN GRAND TETON NATIONAL PARK

can never get " Ienough of Georgia

O’Keeffe’s painting Antelope.”

“The Museum has the largest collection of works by Carl Rungius in the U.S., and anything he painted is a pleasure to observe,” Sackrey says. “The colors he used and his understanding of how to put a painting together are masterful.” JH

Photo by B-E boatman Jim Stanford

MY FAVORITE THINGS TO SEE AT THE NATIONAL MUSEUM OF WILDLIFE ART “The Members Lounge is my favorite space in the museum, and you don’t have to be a member to visit it,” Sackrey says. “It overlooks the elk refuge, and there’s a spotting scope in it. Sometimes I’ll just take my laptop in there and work, and anyone is welcome to do that.”

WITH THE ORIGINAL

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53

LOCAL LIFE HELLO CAM SHOLLY

Q A

A

third-generation National Park Service employee, Cam Sholly assumed duties as the superintendent of Yellowstone National Park in October of 2018. It was also in Yellowstone, in 1990, that he started his NPS career. And it was because his father, Dan Sholly, was Yellowstone’s chief ranger in the 1980s that Sholly graduated from Gardiner High School in the eponymous town just outside the park’s northern entrance.

"

I have a deep appreciation for the diversity of parks we have in the system.”

CAM SHOLLY National parks are part of the family for Yellowstone’s superintendent. // INTERVIEW BY DINA MISHEV

54

“Yellowstone means a lot to me,” Sholly says.

Between doing trail maintenance in the park and returning as superintendent, Sholly worked as a seasonal backcountry ranger in Yosemite (among other ranger “grunt” jobs) and was the chief of ranger operations in Yosemite National Park, superintendent of the Natchez Trace Parkway, and region director, Midwest Region for the National Park Service. As the latter, he oversaw 61

SUMMER 2022 | JACKSON HOLE

national park units in 13 states. “I have a deep appreciation for the diversity of parks we have in the system,” he says.

Outside of his career with the NPS, Sholly is a veteran of the U.S. Army (he deployed with Operation Desert Storm in 1991) and served on the California Highway Patrol. We talked with him about Yellowstone and the NPS.

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JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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LOCAL LIFE HELLO CAM SHOLLY

R YA N D O R G A N

A fisherman on the Upper Yellowstone River in the Thorofare, which includes southeastern Yellowstone National Park and Wilderness areas in the Bridger-Teton and Shoshone National Forests.

THE THOROFARE

Q: Tell us about the first and second generations of NPS employees in your family.

CS: My grandfather was the chief ranger of Shenandoah and Big Bend and, in the 1950s, superintendent of Badlands. My father worked for the NPS throughout my childhood.

Q: So, did you move around a lot as a kid?

Sholly’s first park service job was doing trail maintenance in the backcountry of the Thorofare area of Yellowstone. The Thorofare, in the southeastern corner of the park and adjacent to the Washakie and Teton Wilderness Areas, is the largest roadless area in the continental U.S. and, according to a 2016 article by Wyoming-based writer Mark Jenkins in The Guardian, the only place in the Lower 48 States where you can be 20 miles from the nearest road. The Thorofare is home to grizzly bears, wolves, wolverine, and lynx, although the populations of the latter two species are so low it’s highly unlikely you’ll spot one.

In the summers of 1991 and 1992, the Thorofare was also home to Sholly. “The Thorofare is the most remote place in the Lower 48,” he says. “Living there for two summers, I saw almost no one. I’ve been back five times since becoming superintendent and have still seen hardly anyone there.” The Thorofare Ranger Station is the most remote cabin in all national parks outside Alaska.

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CS: I was a small boy in Yosemite and spent five years in grade school at Crater Lake. There were three years at Hawaii Volcanoes in middle school. And then I finished out high school in Gardiner, Montana, when my dad was at Yellowstone.

Q: What did you take away from growing up in these places?

CS: What sticks with me the most is the clear diversity of what different national parks have to offer, and also a true appreciation of the value of the resources these parks protect, be it a volcano in Hawaii or the deepest lake in North America (Crater Lake). This is a very special system we have, and it sets the standard for the world.

Q: Having now experienced even more national park units thanks to you own career, what do you think is most special about Yellowstone?

CS: For all of the attractions and beautiful aspects of Yellowstone, like Old Faithful and the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone, there is no substitute for being in such a wild environment away from developed areas and people. Yellowstone is one of the few places where you can do that. You can experience a piece of primitive America here and go days without seeing people and allow yourself to be absorbed in the wild. That’s a special thing.

Q: As superintendent, do you actually have time to get out and enjoy Yellowstone?

CS: I did over 230 miles in the park’s backcountry last year.

Q: And were you able to be absorbed in the wild?

CS: I think once I was a mile from the road, I counted 25 people over the whole summer. So, yes.

Q: Do you still find yourself impressed by the park’s wildlife?

CS: There is so much great wildlife in Yellowstone, and I find myself regularly awed by grizzly bears, wolves, and bison in particular. These three animals are incredibly symbolic in so many ways. Wolves and bison are really good reminders of where

we’ve been not too long ago. One hundred years ago, we wiped out all of the wolves in this park and almost killed every bison. There were less than 25 bison in the 1920s, and today they’re now at a level we haven’t seen in the park since 1872. And the reintroduction of wolves is a great success story.

Seeing Yellowstone’s wildlife is always a special thing.

Q: What about the park’s aquatic species?

CS: One of my favorites is cutthroat trout.

Q: Do you fly-fish a lot?

CS: I work too much to take advantage of as much fishing time as I would like, but I do spend as much time as I can on or near the water. And there is water everywhere here. If I’m out backpacking on a weekend, I normally take my fishing rod with me.

Q: Did you fish here during high school?

CS: One of my first jobs ever was flipping burgers at Mammoth at the Grill, that was the summer of 1985. I also worked in the sporting goods section of the General Store in Mammoth that summer. Most of what I recall from that job was talking to visitors about flyfishing and fishing and selling lures. And also selling film for cameras.

Q: Aside from visitors no longer using film, what is a big change you’ve noticed in Yellowstone between the 1980s and today?

CS: I think other people would say congestion, but what people don’t realize, is that even back then, when Yellowstone was getting about 2 million visitors a year, there were traffic jams. Seventy percent of visitors to Yellowstone are first-time visitors, and most have never seen a grizzly or bison in the wild. When they get here and see that, they don’t really care if they’re stuck in traffic. The narrative about visitors today overrunning the park is true within a very, very small percentage. Yellowstone is 2.2 million acres, and there are 1,750 acres of paved roads, parking lots, and pullouts. So, it’s a big problem, but in a very small portion of the park. The wildness that I think is the heart of Yellowstone is unchanged. JH

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57

LOCAL LIFE BLAST FROM THE PAST

Night of Havoc // BY JIM STANFORD

Remembering the Secret Service plane that crashed on Sheep Mountain.

fter a day on the Snake River assisting the Secret Service with a presidential rafting trip, Keith Benefiel plopped down on the couch at his home in Wilson and popped in one of his favorite movies, Apocalypse Now. No sooner had Robert Duvall’s character, Lt. Col. Kilgore, uttered his famous line, “I love the smell of napalm in the morning,” than a real-life fireball exploded over the Gros Ventre Mountains east of Jackson Hole, and Benefiel, a Teton County Search and Rescue volunteer, sprang back to action.

An Air Force C-130 Hercules, transporting equipment from the presiden-

A member of the Air Force investigation team studies the only recognizable piece of the C-130 military cargo plane that crashed into Sheep Mountain Aug. 17, 1996. Nine died in the crash.

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tial visit, had crashed into 11,244-foottall Sheep Mountain, on the belly of the natural rock formation called Sleeping Indian. Benefiel was one of 28 rescuers who hiked for more than three hours up the steep mountainside by headlamp to reach the crash site, where he was greeted by the smell of burning jet fuel and smoldering wreckage. “‘Surreal’ would be about the only word that would wrap it up,” he says.

President Bill Clinton and his family had departed safely late that afternoon, but eight crew members and one Secret Service agent died in the crash. All that remained of the plane, whose call sign

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Factor in a respected community leader with an insider’s perspective on real estate services and lifestyle insights. Now imagine that person publishes Jackson Hole’s premier home design and travel magazines. Say hello to Latham Jenkins. Frequently described as genuine, creative and honest, no one is more perfectly placed or uniquely positioned to get the results you want. Latham loves what he does — and you will too.

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An Army chinook helicopter transports the tail section of the C-130 that crashed on Sheep Mountain to Jackson Hole Airport about a week after the incident.

was Havoc 58, was a section of the tail and wheels from the landing gear. The Air Force attributed the cause of the crash to human error, as the crew misinterpreted radar and failed to climb quickly enough. It was a starry night, with no moonlight to illuminate the ridgeline.

The tragedy of Aug. 17, 1996 marred what had been a bucolic nine-day visit to the valley by the Clintons; it was the second consecutive summer the First Family had vacationed in Jackson Hole. Only five days earlier, President Clinton had proclaimed, “Yellowstone is more precious than gold,” in announcing a deal to nix a proposed gold mine near the park’s boundary. The plane was bound for New York, where the president would celebrate his 50th birthday.

Grieving family and friends have visited the mountain over the years, and last summer, on the 25th anniversary, 16 people gathered at the memorial plaque erected nearby in Curtis

Latham Jenkins Associate Broker | 307-690-1642 latham@livewaterproperties.com

JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

59

LOCAL LIFE

B R A D LY J . B O N E R

BLAST FROM THE PAST

Canyon. From the plaque you can see the crash site. “Cathartic” is how several former members of the tight-knit squadron from Dyess Air Force Base in Abilene, Texas, described the experience. “I didn’t realize I had these emotions in me the past 25 years until I came out here, and now I know what I was holding on to,” said Tim Taylor, a retired lieutenant colonel who was close friends with Capt. Kevin Earnest, Havoc 58’s pilot.

The Air Force removed the largest pieces of wreckage, but for years, the site was sprinkled with tiny bits of

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glass, wire, and plastic. Hikers collected these fragments and piled them into mounds, one of which was marked by a wooden cross, and the wind-blown hillside took on the feeling of a shrine. In 2015, the Bridger-Teton National Forest and Wyoming Wilderness Association spearheaded a cleanup that removed more than 100 pounds of debris from the site, which is located in the Gros Ventre Wilderness.

“The reality is there’s so much stuff, little bits of stuff, there’s no way we can totally clean that up,” says forest manager Linda Merigliano. The cleanup

In 2015, Bridger-Teton National Forest wilderness ranger Melissa Early and volunteer Annie Lovell were among a group who collected and removed about 100 pounds of debris that still remained on Sheep Mountain from the crash almost two decades earlier.

Explore Jackson Hole

B R A D LY J . B O N E R

HISTORY

VICTIMS OF SHEEP MOUNTAIN CRASH Those killed were Capt. Kevin N. Earnest; Capt. Kimberly Jo Wielhouwer; 2nd Lt. Benjamin T. Hall; Staff Sgt. Michael J. Smith Jr.; Senior Airmen Michael R. York, Ricky L. Merritt, and Billy R. Ogston; and Airman Thomas A. Stevens—all based at Dyess Air Force Base in Abilene, Texas—and Secret Service agent Aldo E. Frascoia of Clinton, Maryland.

Tues-Sat, 10a-5p | 225 N Cache St 307.733.2414 JacksonHoleHistory.org

primarily targeted piles made by visitors, some of which included bottle caps and other garbage. “To me, it’s more sacred when stuff is on the ground and you see it as itself, in place,” Merigliano says.

Today the scene bears hardly any trace of the horror of that night. Churned by pocket gophers, the smallest bits of debris have become part of the soil. In the evening, the rose of alpenglow coats the slope where it tilts slightly toward the valley and the majestic Teton peaks. The Sleeping Indian remains in peaceful repose. JH

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PEAK A D V E R T I S I N G

T

F E AT U R E

PROPERTIES

he factor that makes the Jackson Hole real estate market so unusual is the relative scarcity of private land. Ninetyseven percent of Teton County, Wyoming, is publicly owned—either national park, national forest, or wildlife refuge. This computes to just 75,000 privately held acres in a county spanning 2.5 million acres. The guaranteed open spaces and unobstructed views these surrounding public lands afford make the remaining private land a real treasure. Add the abundance of recreational opportunities found in and around the valley, and the quality of life one can enjoy in Jackson Hole is simply unbeatable.

Moreover, many of the properties featured here are secluded, scenic retreats located in the midst of prime wildlife habitat. Most existing and prospective property owners in Jackson Hole cherish this notion, and serve—or will serve—as stewards of nature.

One cannot put a dollar value on waking to the Teton skyline, skiing home for lunch, or listening to a trout stream gurgling through the backyard. In Jackson Hole, “living with nature” is not a fleeting, vicarious experience a person has while watching TV. Here it’s a fact of life, and we wouldn’t have it any other way.

FARMHOUSE LUXURY IN WILSON

AT A GLANCE 2,436

SQUARE FEET

4

BEDROOMS

3

BATHS

6,250,000 DOLLARS

22-383 MLS#

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LUXURY RETREAT IN THE WOODS

AT A GLANCE Elegant and tastefully appointed, this modern farmhouse inspired home sits on a generously sized lot adjacent to open space. Its open floor plan is complemented by vaulted ceilings and exposed wood beams in the kitchen, dining, and great room. The wood burning fireplace radiates warmth at the heart of this inviting 4-bedroom, 3-bathroom residence.

Light-filled interior spaces, a generous deck for entertainment, private balcony space, and expansive open space views define this impeccable Wilson home.

JACKSON HOLE SOTHEBY’S INTERNATIONAL REALTY HUFF VAUGHN SASSI (307) 203-3000 HuffVaughnSassi@jhsir.com MercedesHuff.com

SUMMER 2022 | JACKSON HOLE

2,806

SQUARE FEET

3

BEDROOMS

3.5

BATHS

3,650,000 DOLLARS

21-830 MLS#

Single-story lodge style home and guest studio located on a beautiful, treed lot at the Snake River Sporting Club.

Situated a short walk from the National Forest entrance and Snake River access. Part of the most beautiful country club setting that Jackson Hole has to offer along miles of the Snake River and the #1 ranked golf course in all of Wyoming designed by Tom Weiskopf. Expected completion Spring 2022.

COMPASS REAL ESTATE BUDGE KELLEY REALTY GROUP Chad Budge and John Farrell • (307) 413-1364 budgekelley@compass.com budgerealestate.com

A D V E R T I S I N G

ROSS PLATEAU

ACRES

—

BEDROOMS

—

BATHS

25,500,000 DOLLARS

—

MLS#

The Ross Plateau is an extremely rare and exceedingly beautiful property privately located 11 miles south of downtown Jackson Hole. Graced with elevated views of the Teton, Gros Ventre and Wyoming Range, a property with this exclusivity and these vantages cannot be found elsewhere. Unencumbered by restrictions, divided into four parcels and entirely surrounded by National Forest, this is a rare opportunity for the buyer looking for a blank canvas to create their dreams in Jackson Hole.

LIVE WATER PROPERTIES Matt MacMillan • (307) 413-3582 matt@livewaterproperties.com John Turner • (307) 699-3415 jturner@livewaterproperties.com livewaterproperties.com

QUINTESSENTIAL TETON RETREAT

AT A GLANCE 3,773

SQUARE FEET

5

BEDROOMS

3 .5

BATHS

WILSON RETREAT ABOVE FISH CREEK

AT A GLANCE

AT A GLANCE 159

2,781

SQUARE FEET

4

BEDROOMS

5,800,000 DOLLARS

21-3199 MLS#

MLS#

MOUNTAIN STANDARD REALTY Andrew Byron: Partner/Sales Associate (307) 690-2767 andrew@mountainstandardrealty.com Nicholas Houfek: Partner/Sales Associate (307) 399-7115 nicholas@mountainstandardrealty.com

HISTORIC CLOSING |

COMMUNITY HOUSING FUND WINS!

AT A GLANCE Truly unique offering in Teton Valley, this meticulously maintained custom home in Victor with mature trees offers both privacy and captivating views in all directions.

Highly sought after location, not in a subdivision, with close proximity to US Forest Service land allows for countless recreational opportunities just outside your door. Luxurious finishes include hickory floors, stainless appliances, granite countertops & hydronic in-floor heat. Numerous recent upgrades and remodeled spaces.

UPON REQUEST

22-103

7 acres of seclusion, stunning views, lush aspens and conifers await you. The home has two walk out levels with a backyard made for family gatherings, the original horse barn is reimagined into a warm, inviting entertainment space with historic Schofield barn-wood, full kitchen and a large spa bathroom with a spacious soapstone shower. A beautiful haven you must experience.

2

BATHS

1,173

SQUARE FEET

3

BEDROOMS

2

BATHS

LIST

DOLLARS

F E AT U R E

JACKSON HOLE SOTHEBY’S INTERNATIONAL REALTY Elizabeth Cheney • (914) 588-2302 elizabeth.cheney@jhsir.com

1,175,000 DOLLARS

21-2836 MLS#

On 2/23/22 history was made at the closing table when all parties involved, the Buyer, the Seller and the Real Estate Agent, contributed to the Community Housing Fund.

These contributions were tax deductible, and the funds will support our community’s need for more affordable housing. Thanks to JHTE, Amanda R., Brice & Ashley L., and to Bomber Bryan.

COMPASS REAL ESTATE 80 W. Broadway, Jackson, WY 83001 Bomber Bryan, Associate Broker, GRI, SRS (307) 690-2295 Bomber.Bryan@compass.com @JacksonHoleBomber BomberBryan.com

JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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A D V E R T I S I N G

F E AT U R E

FREESTANDING TIMBERS TOWNHOME

AT A GLANCE 3,183

SQUARE FEET

3

BEDROOMS

3 .5

BATHS

7,995,000 DOLLARS

22-580 MLS#

AT A GLANCE Quality, privacy and location in this freestanding Timbers home. John Carney Architecture and built by Dembergh Construction, this 3 bedroom, 3.5 bathroom, 3,183 square foot residence is steps from everything at Jackson Hole Mountain Resort. 3 levels of living, private hot tub, large 2 car garage, spacious mudroom, open floor plan, amazing light, elegant wood burning fireplace in the great room, gourmet kitchen, and custom furnishings throughout.

JACKSON HOLE SOTHEBY’S INTERNATIONAL REALTY Rob Deslauriers • (307) 413-3955 Anne Jones • (307) 699-3004

THE OUTPOST AT MOUNTAINSIDE VILLAGE

AT A GLANCE 2,200-3,500 SQUARE FEET

3/4

BEDROOMS

Envision yourself in a new kind of mountain community.

Adventure waits just out your door. A place where life moves a bit more slowly while outdoor passions are immediately realized. This is The Outpost at Mountainside Village. Phase 1 Sold Out. Phase 2 Coming Soon! Bespoke Mountain Modern Farmhouses. Located at the base of Teton Pass in Victor, Idaho.

2/3

DOLLARS

—

MLS#

64

2,391

SQUARE FEET

3

BEDROOMS

Perfect 3 bed / 3.5 bath newly renovated townhome on East Kelly Avenue near the base of Snow King. This unit just completed a top to bottom renovation and is being sold fully furnished with interior design by Idle Hands Workshop. Cache Creek runs through front yard. 2 car Garage. Bonus room could be changed to 4th bedroom.

Turn Key!

3.5

BATHS

2,575,000 DOLLARS

—

MLS#

TOM HEDGES, AKIN & HEDGES REALTY (307) 690-2495 tom@ahjacksonhole.com theoutpostmsv.com

MOUNTAIN SANCTUARY IN JACKSON HOLE

AT A GLANCE 5,496

SQUARE FEET

5

BEDROOMS

6.5

BATHS

1.2m 1.2 m - 1.7m 1.7m

NEWLY UPDATED EAST JACKSON TOWNHOME

BATHS

TOM HEDGES, AKIN & HEDGES REALTY (307) 690-2495 tom@ahjacksonhole.com theoutpostmsv.com

SUMMER 2022 | JACKSON HOLE

5,295,000 DOLLARS

21-3902 MLS#

Located in Jackson Hole, this well maintained, 2.5 acre property offers a 4,501 sq. ft. main home with 4 bedrooms, 995 sq. ft. guest home, 1,663 sq. ft. garage, and a 850 sq. ft. outbuilding/horse shelter. The main home offers quintessential log detailing throughout and includes a gourmet kitchen with custom cabinets, granite counters, Wolf and SubZero appliances, open floor plan with large wood-burning fireplace, a private office, a rec room/second living area with wet bar, a large loft, and more!

JACKSON HOLE SOTHEBY’S INTERNATIONAL REALTY Audrey Williams • (307) 690-3044 audrey.williams@jhsir.com audreywilliamsrealestate.com

Dianne Budge Associate Broker 307.413.1362

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TH E CA BI N OPENING SPRING 2022

JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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ENJOY

PRICE CHAMBERS

ARTS, CULTURE, FOOD, AND DESIGN

JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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8 ENJOY FOOD

of the Valley’s Best Outdoor Dining Spots

“I

n the winter months, cozy fireplace settings are prime seating, but in summer, many crave outdoor air,” says Allison Arthur, the owner and co-founder of Dishing, a magazine dedicated to all things food and eating in Jackson Hole.

With an outdoor dining season that’s as brief as the valley’s views are vast, Arthur’s recommendation is to “soak in every last drop of the extra-long daylight on one of many outdoor decks during the short but sweet season.” Here are some favorites to check out.

// BY SAMANTHA SIMMA

“This is a public space that benefits the entire community and provides social entertainment to all ages,” says Sam McGee, owner of Frederick Landscaping and longtime mug club member at Snake River Brewing, about the brewpub’s newly improved extensive lawn. (And McGee swears he’s not just saying this because his company led the charge on the lawn’s improvements.) In addition to an actual lawn, there are gardens by A New Leaf Garden Design, an oversize fire pit, cornhole boards, a dining patio, picnic tables, and Adirondack chairs. Settle into one of the latter with one of the many beers on tap, or go for a table on the outdoor dining patio to enjoy Snake River’s menu of elevated pub fare. Open Tuesday– Saturday at 11 a.m.; 265 S. Millward St., Jackson; 307/739-2337, snakeriverbrewing.com

It’s the unusual summer morning 2 when there’s no line out the front door and down the sidewalk at Persephone Bakery. In a white log cabin just off Jackson’s Town Square, the James Beard Foundation-recognized bakery and café makes what might be the best croissant this side of the Atlantic and breakfast and lunch entrees that are as yummy as they are interesting. While the inside of Persephone’s cabin is cozy—and highly Instagrammable—the outdoor seats are the better ones. An attached wraparound deck has fire pits and heaters, and bistro tables sit in an adjacent garden—all beneath the shade of towering cottonwood trees. Not that she ever has the time to do this herself as Persephone’s co-owner (and also the co-owner of sister concepts Picnic and Coelette), but Ali Cohane says about the outdoor seating, “It’s a great spot to find a nook and settle in for coffee, treats, some work, or a good book.” Open daily 7 a.m.–6 p.m.; 145 E. Broadway Ave., Jackson; 307/200-6708, persephonebakery.com

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R YA N D O R G A N

1

Pearl Street Bagels in Wilson has the same hustle, but less bustle than the bagelry’s location in downtown Jackson.

Avoid bustle entirely by following the yeasty, malty smells of Pearl Street’s East Coast-style bagels as they waft out the rear door. In this backyard, the sounds of slicing bagels and steaming milk are replaced by the babble of Fish Creek, near which sit several no-fuss picnic tables. Pearl Street Bagel owner Heather Story-Gould thinks this spot is the best in the valley for kid- and pet-friendly outdoor dining. Also, “It is not uncommon for a moose to wander by to share the moment with you,” Story-Gould says. Open daily 7 a.m.–3 p.m.; 1230 Ida Dr., Wilson; 307/739-1261, jacksonholebagels.com

COURTESY PHOTO

4

On the deck at The Bird, wings, burgers, and beers complement the sweeping views of South Park. “Come here for the burgers, but stay for the views, and of course, the booze,” says Arthur. If you’ve got the right attitude. The Bird is a no BS kind of place. What does this mean? Printed on every menu is, “We are not a short order kitchen, food may take some time, so please relax and enjoy yourself.” And, printed above the burger section—there are nearly 20 different types of burgers available—the menu explains, “our burgers are made with fresh ground brisket; order it like you would a steak” and then describes the options: “rare (red throughout), medium rare (red center, pink throughout), medium (pink everywhere), medium well (pink center), and well done (wrong decision).” We’ve got to agree with The Bird’s assessment of well done. Open Monday–Saturday at 4 p.m. and 10:30 a.m.–2 p.m. on Sunday.; 4125 US-89, Jackson; 307/732-2473, thebirdinjh.com

JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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While deciding whether to sip on a huckleberry mojito or a local brew, expect to be distracted by the views at the Blue Heron Lounge at Jackson Lake Lodge in Grand Teton National Park.

Here, Jackson Lake spreads toward a horizon that abruptly ends where the northern Tetons start. But don’t expect the usual Teton views; the Grand Teton is the most famous peak in the range, but from the Blue Heron’s deck, Mount Moran and its Skillet Glacier are the stars of the show. (Yes, people ski the Skillet from the peak’s 12,610-foot summit; it is steep, but not as steep as it looks.) Closer views—willow- and grass-rich marshlands between the bar and the near shore of Jackson Lake—might include a moose or grizzly bear. Open daily at 11 a.m.; 101 Jackson Lake Lodge Rd., Moran; 307/543-2811, gtlc.com

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R YA N D O R G A N

The outside seating area at The Bistro in The Cloudveil hotel offers amazing people watching—it is right on the Town Square. The French-inspired menu and creative cocktails are extra credit. Book a patio table for an earlyish dinner and you can catch the nightly Town Square Shootout while dipping a crusty piece of made-that-day baguette into the melted butter The Bistro serves with its escargot. Or book for breakfast, lunch, or a later dinner to avoid the crowds and noise that come with the Shootout. Open daily for breakfast, lunch, and dinner at 7 a.m.; 112 Center St. Jackson; 307/739-1100, thebistrojacksonhole.com

5 “Nothing is quite as rewarding after a hike up to the top of the [Bridger] Gondola as a basket of fries and a sloshie,” says Arthur about what you can order at The Deck at Piste. (If you don’t want to hike the three miles and 3,000 vertical feet up from the base area to eat here, you can ride up in the gondola, too, which takes about nine minutes). Perched at 9,095 feet, the deck here offers views of Jackson Hole—practically in its entirety—the Gros Ventre Mountains, and, on clear days, even the glaciated Wind River Range, home to the tallest peak in Wyoming (Gannett), in the distance to the east. Time it right and you can enjoy one of the best sunset views of the valley from here, with alpenglow illuminating Sheep Mountain (aka Sleeping Indian) and Jackson Peak on the opposite side of the valley.

For those who would rather ride than hike, the gondola ride up to The Deck is $15 after 5 p.m. (Before this, you’ve got to buy a sightseeing lift ticket, $35; the ride down is always free.) But mind the time—the last gondola down is at 9 p.m. Open daily 4:30–9 p.m.; 3395 West Cody Lane, Teton Village; 307/739-2675, jacksonhole.com

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8 The rooftop deck at Dornan’s Pizza & Pasta Company has, arguably, the best view in the valley. (We think it also has the best spinach artichoke dip in the valley.) Sit here and, over a pizza or pasta—maybe the buffalo bolognese?—scout out your next adventure in the Tetons, marvel at what you just climbed or hiked, or simply enjoy the views. Dornan’s is in Moose, near the main entrance to Grand Teton National Park, and from it the mountains feel close enough to touch. Wondering about the names of the different peaks? Take a look at your napkin—it’s stamped with a profile of the range and the names of the major peaks. Open daily for lunch and dinner at 11:30 a.m.; 12170 Dornans Rd., Moose; 307/733-2415, dornans.com JH

PRICE CHAMBERS

L ATHAM JENKINS

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Signal Mountain Lodge L.L.C. is an authorized concessioner of Grand Teton National Park

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Snake River Roasting // BY SAMANTHA SIMMA

T

his summer, after 15 years of selling its blends of locally roasted coffee and espresso beans to valley cafés including Picnic and at local markets including Smith’s, Albertsons, and Pearl Street Market, Snake River Roasting is opening its own café. General manager Cait Brooks says the café is, “a platform for us to share what we love best…brewing excellent coffee and building relationships with all coffee lovers alike.”

The couple who founded the roastery in 2007, Ruth Ann Petroff and Mark Barron, sold the company to local businessman Mekki Jaidi this past winter, but they remain coffee connoisseurs, happy to share their opinions, including: “There’s no right or wrong way to drink coffee," says Petroff. If you can’t make it to the café (145 E. Broadway Ave.), find Snake River Roasting beans at Smith’s, Albertsons, Whole Foods Market, Aspens Market, and Pearl Street Market. The price for 11 ounces of whole beans starts at $15.89.

Sleeping Indian is a decaf coffee that stands up to the full-bodied flavors of its caffeinated companions. Suitable for coffee purists looking to cut out caffeine, the blend utilizes a diffusion process that decaffeinates the coffee without chemicals while preserving its flavors of cream, milk chocolate, and white pepper.

The espresso blend White Spider is Snake River Roasting’s most awardwinning coffee. Named for the winter bootpack trail on Jackson Hole Mountain Resort’s Headwall, it has won a total of six bronze medals in Golden Bean and America’s Best Espresso events, including for Espresso, Organic Espresso, and Milk-based Espresso.

Roasted to maximize the blend’s caramelization for a deep chocolate flavor and creamy mouthfeel, “its heavy body allows the flavor to linger on your tongue,” Petroff says.

“We fell in love with the story, then fell in love with the coffee,” Petroff says of Guatemala Asproguate, which represents small producers from the Acatenango, San Martin Jilotepque, Coban, and Atitlan regions of Guatemala, where the majority of coffee farms are womenowned. Honey, orange, and caramel are artfully combined in this light, bright roast.

“Lithium is a smooth, medium-bodied coffee with a kiss of brightness from its Guatemala base,” says Petroff. “The base of a blend is the most prominent, with additions made to achieve the components you desire.” Here the secondary tastes include honeyed orange zest, dark cocoa, cedar, hazelnut, and cherry.

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Crafted in honor of friend of Snake River Roasting and iconic Jackson Hole ski patroller, Kirby Williams, the full-bodied Kirby’s First Tram dark roast is for the traditional coffee drinker. “Although we would like to think it’s the coffee, we are well aware that affection and admiration for Kirby are what’s driven Kirby’s First Tram to be one of our top coffees year after year,” Petroff says.

Named for a classic fishing fly and best paired with contemplative mornings on the Snake River, Petroff considers G’s Supafly Stone Dry to be a fresh take on a classic medium roast. “As you roast, the sugars in coffee are caramelized,” she says. “The deeper you roast, the more caramels and chocolates you get.”

In this case, the blend is roasted just enough to accentuate notes of hazelnut, cinnamon, and caramel.

Petroff says the Roam blend “reminds us of everything wild and unique that Wyoming has to offer,” and its tasting notes are a nod to exactly that.

Berry and orange zest ooze fruitiness from naturally processed Ethiopian beans, while heavy-bodied Indonesian beans temper those flavors. A touch of naturally processed beans from Brazil brings a slight chocolate finish.

Skip the morning pastry and drink the Wild Iris blend instead. Naturally processed Ethiopian beans evoke fruity, berrylike characteristics, which are balanced with Sumatran and Brazilian beans for added body and chocolate flavors. The end result is reminiscent of a warm blueberry muffin.

TRUST THE SHOP THAT’S BEEN

SKIING & BIKING SINCE 1976

There’s no better way to enjoy a day in the Tetons than in the saddle of a road bike or among the mountains on a bike fit for crushing all types of terrain. Here at Hoback Sports, we are the premier cycling hub, offering the best selection of rental bikes in Jackson Hole.

Described as being “crafted for that person who just needs a smoky, dark brew,” the Gros Ventre French roast is Snake River Roasting’s darkest blend. The result is “black as night and as smooth as the moonrise in the Wyoming sky,” says Petroff, with notes of black cherry and brown sugar. JH

ELECTRIC, PATHWAY, MOUNTAIN & ROAD BIKE RENTALS HOBACKSP ORTS.COM

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TASTE OF JACKSON HOLE

Bubba’s

Worker’s Special Worker’s

// BY SAMANTHA SIMMA

I

t’s not until you pull open the second set of doors in the entryway at Bubba’s BBQ that the aromas of coffee and bacon, along with a cloud of other classic breakfast smells, hit you. At this popular spot among locals and visitors, the ones in the know aren’t being tempted by the pecan pancakes or Felipe’s Special. Instead, they’re ordering something that’s not on the menu: the Worker’s Special.

our locals " Without in this community,

and all their support, we would not be in business.”

— NICOLE DAVIS, BLUE COLLAR RESTAURANT GROUP’S REGIONAL PRESIDENT

When it comes to a classic breakfast spread, the Worker’s Special is a biscuit above the rest. “Reasonably priced food is hard to come by in Jackson,” says Allan Morton, who has been a regular at Bubba’s since moving to the area 37 years ago. He finds himself at Bubba’s for breakfast at least once a week and says he is a “Worker’s [Special] and a big glass of water kind of guy.” For $9.99, the Worker’s Special includes a cup of coffee; two eggs cooked to your

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liking; hash browns; the choice of ham, bacon, or sausage; and either a muffin, toast, or one of Bubba’s Big Biscuits. If you opt for the biscuit like Morton does, your server will bring you enough butter and honey to spread between every flaky layer.

The Worker’s Special was on the menu in 2013 when Blue Collar Res-

taurant Group purchased the establishment. They took it off the menu, but kept it available for those who knew to order it. Why? “Without our locals in this community, and all their support, we would not be in business,” says Blue Collar Restaurant Group’s regional president, Nicole Davis. “Having something like the Worker’s Special is a way

KATHRYN ZIESIG

For $9.99, the Worker’s Special includes a cup of coffee, two eggs cooked to your liking, hash browns, the choice of ham, bacon or sausage, and either a muffin, toast, or one of Bubba’s Big Biscuits.

to thank the local workers and community members for their continued support. They are the backbone of our business.” Should you like to take a walk in a local’s shoes, the next time you’re at Bubba’s for breakfast say, “I’ll have a Worker’s.” Open daily 6:30 a.m.– 9 p.m.; 100 Flat Creek Dr., Jackson; 307/733-2288, bubbasjh.com JH JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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Art

COURTESY PHOTO

IDAHO COMMUNIT Y FOUNDATION

ART

How Jackson’s gallery scene grew to be one of the most vibrant in the country.

// BY JIM MAHAFFIE

Evolution T

LEFT: Archie Teater painting in his Jackson Hole studio in the late 1950s.

RIGHT: Ringholz Studios in downtown Jackson.

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rotting on your horse down the dirt road to Jenny Lake in the 1920s, you would have passed a tent. You likely would not have guessed that, tucked under the soaring Cathedral Group peaks of the Teton range, with painted canvases hanging from a clothesline out front, that humble tent was the leading edge of an arts community that, a century later, would be rated one of America’s finest.

The tent was the studio and showroom of painter Olaf Moller. Born in Denmark, he immigrated with his family as a child, and studied under painter N.C. Wyeth and at the Academy

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of Fine Arts in Philadelphia. His family settled in Idaho, and he came to Jackson to paint every summer throughout the 1920s.

Across his tent’s roof and later his studio cabin was a giant sign that said PICTURES. Inside were paintings, photos, and postcards for sale.

Artists before Moller painted, and photographed, the Tetons, but Moller was the first to sell his paintings right at the eastern base of the range. Moller had neighbors before Grand Teton National Park was established in 1929—an eclectic collection of artists, photographers, adventurers, and climbers who, like

him, spent summers in the Tetons.

“Jackson Hole is outstanding in its scenic values and the mecca of numerous artists during the summer season,” read the Salt Lake Tribune in 1939. “An artist with his easel, by the roadside, in front of the Teton Range, is no uncommon sight.”

Others that sold their works from Moller’s “gallery” included Archie Boyd “Teton” Teater, a prolific landscape artist from Idaho who studied at the Portland Art Museum and Art Students League in New York. Another was Kansas-born photographer Harrison Crandall, who came to Jackson with his wife, Hilda, in the summer of 1922 to honeymoon. The Crandalls set up a darkroom in their tent on String Lake and sold photos and postcards there and at the JY Ranch and Moran General Store. In 1923 the Crandalls bought land and began to build a homestead on Jenny Lake. The Crandall Picture Shop and Studio was completed in 1927 and is now the site of the Jenny Lake Visitor Center.

Here’s a look at how Jackson’s gallery scene got from then to now.

ASTORIA FINE ART

HENRY WHITING II COLLECTION

Born in Idaho and kicked out of eighth grade for drawing instead of doing homework, Archie Boyd “Teton” Teater (1901–1978) summered in the Tetons with pals Olaf Moller and legendary mountaineer Paul Petzoldt, who helped sell their art to tourists on his climbing trips.

In 1941, Teater built a cabin to use as his studio and gallery—a big step up from selling paintings out of his tent on Jenny Lake and at pop-up stands on the Town Square. (Teater’s studio still exists today; it is home to JC Jewelers, although its current location on the Town Square is not where it was in Teater’s day.)

Jackson Hole’s first year-round resident artist was Wyoming-raised painter Conrad Schwiering, who came to Jackson in 1947 and began selling paintings out of a trailer on the Town Square. Schwiering’s father was a dean at the University of Wyoming, and Conrad grew up in Laramie. While studying at the Art Students League in New York City from 1939 to 1941, he met Western wildlife artist Carl Rungius, renowned for his paintings of animals in their natural environment. A nationally known painter, Schwiering worked on displays at New York’s Museum of Natural History before coming to Jackson. Schwiering organized a show of Wyoming artists in 1947 that traveled around the state.

Moore’s Café, a popular gathering spot next to the Cowboy Bar, began hosting art shows in 1938. That June, Moore’s owner and chef, Jack Moore, and his wife, Berta, held a solo exhibition for their friend Archie Teater. This show was so successful the café did a larger JACKSON HOLE HISTORICAL SOCIETY one the following summer. It included work

by Moller, Teater, naturalist Olaus Murie, and painters Bert Humphrey and Earl Reed. When the show traveled to other destinations in 1940, it added works by Florence Ware, a painter and professor of art from the University of Utah, and the first in a talented and distinguished line of women artists who brought more attention to the Jackson Hole art scene.

1920s

1922

1927

1928

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1938

1939

Painter Olaf Moller spends summers in a tent on Jenny Lake then buys a cabin to host exhibitions and classes, billing himself in ads as an “Instructor in Portrait, Landscape, Still Life, Drawings and Paintings.”

Harrison and Hilda Crandall honeymoon in Jackson Hole but quickly turn it into a business trip. They set up camp on String Lake with a darkroom, and sell postcards to dudes at the Moran General Store.

The Crandall Picture Shop and Studio opens (on the site of the current Jenny Lake Visitor Center), selling photos, paintings, art supplies, and posters by artists including Olaf Moller, Charlie Russell, Winold Reiss, Stephen Leek, and Joseph Stimson.

Archie Boyd Teater sells paintings out of a tent at Jenny Lake.

Encouraged by his success, he rents a cabin on Jenny Lake from the Crandalls to display and sell his work.

The Crandalls’ property becomes part of Grand Teton National Park— and the couple becomes the new park’s first official concessionaire.

Moore’s Café (in the space that is now Local restaurant) hosts Archie Teater’s first solo exhibition, which includes paintings of Jenny Lake, the Tetons, and other Jackson Hole scenes.

The Teton Artists Association creates an artists’ colony.

The hub is the Jenny Lake studio of Olaf Moller, its first president, and his cabin hosts rotating exhibits in summer. These exhibits later move to Moore’s Café.

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Early galleries expanded Jackson’s art horizons and attracted even more artists and national attention. In 1963, Dick Flood opened Trailside Galleries on Jackson’s Town Square, representing artists from all over the West. Wilcox Gallery (shown at right) opened in 1969 to sell the work of award-winning painter Jim Wilcox and several other artists and sculptors. In 1978, wildlife photographer Thomas Mangelsen opened Images of Nature (shown below), a gallery selling his fine art photography from around the world.

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B R A D LY J . B O N E R

After World War II, many more art lovers, patrons, travelers, and collectors discovered Teton landscapes, wildlife, and Western scenes, and demand gave rise to new galleries, art fairs, and exhibits. By the 1960s, the town had transitioned from ranching and cattle to tourism and the trappings of wealth, such as art. Jackson joined the ranks of other “miracle markets” (like Santa Fe, Scottsdale, New Orleans, and Charleston), where wealthy homeowners, a large transient visitor population, and beautiful surroundings combined to drive art markets. In 1962, a Jackson Hole Guide headline read, “Jackson Hole to Become Cultural Center for Wyoming and the Entire West.”

In 1948, Wort Hotel owners John and Jess Wort offered Conrad Schwiering balcony space at their hotel for the town’s first hotel gallery. Amid the gambling, showgirls, and rowdy bar scene was a small sign that read “Conrad Schwiering, Western Paintings” with a finger pointing up to the balcony where his artwork hung and sold for 12 years.

1942

1945

1947

1963

1969

1978

1983

Led by Harrison Crandall, renowned photographer Ansel Adams shoots his striking view of the Snake River winding toward the Tetons.

After living in a truck bed, covered wagon, and the Railway Express office, Archie Boyd Teater opens a log cabin studio and gallery on the Town Square. It remained until his death in 1978.

Conrad Schwiering arrives in Jackson.

An impressionist who painted more than 500 Jackson Hole and Teton scenes, he was the town’s first yearround resident artist. His paintings were sold in a gallery inside the Wort Hotel.

Dick Flood opens Trailside Galleries on Jackson’s Town Square, bringing several well-known artists and their work to the valley.

Wilcox Gallery opens to sell the work of painter Jim Wilcox and other popular and successful western painters.

Wildlife photographer Thomas Mangelsen opens Images of Nature, a gallery selling his fine art photography of wildlife and landscapes.

The first Fall Arts Festival is held (it is still going strong today).

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Coeur d’Alene Art Auction Fine Western & American Art

Best in the West – Coeur d’Alene Art Auction Realized Over $20 Million in 2021 Sales at Auction.

The Auction is now accepting quality consignments for our 2022 Auction to be held July 23 in Reno, Nevada.

Visit our website at cdaartauction.com 208-772-9009 • info@cdaartauction.com

William Herbert Dunton (1878 – 1936), Crest of the Ridge, Grizzly, oil on board, 8 × 10 inches, Estimate: $ 200,000 – 300,000

ENJOY ART

COURTESY PHOTO

Founded in 1962 and first led by Baroness Consuelo von Gontard of Melody Ranch, the Jackson Hole Fine Arts Foundation put on the first Jackson Hole Fine Arts Festival that year. Today, the Jackson Hole Gallery Association brings together top artists and galleries in its annual gallery guide.

Founded in 1981, today it includes 28 member galleries.

While galleries selling traditional Western and wildlife art dominated the art scene for decades, in the early 1980s, Beth Overcast opened Center Street Gallery, which was the valley’s first to sell contemporary art. In the decades since, this segment of the gallery scene has exploded. Case in point: Ringholz Studios (shown above), which sells the colorful paintings and drawings of artist Amy Ringholz, who is based in Jackson, and has work in collections across the country. “Jackson Hole is well-known for traditional Western and wildlife artwork, and is adding more contemporary work with new and different artists arriving,” says current Jackson Hole Gallery Association president and Ringholz Studios manager, Ashley Quinn. Carrie Wild, an artist and co-owner of Gallery Wild says, “I see a really strong contemporary art market with newer work more abstract and colorful. Our artists use our natural beauty as an inspiration, and they are doing their own interpretations of it. Just like with traditional work, buyers go for cool art that they can take home and reminds them of their visit.”

"

I see a really strong contemporary art market with newer work more abstract and colorful." ­—CARRIE WILD, AN ARTIST AND CO-OWNER OF GALLERY WILD

Bar BC Ranch-born-andraised writer and social historian Nathaniel Burt predicted Jackson’s art future in his Jackson Hole Journal, published in 1983: “New West…where painters flourish and every other store is an art gallery of some kind. Someday Jackson Hole may be more famous for its artists in some form or another as it is now for its mountains.”

In Jackson Hole, the definition of “art gallery” is broad. Thanks to local businesses supporting local artists, you can buy a painting with your bagel at Pearl Street Bagels or with a beer at Snake River Brewing.

Local restaurants the Blue Lion and Cowboy Coffee also exhibit the work of local artists.

COURTESY PHOTO

What’s the future look like for art galleries in Jackson Hole? “We’re a real success story nationally,” says Maggie Moore, founder of Artemis Art Advisory, an art appraisal and collectionmanagement service based in Jackson. “New galleries are opening in Jackson, and Jackson is seeing young artists and entrepreneurs carrying on the traditions of Archie Teater and the Crandalls today. There’s something to be said for people going on vacation, seeing this incredible place, then visiting a true gallery, capturing it in a memento from their trip, and taking it home.”

1990s

1991

1998

2004

2013

2019

2019

Center Street Gallery and Martin Harris Gallery bring contemporary art to Jackson, paving the way for other contemporary galleries.

Legacy Gallery opens on the Town Square representing many wellknown wildlife and landscape artists from around the country. It closes in 2019.

West Lives On Gallery begins selling fine Western art. (West Lives On Contemporary opens in 2009 to meet demand for contemporary artwork.)

Trio Fine Art, which is owned by local artists, opens.

Trailside Galleries celebrates 50 years of selling Western art and sculpture on the Town Square.

Jackson is ranked the number-one “arts vibrant” small community in the country in the fifth annual SMU DataArts Arts Vibrancy Index.

Trio Fine Art becomes Turner Fine Art, which showcases Jackson-born painter Katherine Mapes Turner’s artwork, as well as other nationally renowned fine artists. JH

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47 YEARS OF INSPIRATION AT 6000 FT.

ALL DESIGNS COPYRIGHTED

Gaslight Alley • Downtown Jackson • 125 N. Cache www.danshelley.com • info@danshelley.com • 307-733-2259

JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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RUGILE KALADYTE

CULTURE

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Tim Sandlin Even better than this Jackson-based novelist’s books might be the writing community he helped create. // BY WHITNEY ROYSTER

I

n 2016, Peter Aguero, the host of The Moth, a national storytelling platform, came to the Center for the Arts stage, and announced, “Yeah, I’m crying” to a packed, $75-per-ticket crowd.

The reason? Earlier that day, he had discovered one of his boyhood heroes, Jackson resident and prolific author Tim Sandlin, worked at the front desk of the town’s famous arts building. “Do you guys know how lucky you are?” he asked The Moth crowd.

Had Sandlin heard about this? Yes, he had, and he shrugged it off with humility. “People see me on the desk here, and they don’t know who I am,” he says.

“I’m like the bottom guy in the whole town with this entry-level job, but I’m the only one with a fan club.” His “Sandlinistas”—fans of his 10 novels, two books of columns, screenplays, and other writing—follow him at timsandlin.com. (Sandlin does say Sandlinista membership is not as robust as it was

when he was writing his widely enjoyed “GroVont Trilogy” in the early and mid 1990s.)

Sandlin’s first novel, Sex and Sunsets, was published in 1987. Since then, he has garnered acclaim with the GroVont Trilogy (Skipped Parts, Sorrow Floats, and Social Blunders), Honey Don’t, Rowdy in Paris, and Jimi Hendrix Turns 80. Three of Sandlin’s books have been made into movies. In 2022, his latest collection of columns—most of which first appeared in Jackson Hole magazine— Somewhat True Tales of Jackson Hole, was published. What’s most striking about Sandlin’s 35-plus years of writing about Jackson Hole is this: much of the content doesn’t change.

Then and now, characters bemoan the housing crisis and cold Jackson winters. Global warming comes up, as do guns and clueless tourists. Sandlin admits he’s been writing about Jackson Hole for so long, he steals from himself.

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MICHAEL TURNER

CULTURE

Tim Sandlin speaking at the Jackson Hole Writers' Conference, which he co-founded.

“There are so many ongoing battles,” he says. “Like, ‘Are you a real local?’ I came here in ’59 and I wasn’t born here, so no, I’m not.” That conversation, too, comes up in his novels. “I trashed rich people a lot," he says. "I was one of the first ones to say the billionaires have driven out the millionaires.”

Sandlin can also map some of the valley’s cultural evolution. The first artists here were the writers, the biologists, and nonfiction writers. Diary of a Dude Wrangler by Maxwell Struthers Burt put Jackson Hole on the map, and the area became a place where critics would gather in the summer and drink around the campfire.

In the 1960s, there was one radio station and one movie —TIM SANDLIN theater. “Cable TV changed everything,” Sandlin says.

Before, people had the annual “Pothole Festival” where you submitted the gnarliest pothole to the newspaper for voting. (“The chamber of commerce shut that down,” he says.) “You had to really want to be here,” Sandlin says.

“Now it’s easier.”

to really want to " Yoube had here. Not it's easier.”

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In his time here, Sandlin has had what he guesses to be 40 entry-level jobs, from skinning elk to driving an ice cream truck, gardening for the Rockefellers, and dishwashing. In 1972, he slept under the grandstands of the Grand Teton Music Festival in Teton Village and woke up when the orchestra started playing.

Sandlin has slept on the front porch of the secondhand shop Browse ‘N Buy, and in a barn near Taggart Creek. “I knew people who rented a bed in an apartment where you would come in from work at 7 a.m. and kick someone out,” he says.

“It seemed just as bad. In the early 1970s, people lived on forest service land in tents. I had a teepee. I always liked that better than seven people in an apartment.” He wrote every day for 20 years before meeting another writer.

And then Sandlin, the late John Byrne Cooke, and Debbie Bedford began informally meeting. Those informal meetings grew into the Jackson Hole Writers’ Conference, which Sandlin is now directing into its 31st year. “It was cool once a year to talk to someone you had something in common with,” he says. “I didn’t ski or sell real estate so I wouldn’t have anyone to talk to.”

Today he’s committed to the organization’s success both as a jumpingoff point for writers and a community touchstone.

The Jackson Hole Writers’ Conference has had more people go on to publish books than any other conference per capita, Sandlin says. Past attendees include Kyle Mills (who went on to become a number-one New York Times bestselling author; he writes thrillers) and Shawn Klomparens (the author of three books). “I taught a novel-writing class where 7 out of 10 went on to publish their books,” Sandlin says. “It took a long time, but it’s an amazing ratio.”

Building that connection in the writing community has kept Sandlin from becoming bitter as Jackson grapples with changes. “The longer you live in Jackson, the less people you know,” he says, attributing the sentiment to the former state representative H.L. Jensen (who shows up in his books). “Once you

get out of those jobs where you’re in restaurants and bars, people leave. I know a lot less people now.”

Still, there have been changes for the good. The Center for the Arts opened in 2008 and today is home to 22 arts-related nonprofits, in addition to the Center Stage, Black Box Theatre, classrooms, and studios. “This building has been a second home since it opened,” Sandlin says. “We all take care of each other in here. The cooperation and collaboration has been really amazing. The Center itself is trying to help us survive.” Sandlin also loves the National Museum of Wildlife Art and the Grand Teton Music Festival. Sometimes these things collide, like when a GTMF quartet plays on the Center for the Arts lawn in summer.

And there are local artists who inspire him. “There’s a new generation coming up,” he says. “Andrew Munz, Molly Loomis, Katy Fox, and Matt Daly.

I like a lot of the work they’ve been do-

ing.” He’s also inspired by the people who come and go from the Center for the Arts. “There are a lot of people who think you have to be a millionaire to come in this building,” he says. “From working here, it’s not true. Those organizations (in the building) will get you into a class. The whole [Center] elitism thing is inaccurate.” Sandlin is impressed by the ceramic artists. “I watch them when I’m on the front desk,” he says. “[They] are such fanatics. They are in there like every day. I work on Sundays, and when I get here, they are waiting for me in the parking lot, and when I leave they are still here.”

While he enjoys watching artists coming and going at the Center, Sandlin himself visits rocks and streamsides to keep writing. “I watch the sky and I watch the sun come up and go down,” he says. “I figured out once the number of full moons I’ve seen in Jackson Hole.

It’s about 1,600.” JH

185 Scott Lane, Jackson WY 83001 linenalley.com 307-734-7424 | linenalleyjh@gmail.com

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Insider Eye // BY MAGGIE THEODORA

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We asked architectural photographers to share photograpahs of some of their favorite homes.

AUDREY HALL

A

ccording to the most recent data available from the U.S. Census Bureau, there are 13,848 “housing units” in Teton County. This number includes everything from modest apartments to Camp Teton, a compound with a main home, guest home, entertaining treehouse, and spa set on 55 acres on Hansen Peak that was listed for sale in 2021 for $65 million (making it the most expensive listing in Jackson Hole at the time).

“Homes in Jackson Hole range from little cabins to in-your-wildest-dreams kind of places,” says Montana-based photographer Audrey Hall.

We asked Hall and two other architectural photographers who work in the area—David Agnello and Aaron Kraft—to share some of their favorite images from the most interesting projects they’ve shot. Between the three of them, they’ve seen (and photographed) hundreds of homes in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. Their submissions surprised us a little: It’s not always, or even usually, the wildestkind-of-dreams homes that Agnello, Kraft, and Hall find most interesting.

“A project stands out to me not for its opulence,” Kraft says. “When I walk in and feel the architect’s intention—that everything was done for a reason—that makes a space stand out to me. Intention doesn’t need a big budget; it can be present in a tiny cabin as much as in a six-structure compound. But, if it’s a big project and thoughtfully designed, the spaces can be absolutely amazing.”

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AARON KRAFT

A

aron Kraft’s work has been published in Dwell, Big Sky Journal, and the Wall Street Journal, and he has taken photos for the portfolios of CLB Architects, Pearson Design Group, and Berlin Architects. Over his career as an architectural photographer, Kraft says, “I’ve developed an appreciation for light and the way spaces and scenes within spaces unfold. I know good architecture everywhere utilizes light, but the interplay between interiors here and the landscape seems extra special.”

“This room is very masculine—it has a smoker’s lounge or library feel to it, and the staircase is so beautifully crafted,” Kraft says.

“I like this particular photograph because I spent a lot of time working on getting the lighting that I wanted. The space is moody, and I wanted to highlight that, and to make the wood in the stairs glow red.” There is one window just outside the frame, and Kraft composed this image so that all the light came from the unseen window.

room is very masculine—it has a " This smoker’s lounge or library feel to it, and the staircase is so beautifully crafted.”

— AARON KRAFT

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Distinctive Designs Inspired By Your Lifestyle Kate Binger | 307-733-8582 | DwellingJH.com | Boutique Showroom at Osprey Landing

ENJOY DESIGN

AARON KRAFT

This is the private home of the founder of a local boutique interior design and styling firm. “I am familiar with many of her professional projects, and I loved seeing her personal space,” Kraft says. “It’s an old log cabin that she has just made so warm and inviting.

It’s not big, but is so homey, and all of the items and collections in it tell a story. Places that tell stories are my absolute favorite to shoot.”

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“People still love the idea of coming to Jackson Hole and having a log cabin,” Kraft says. “But the glossy orange finish that was popular in the log homes built here in the 1980s and 1990s is dated. It’s nice to see these log homes be repurposed rather than knocked down.” This home on Fall Creek Road was modernized by GYDE Architects.

The two original log buildings, one a one-bedroom cabin and the second a garage, were gutted and painted black inside and out, and a new structure was built to connect them. “I really like the black logs,” Kraft says. “I’ve seen homes in which logs have been painted white, and that looks good, but this is the only one that I’ve seen that went with black. It works well, and it’s one of the things that makes this home stand out to me.”

“This project is one of those that pairs thoughtful design with a substantial budget. Spending time in this room, I saw that it was made for getting light at the time of day that I took this photograph. Throughout the house, you could tell that attention was paid to the placement of windows not just for views, but for light,” Kraft says. He also likes the space for its interior design.

“The interior designer did an amazing job of pulling together a collection of things that are so different but also work so well together” he says. “There is so much texture and contrast, and the fireplace is a unique creation.”

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DAVID AGNELLO

“W

hen I enter a space to photograph it, whether for an architect, builder, or interior designer, my goal is to convey the emotional intent they had in mind when they worked on the space,” says David Agnello, whose images of homes have been published in the Wall Street Journal, ArchDaily, Mountain Living, and The New York Times. “And then I also want to convey what it means to me to be in that space.”

“This is a space I enjoyed photographing because of its design and intent,” Agnello says. (The home was designed by UK-based architects McLean Quinlan; the same firm also did the interior design.) Agnello says this home also shows the general transition away from residences with two-story-tall windows in great rooms that are taller than they are wide. “I had always thought those rooms were incredibly uncomfortable because of the proportions,” he says.

“This space is pretty much a glass room, and it’s completely exposed and open, but it doesn’t feel uncomfortable because there’s a sense of scale.”

“This is one of my favorite photographs that I’ve taken in years,” Agnello says. “I don’t know if this is because I like the photograph, the house, or the space so much.

This house, in particular this area of the house, brought about a feeling of calm. Just being in it was amazing.”

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Agnello, who once thought he might study architecture in college, loves the interior and exterior of this home, which local architect Peggy Gilday designed for herself (Gilday’s firm is GYDE Architects). “Being in this living room, there is a sense of openness, but also of privacy. This home has houses close on both sides, so [the architect] put most of the windows at the front and back rather than the sides, where neighbors are,” Agnello says. “The space feels very intimate and very thoughtful.

And it is also relatable.”

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JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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AUDREY HALL

B

ased in Livingston, Montana, Audrey Hall has shot for Western Interiors and Design, The New York Times, Sunset, and Mountain Living. Hall photographed 15 homes in the Mountain West for the 2017 book Rustic Modern; her most recent book is Bison: Portrait of an Icon. “There are similarities and differences between photographing homes and portraits, whether of people or wildlife,” says Hall, who studied fine art photography under Thomas Joshua Cooper at the Glasgow School of Art in Scotland.

“Portraits are all about light and gesture and mood and style, and architecture and interiors to me are about light, content, and composition.”

This home designed by Reid Smith Architects with the interiors by Envi Design has a custom swing made by Russ Frye Design and Fabrication. “I love the simplicity of composition of this image, how it’s inspired by modernist painters like Wassily Kandinsky, and how the furnishings that subtly enter the frame echo the contemporary theme,” Hall says. “The setting is spectacular, perfectly framed by floor-toceiling windows. The sophistication of the room is lightened by the whimsy of the custom swing—a place where all the young at heart can spend time reading or simply gazing at the view.”

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This 700-square-foot cabin is in Idaho’s Little Lost River Valley. “There is nothing around it,” Hall says. “At night, you look 360 degrees, and there isn’t so much as a single light.”

The location alone made this cabin extraordinary to Hall, but as she learned more about the site, she found the project even more interesting. “The people who built the cabin purchased large pieces of land that needed restoration work.

There was a spring creek on the property that they brought back to life,” she says. “This project was exciting for me for multiple reasons.”

“I love that this climbing wall is quirky and unexpected,” Hall says.

“I love the organizational principles of the architectural design (by CLB Architects), it feels like a Jackson Pollack meets Mondrian.

I love the contrast of the steel and the landscape. I love the whimsy and the colors.”

Hall photographed this wall tent for her 2015 book American Rustic.

(With text by writer Chase Reynolds Ewald, American Rustic is now in its fifth printing.) It was built as a writing, reading, and playing retreat for musician, artist, and writer “Dobro Dick” Dillof. Dillof first came to Montana to train hop and ended up moving to the state full time. “The wall tent has swelling views toward Yellowstone and is filled with instruments and collectables,” Hall says. Dillof did the interior himself. “He has a keen eye for historic objects and beautiful aesthetics,” Hall says. JH

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ENJOY HEALTH

Move On Whether you’re a mountain athlete looking to get better or want to stay active and independent as you age, mobility can help. // BY LILA EDYTHE

S

trength and conditioning coach (and former professional big mountain skier) Crystal Wright doesn’t mince words when it comes to mobility. “Mobility is how you prevent injury and still enjoy the outdoors and the activities you love!” she says. And mobility isn’t just something aging super athletes should think about. “Everyone needs better mobility,” Wright says. “The better your mobility is, the better you are able to protect your body, and protecting your body is important at any age.”

The concept of mobility as an important part of fitness and of aging well is relatively new. Previously, mobility was often conflated with flexibility. Grayson Wickham, a physical therapist and the founder of Movement Vault, a mobility and movement company, told Shape magazine, “People have been using flexibility and mobility interchangeably forever, but recently there’s been a push to separate the two concepts.”

So, what exactly is mobility? And how is it different from flexibility? Chris Bates, a personal trainer for 10 years and the founder of Jackson-based Victory Lab, says flexibility is passive and mobility is active. “Think of a trainer lifting your leg up while you’re lying on your back versus you lifting your leg on your own from the same

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position. How far a trainer can move your muscles is flexibility. Mobility is how far you can lift your leg on your own,” he says. An easy way to see the difference between flexibility and mobility on your own at home is to lie on your back and bend your knee in and bring it up toward your chest. Your hip mobility is defined by how high your knee can go without assistance. Now put your hands around your knee and pull it close to your chest—this reveals your hip flexibility.

While flexibility and mobility are different, they are related; flexibility is a component of mobility, but not necessarily vice-versa. Other parts of mobility include strength, coordination, and balance. “Mobility is complex,” Bates says. “And mobility exists on a spectrum. Each joint—your ankle, knee, hip, elbow, shoulder—has its own level of mobility that allows it to be functional. For example, knees and elbows have less mobility than wrists and ankles.

and ski several weeks a year. In his early 60s, he partially retired and moved to Jackson. Realizing he was lacking in physical fitness, he began working out with Crystal Wright. “She had a job on her hands when I walked in the door,” George says. He was also about three years out from having had a stroke. “It left me with a lot of problems on my right side, especially in terms of walking and running,” he says.

George initially started with strength training and about six years ago added weekly mobility-specific workouts to his twice-a-week strength-training sessions. With just the strength training, George noticed improvements in his walking and running, and says that adding mobility work allowed him to do more with his strength training. “When I first started with Crystal, doing a squat was very challenging for me—keeping your feet on the ground and going all the way down and then all the way up,” he says.

and strength go hand-in-hand to " Mobility prevent injury and increase performance.”

MOBILITY AND MOUNTAIN ATHLETES “I feel in a mountain town, shoulders and ankles are the worst [in terms of mobility],” Wright says. “Most people run, bike, or carry a pack so their pecs become very tight and their upper back becomes weak so they can’t move well with their upper body, and then the core gets neglected, and it is a double whammy.” Also, most mountain athletes have quads that are overly developed (i.e. strong) compared to opposing muscles like hamstrings. “It seems everyone in this town is quad dominant, so ankle flexion gets neglected because people don’t know how to use their posterior chain and it pulls on the gastroc (the large posterior muscle of the calf) and hip flexors, among other places.”

—CRYSTAL WRIGHT

Knees and elbows more or less go one direction—they flex and extend. But ankles and wrists have more mobility.

They move in multiple planes.”

The natural mobility of the joints begins to decline around the age of 30 and can also be affected at earlier ages by concentrating too much on one or two particular activities, injuries, and surgeries, among other things.

P

aul George, a 71-year-old who was an athlete in high school and college, says that during his adult life, when he attended law school and then in the following decades of his work life, he didn’t do much besides play tennis

“In high school and college, squatting wasn’t a problem, so it was a movement I knew, but I had lost the ability to do it. As my mobility increased and I was able to squat properly and more deeply, I was able to strengthen more muscles and do heavier weights.” George says that when he started working out with Wright, “I noticed that she had me on the ground all the time. I realized I had trouble getting down on the floor and also getting back up, but having better mobility has improved that.”

Wright says, “If an athlete can’t squat, they can’t get stronger. If they can’t lift their arms above their head, they can’t prevent injury or create strength and power. Mobility and strength go hand-

in-hand to prevent injury and increase performance.”

George also credits the strength and mobility work he’s done with improvements in his balance and in preventing injuries. “I do a lot of flyfishing and wading, which requires I walk over rocks that are very slippery.

My ability to do that, even though I’m five years older, is better than it was when I started,” he says. On the ski slope, he says, “If I fall, I feel that the strength and mobility I have minimizes the fall, and getting up off the ground isn’t difficult for me anymore.

It is because of strength and mobility work that, at my age, I can still do the activities I want to.”

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3

MOBILITY EXERCISES YOU CAN DO AT HOME

THE AMAZING SQUAT

1

Y AND L: These are helpful for shoulder impingements. Standing, with your hips pressed slightly back, start with your arms hanging down at your side.

Pulling back with your shoulder blades and leading with your thumbs, raise both arms so that they are in the shape of the letter Y. For the L, start in the same position as you do for the Y, but have both elbows out to the side, bent at a 90-degree angle and even with your shoulders. Start with your hands below your shoulders and then pivot at the elbow while maintaining the 90-degree bend so that your hands are above the elbow and in the shape of the letter L. Do three sets of 10 reps of each exercise.

2

PLATED ANKLE RESTRICTION: To work on ankle mobility, use a 2.5–3-inch heavy band. Secure one end to an immobile object. Step into the opposite end of the band with one foot and place the band so that it sits where your ankle meets your foot. Place a barbell weight plate (a thick hardcover book works, too) about three feet in front of where the band is secured and step onto the plate/book with your entire banded foot. You are kneeling on the opposite leg for support. Keeping the banded foot flat, flex that ankle forward so that the corresponding knee passes beyond the front of your toes. Do about 20 reps with each leg, holding each rep for about 3 seconds.

3

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DEADLIFT: This activates and loosens hamstrings and teaches body awareness. You can do this with a barbell, kettlebells, or dumbbells. Start by standing with both feet flat on the floor and about shoulder-width apart. Bring your hands to the floor to pick up your weights by hinging at your hips and pushing them back while keeping a flat back. After grasping the weights, bring your hips forward to return to a standing position. Select a weight that allows you to do three sets of 10 reps.

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The abstract of a 2014 overview about squatting authored by Gregory Myer and available on the website of the National Library of Medicine’s National Center for Biotechnology Information states, “The squat movement pattern is arguably one of the most primal and critical fundamental movements necessary to improve sport performance, to reduce injury risk, and to support lifelong physical activity.” This is reiterated later in the study’s overview: “The squat movement pattern is required for essential activities of daily living such as sitting, lifting, and most sporting activities. It is also a staple exercise in training regimens designed to enhance performance and to build injury resilience.”

B R A D LY J . B O N E R

B R A D LY J . B O N E R

An article in The New York Times in late March, “The Power of the Squat,” explored the importance of squatting, and determined the motion might be the single most important motion to living and aging well. The article quotes Dr. Silvio Rene Lorenzetti, the director of the Performance Sports division of the Swiss Federal Institute of Sport in Magglingen: “The squat mimics so many physiological tasks of our daily living.” So, he says, when it comes to squats, the “biggest mistake you can make is to not start squatting.”

SO HOW DO YOU SQUAT? No gym or specialized equipment is required. Start in a standing position with your feet flat on the floor, your toes facing forward, and your knees, hips, neck, and spine in a neutral position. Engage your core muscles and pull your shoulders back and down. As you begin to descend, shift your weight onto your heels and flex at the knees, ankles, and hips but keep your chest, neck, and spine in an upright position—don’t lower yourself by rounding your spine. Look for your knees to track over your toes and to not collapse inward. (If you notice the latter happening, it is usually because of weak hip abductors.) Ideally, you can lower yourself so that your quads are parallel to the floor. To stand up, engage your glutes and push through your heels. Start with three sets of 10 squats but stop earlier if your form deteriorates.

Work up to five sets, with a several-minute break in between, of 20. JH

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www.stjohns.health/joints

ENJOY

CHOOSE YOUR OWN ADVENTURE

Why Does My Body Hurt?

// BY WHITNEY ROYSTER

ARE YOU OVER 50?

YES

NO

Um, duh. But this is different.

OK. Is it your head?

YES

NO

Did you do any water activities?

NO

YES

NO

Cold, isn’t it?

How about just more physical activity than you are used to?

Have you consumed enough water to replenish Jackson Lake?

YES Then maybe you just overdid it.

NAP

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Oh c’mon.

Everyone will tell you it’s dehydration at this altitude!

It’s real!

ELECTROLYTE TABS CAN WORK MIRACLES.

Many people tense their bodies in cold water leading to muscle pain.

OK, that might be it.

CHECK OUT THE DROP IN YOGA CLASSES AT INVERSION, PURSUE, AKASHA, AND THE TETON REC CENTER.

JACKSONHOLE.COM

Eat, drink and be merry with incredible views at 9,095’.* The best view in Jackson Hole can be found at The Deck @ Piste. After a short gondola ride, you’re greeted by expansive views and nightly drink specials. Don’t miss the summer menu of appetizers and shared plates from the chefs at Piste Mountain Bistro. There’s no better way to cap off an amazing day in the great Jackson Hole outdoors than with drinks and appetizers on The Deck @ Piste. *Evening gondola access is included with your full-day sightseeing ticket, Summer Sightseeing Pass, 2023 Winter Full-Season Pass or a Piste Mountain Bistro reservation. A separate evening-only (after 5 p.m.) gondola ticket can be purchased for $15. For more details, scan code.

SCAN CODE TO VIEW MENU AND HOURS

GALLERIES Whether you’re passionate about plein-air, a serious collector of Western paintings by contemporary or deceased masters, or a casual art fan searching for a keepsake to remind you of your time spent here, in Jackson Hole you have the opportunity to enjoy art in its multitude of forms. Over the past two decades, Jackson Hole has grown to become one of the most heralded art centers of the West, popping off the tongues of aficionados alongside the likes of Santa Fe, Palo Alto, and Scottsdale. Begin by visiting some of the galleries highlighted here that show the diversity of art available in the valley, from traditional wildlife and Western art to contemporary paintings and sculptures.

AZADI FINE RUGS

Established in 1790, AZADI Fine Rugs is owned by one of the oldest rug-weaving families in the world. For over two centuries, AZADI Fine Rugs has been honored to share history, art, and culture through the magic of handwoven rugs. With an inventory of over 40,000 in-stock fine rugs, AZADI has given the most refined clients and interior designers in the world an unforgettable experience by providing an unparalleled selection of fine quality rugs.

55 NORTH GLENWOOD (307) 734-0169 AZADIFINERUGS.COM

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BELLA FINE GOODS

Taking a nod from the exquisite environment that surrounds us, our goal at Bella Fine Goods is to inspire and delight you with beauty! Enjoy our upscale collection of fine jewelry, unique home furnishings, fine art, and special gifts. Stop by, or give us a call, and we’ll take care of you with an unforgettable experience.

30 CENTER STREET (307) 201-1848 BELLAFINEGOODS.COM

ALTAMIRA FINE ART

We are a haven for maverick voices in Western Contemporary art. No matter the month or the season, visitors to our downtown gallery will find resonance within our walls. Whether connecting to the contours of an equine outline or recalling a mountain memory within an abstract landscape, our patrons recognize the essential value of art in their lives. Like nature, art stirs our souls—a sentiment we share with as many people as possible through monthly events such as the third Thursday ArtWalk. Stop in for inspiration. Mon–Sat 10–6p.m., and Sunday 10a.m.–5pm 172 CENTER STREET (307) 739-4700 ALTAMIRAART.COM

DANSHELLEY JEWELERS

Experience a delightful look into the world of gems inspired by living and loving life at 6,000 feet. Shown above is Wyoming's state animal with a hand-inlaid scene of the mountains where they roam. A visit to this gallery is a must.

125 N. CACHE (307) 733-2259 DANSHELLEY.COM

DRIGGS CITY GALLERY

Downtown Driggs Association hosts the 11th Annual Driggs Plein Air Festival July 24–30, 2022 featuring hundreds of plein air paintings of the Teton Valley by 70 accomplished national artists. The Opening Reception on July 24, starting at 6:30p.m., includes a free outdoor music concert beginning at 4:30p.m. on the Driggs Plaza. Competition Judging and Awards Ceremony on Friday, July 29.

The Exhibition & Sale extends through Sept 9 in the gallery and online. Details at driggspleinair.org.

60 SOUTH MAIN ST. (307) 690-2234 DRIGGSPLEINAIR.ORG

JACKSON HOLE JEWELRY CO.

Crafters and curators of fine jewelry.

Representing top Italian jewelry houses including Picchiotti and Fope. Service and quality above all else. Home of the iconic Teton Stacking Rings.™ In love with jewels, inspired to give back. Presenting sponsor of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital Moonlight on the Mountains Event. Voted best jewelry store in Jackson Hole.

60 EAST BROADWAY, (307) 201-1722 JACKSONHOLEJEWELRY.COM

GALLERY WILD

HINES GOLDSMITH

Gallery Wild is artist owned and operated, showcasing contemporary fine art inspired by wildlife and wild places from both established and emerging artists.

Our curated collection of photography, paintings, and sculpture is directly influenced by thousands of hours in the field observing, studying, and falling in love with all things wild. You are also welcome to explore the artist studio where Carrie Wild and visiting gallery artists share their techniques and artistic process as they create new work.

Celebrating 52 years, Hines Goldsmiths is Jackson’s fine jewelry, hand-etched crystal, and glass gallery. Our famous Teton Collection is available in karat golds or sterling silver in a range of sizes and prices with our diamond pave and inlays of opal or turquoise highlighting our superb craftsmanship. In our Jackson studio we also create the Wyoming Bucking Bronco and custom elk ivory jewelry as well as Wyoming’s largest collection of unique gold and silver charms. Our dazzling collection of crystal and glass bar and giftware is hand etched with local wildlife. Custom pieces can also be created for weddings, anniversaries, or business promotions.

80 WEST BROADWAY (307) 203-2322 GALLERYWILD.COM

80 CENTER STREET (307) 733-5599 HINES-GOLD.COM

JW BENNETT

THE COEUR D’ALENE ART AUCTION

Discover the Shape of Western Style with a Custom Hat Fitting Experience. Founded on a proud Wyoming heritage that embraces the people, integrity, and lasting values of the West, JW Bennett hats are handcrafted using refined skill, attention to detail, and traditional techniques. Our style is modern, sophisticated, gritty, and beautiful. Visit our boutique for a personal experience with founder Sarah Kjorstad and leave with a memory of the Mountain West that is uniquely yours.

Specializing in the finest classical Western and American art, the Coeur d’Alene Art Auction realized a total of over $20 million in 2021 sales at auction with over 95 percent of all lots selling. Recognized by the Wall Street Journal as “The nation’s biggest and most successful auction of Western Art,” we are now accepting a limited number of quality consignments for our July 2022 sale to be held July 23 in Reno, Nevada.

55 N. GLENWOOD (307) 201-5669 JWBENNETT.COM

(208) 772-9009 CDARTAUCTION.COM

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NATIONAL MUSEUM OF WILDLIFE ART

Founded in 1987, the National Museum of Wildlife Art is a world-class museum and nonprofit located in Jackson Hole, Wyoming. The Museum’s collection boasts more than 5,000 artworks representing wild animals from around the world. Featuring work by prominent artists such as N.C. Wyeth, Georgia O’Keeffe, Andy Warhol, Bob Kuhn, Albert Bierstadt, and Carl Rungius—the Museum’s unsurpassed permanent collection chronicles much of the history of wildlife in art, from 2500 B.C.E. to the present.

2820 RUNGIUS ROAD (307) 733-5771 WILDLIFEART.ORG

QUENT CORDAIR FINE ART

Established in 1996, Quent Cordair Fine Art is celebrating 26 years as the world’s premier provider of Romantic Realist art.

Located steps off town square, the gallery features hundreds of uplifting and inspirational paintings and sculptures by 32 award-winning, internationally renowned, and emerging artists. The collection emphasizes moments of passion, connection, achievement, and joy. Commissioned art is a specialty. In addition to posted hours, the gallery is open by private appointment and is available for private events.

164 EAST DELONEY AVENUE (307) 264-1964 CORDAIR.COM

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ODEN WATCHES & JEWELRY

We offer luxury equestrian jewelry handcrafted by Jewelry designer and artisan Vincent Peach; jewelry by the the prestigious luxury designer JB Star, trendy Italian Caio Bella; and the timeless, elegant look of the House of Oden Collection. We are a Swiss watch boutique that features brands like Omega, Norqain, and others. We specialize in diamonds, and would love to help you to design the perfect engagement ring or special piece of heirloom jewelry that will be passed down for generations!

DELONEY AND GLENWOOD (307) 733-4916

WEST LIVES ON GALLERY

The West Lives On Gallery features fine art reflecting the rich heritage of the American West. Featuring Western, wildlife, and landscape art in our traditional and contemporary galleries. The West Lives On Gallery has been representing over 100 national and regional artists since 1998.

55 & 75 NORTH GLENWOOD (307) 734-2888 WESTLIVESON.COM

PEARLS BY SHARI

Specializing in Golden South Sea pearls and heirloom strands, Pearls by Shari brings the elegance of pearls to the heart of the Tetons. Founder Shari Turpin brings immense passion and over 20 years of professional pearl-buying experience to each piece that is designed on 90 E. Broadway.

Whether you are memorializing your trip to Jackson or want to add a one-of-a-kind pearl design to your jewelry collection, Pearls by Shari features the widest selection of high-quality pearls in the United States. Make an appointment, or stop by our showroom located on the Square.

90 E. BROADWAY (307) 734-0553 PEARLSBYSHARI.COM

WILD BY NATURE GALLERY

Dedicated to capturing the natural beauty of Jackson Hole and the surrounding national parks, Wild by Nature Gallery features unique and striking wildlife and landscape images by local photographer Henry H. Holdsworth. Nationally recognized for his work with publications such as National Geographic, National Wildlife, Wildlife Conservation and Outdoor Photographer, Henry’s photographs are available as limited edition prints, notecards, and local coffee table books. One block west of the Town Square.

95 W. DELONEY AVENUE (307) 733-8877 WILDBYNATUREGALLERY.COM

Left: © September Vhay, Two is a Pair—detail, 2010. 2010 Western Visions Trustees Purchase Award, National Museum of Wildlife Art Right: Rox Corbett, Windfall—detail, 2015. 2015 Western Visions Trustees Purchase Award, National Museum of Wildlife Art. © Harriet Corbett

WILDLIFEART.ORG

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FAIRWAY VIEWS & COUNTRY CLUB FARE.

Get out of the crowds and into the views. Relax and enjoy our fireside patio dining with an unmatched backdrop and creative country club fare.

Reservations via RESY.com are recommended. www.figsjh.com / 307.733.2200

SEASONAL DINING FOR LUNCH, DINNER & APRÈS GOLF 307-733-7788 • jhgtc.com 5000 Spring Gulch Road

Wines With Altitude

Tastings By Appointment 2800 Boyles Hill Road • Jackson, WY

307.201.1057 • www.jacksonholewinery.com

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COFFEE SHOP & E ATERY O PENIN G SUM MER 202 2 50 W BROADWAY AVE | JACKSON, W Y

ENJOY

DINING GUIDE

The Bunnery Bakery & Restaurant |

(307) 733-5474 | JACKSON Hearty, healthy fare, bakery, & famous OSM products.

Figs |

(307) 733-1200 | JACKSON Vegetarian and vegan friendly, Mediterranean-inspired small plates/entrees.

Kampai |

(307) 201-5329 | JACKSON Kampai pays homage to Japanese culture through its intentionally curated menu and top-tier service.

North Grille at Jackson Hole Golf & Tennis Club

(307) 733-7788 | JACKSON Enjoy country club fare with unmatched Teton views.

Palate |

(307) 201-5208 | NATIONAL MUSEUM OF WILDLIFE ART An artful lunch with a view in Jackson Hole.

Red Willow Restaurant |

(307) 855-2605 | RIVERTON Order your favorite decadent meal in the Wind River Hotel & Casino.

Silver Dollar Bar and Grill |

(307) 732-3939 | JACKSON Breakfast, lunch, dinner, happy hour, and live music.

Snake River Brewing Co. |

(307) 739-2337 | JACKSON Family-friendly brewpub since 1994.

Teton Thai |

(307) 733-0022 | TETON VILLAGE Best of JH: Best Overall Asian Restaurant.

GRAND TARGHEE

Branding Iron Grill |

(307) 353-2300 | GRAND TARGHEE RESORT Rocky Mountain fare with fresh, local ingredients.

Trap Bar & Grill |

(307) 353-2300 | GRAND TARGHEE RESORT Famous Wydaho Nachos, great food, and delicious drinks.

Snorkels Café |

(307) 353-2300 | GRAND TARGHEE RESORT Homemade breakfast, lunch, pastries, and espresso bar.

JACKSON HOLE MOUNTAIN RESORT Piste Mountain Bistro |

(307) 732-3177 | TOP OF BRIDGER GONDOLA Enjoy Rocky Mountain cuisine at 9,095 feet. Book on Open Table.

Gondola ticket required, waived with day ticket or season pass.

RPK3 |

(307) 739-2738 | TETON VILLAGE Dine under the Jackson Hole Tram.

Tin Can Cantina | Casual Tex-Mex fare.

TETON VILLAGE

SIGNAL MOUNTAIN LODGE

Leeks Marina and Pizzeria |

(307) 543-2494 | GTNP Scratch-made pizza on Jackson Lake.

Trapper Grill/Deadman's Bar |

(307) 543-2831 | GTNP Casual fare with amazing views of the Tetons.

SNOW KING MOUNTAIN

Kings Grill |

(307) 201-KING | JACKSON Classic American menu. Happy hour. Families welcome!

Snow King Cafe |

(307) 201-KING | JACKSON Sandwiches, burgers, beers, and kids meals.

Panorama House |

(307) 201-KING | JACKSON Best Teton views and Jackson Hole sunsets from the top of the Snow King Gondola.

Drinks, crepes, snacks, beer & wine.

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Locally sourced food paired with stunning valley views.

Piste Mountain Bistro delivers a lively dining experience at the top of the Bridger Gondola. Just beyond the friendly bar scene are floor-toceiling windows that offer the best views of the mountain and valley.

The outstanding locally sourced food and ambiance are further elevated by the excellent service.

Be warned — you will want to return to this place time and time again.

Reservations are recommended.

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MOUNTAIN DINING FOR ALL TYPES OF ADVENTURERS

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*Evening gondola access is included with a Piste Mountain Bistro reservation, a full-day sightseeing ticket, Summer Sightseeing Pass, 2023 Winter Full-Season Pass. A separate evening-only (after 5 p.m.) gondola ticket can be purchased for $15.

For more details, scan code.

SCAN QR CODE TO VIEW MENU AND HOURS JACKSONHOLE.COM

Average entree; $= under $15, $$= $16-20, $$$= $21+ JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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UN SU NG JACKSON’S

MOUNTAIN ATHLETES // BY MOLLY ABSOLON

Some of the valley’s best athletes don’t advertise their adventures.

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Conventional wisdom around Jackson says you don’t brag about your athletic accomplishments with a stranger because they’ve probably climbed Everest without oxygen, guided the Futaleufú River in Chile, or run up the Grand Teton that morning.

The Teton Range attracts mountain athletes from around the world to test their skills.

(We’re looking at you, Kilian Jornet.) But the range also breeds its own home-grown superstars. Some of these individuals go on to become famous in the outdoor world (like Jimmy Chin, Kai Jones, Crystal Wright, Hadley Hammer, and Lynsey Dyer), but even more continue to do extraordinary physical challenges with little or no accolades or Instagram fame.

They are people with full-time professional careers who, on their days off, put up first ascents, set speed and distance records, and conceive of and do feats so seemingly out-there and outlandish that they hadn’t crossed anyone’s mind before.

Meet five of these unsung local adventurers. They range in age and in how they physically challenge themselves, but share the fact that being outside plays an important role in their drive toward excellence and is a critical part of their wellbeing and health.

B R A D LY J . B O N E R

CHARLIE THOMAS

THE RUMOR AROUND JACKSON HOLE IS THAT CHARLIE

Thomas, who is now 62 years old, has used up a few of his nine lives. Thomas first came to Jackson Hole in 1978 to do a senior project for high school that he says was mainly about staying out of trouble, and he admits he had some close calls in his early days in the outdoors.

Most of those near-misses stemmed from ignorance.

He learned his outdoor skills through trial and error. “I was clueless,” he says. “I had to figure it out. That’s pretty much how I learned to do sports.”

On his first climbs, he used seatbelt webbing for his anchors, tying straps together with overhand knots that often came loose. Eventually another climber took pity on him and showed him how to do it right. His first kayak adventure included an unplanned scoot over a riverwide ice shelf, his hands in dishwashing gloves and a garbage bag over the boat’s cockpit. He dropped his only flashlight after getting benighted on the descent from Teewinot. Despite his ignorance, he always landed on his feet and, in the process, became a skilled outdoorsman—so skilled he was one of the early kayakers to pad-

“ I WAS CLUELESS. I HAD TO FIGURE IT OUT. THAT’S PRETTY MUCH HOW I LEARNED TO DO SPORTS.”

dle the Box Canyon of the Clark’s Fork of the Yellowstone River, which is still one of the most challenging multiday whitewater runs in North America.

But he almost didn’t land on his feet on one of his descents of the Box. In 1993, he was with a group of Jackson kayakers in the canyon. They were in a celebratory mood after figuring out a way to paddle through a section no one had boated before. With that piece of the puzzle in place, the run, which had originally required as many as 17 portages, was down to five spots where you had to get out of your boat and walk (or climb) around. Thomas missed one of the five. “I was fighting the flu,” he says.

“So, I wasn’t operating on all cylinders. I pulled into an eddy above one of the portages, and I guess I forgot where I was. I pulled out and suddenly it was like I was going over the edge of the world.” Water yanked Thomas out of his boat immediately. He remembers flashes of light and dark. Later he realized the light came when he tumbled over waterfalls, and the dark was when he was pulled underwater. Then he popped up. He was totally unscathed. His boat, however, had been torn in half.

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TRIALATHONS, JACKSON HOLE-STYLE An unsanctioned, human-powered multisport “suffergasm” (as its creator David Gonzales calls it on his website), the Grand Picnic has become a test piece for Jackson Hole athletes.

Spin-offs of the original version include the Moranic and the Buck Mountain Triathlon.

The purest version of these mountain triathlons—all include a bike, swim, and hiking/ running/climbing component—is to complete the prescribed route and then reverse it while carrying all of your gear and without any outside support.

CHARLIE THOMAS

THE GRAND PICNIC

RIDE 23 MILES

from Jackson’s Town Square to South Jenny Lake in Grand Teton National Park.

SWIM 1.3 MILES

LOUIS AREVALO

across the center of Jenny Lake to the Valley Trail on the western shore.

HIKE/RUN/CLIMB 10 MILES up 7,000 vertical feet to the 13,770-foot summit of the Grand Teton.

n Do everything in reverse. n First completed by David Gonzales in 2012. n Fastest known time (FKT): Male, Adam

Charlie Thomas, right, and Erme Catino head up Leigh Canyon on a mission to ski the Fallopian Tube in Grand Teton National Park.

Wirth, 11 hours, 12 minutes. Female, Julia Heemstra, 14 hours, 47 minutes.

THE MORANIC

RIDE 25 MILES

from Jackson’s Town Square to the Leigh Lake Trailhead in Grand Teton National Park.

HIKE 1.5 MILES

to Leigh Lake from the trailhead.

SWIM 2 MILES

across Leigh Lake to the base of Mt. Moran.

HIKE/RUN/CLIMB 6 MILES up 6,100 vertical feet to Mount Moran’s 12,610-foot summit.

n Do everything in reverse. n First done by David Gonzales in 2015. n Fastest known time: Female, Julia

Heemstra, 16 hours, 13 minutes. Male, Danny Beasse, 17 hours, 30 minutes.

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“I DON’T THINK IT’S AN ADVENTURE IF YOU KNOW WHAT IS GOING TO HAPPEN.”

In the second miracle of the day, there was an abandoned kayak on the shore nearby that Thomas and his friends had found the year before. That boat—and a roll of duct tape—allowed him to paddle safely out of the canyon. “That was a bit of an awakening,” Thomas says. “I remember thinking, I have kids. I can’t do this. I never took risks like that again.”

Thomas has been married 35 years and has two adult children, both of whom share his passion for the outdoors. For his day job, he’s a woodworker and makes beautiful fine furniture, but all his spare time is spent exploring.

Over the years, he’s collected countless first ascents of peaks and first descents of rivers in the Greater Yellowstone area, although he says his name isn’t always linked to those objectives because he and his friends often didn’t bother to record their accomplishments. To Thomas, first ascents are all about the adventure, not the glory. “I don’t think it’s an adventure if you know what is going to happen,” he says. “With real adventures, you don’t know the outcome.”

Connecting generosity to the community since 1989

cfjacksonhole.org JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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KAREN WAT TENMAKER

B R A D LY J . B O N E R

BRUCE HAYSE

Bruce Hayse navigates Class IV rapids on the Lindi River in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

"FOR ME, BEING IN NATURE DOING INTENSE THINGS IS ONE WAY TO EXPAND MY MIND AND LEARN TO LIVE IN THE WORLD.”

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BRUCE HAYSE’S OUTDOOR ADVENTURES

sound like a movie. Born in 1949 in eastern Oregon, he spent his childhood camping in the mountains, worked for the Forest Service, and was a mule packer. He says as a kid, he wanted to be outside all the time and would sleep in his yard if he couldn’t get farther away.

In 1979, he helped start the environmental group EarthFirst! in response to the degradation he and others were seeing in wild places across the American West. In the following decade, he began carrying a 45-pound inflatable double kayak into the wilderness to paddle streams no one had tried before. Hayse is also a doctor—he established his family-medicine practice in 1983 and still sees patients at an office on W. Broadway Avenue in downtown Jackson today. Plus, he’s a husband; the father of two grown daughters; and an avid backcountry skier, hiker, and boater.

Hayse always chooses the most untraveled path he can find. He doesn’t want information about an objective before he goes, preferring to figure things out on his own. To feed that drive for the unknown, he started taking a yearly adventure vacation to Africa in the late 1980s, where he ran rivers for which he had no map, no GPS, and no guidebook. One river appeared to have a single waterfall from the information his team gathered. It had four. All the rivers required his party to navigate challenging rapids, make

long, arduous portages around unrunnable sections, and deal with poisonous snakes and dangerous hippos. He also got sick from malaria and survived tsetse flies. His expeditions are athletic endeavors in that they require fitness, expert skill, and hard work, but more than an athlete, Hayse considerers himself an explorer and is driven by his passion for the natural world and love for the beauty of the places he visits in a boat, on foot, or on his skis. “I guess I go seeking enlightenment,” Hayse says. “You can find it lots of different ways. For me, being in nature doing intense things is one way to expand my mind and learn to live in the world.”

Hayse says the biggest dangers he has faced on his adventures came from humans.

He was taken hostage in Africa not once but twice. The second time, his captors threatened to cut off the heads of two native men traveling with the group. Hayse, who was carrying a satellite phone, told his captors if he didn’t call in regularly, the U.S. government would bomb the area. His story was a lie, but it worked.

Hayse says he thinks there is less mystery in the world now, because we have information about everything, and that makes him sad. For him, trips into wild places have always been about the unknown. “My athletic endeavors were never based on personal achievements,” he says. “I was really focused on my love of the universe manifested through the love of nature.”

JEN REDDY B R A D LY J . B O N E R

JEN REDDY’S NAME IS FAMILIAR

“BIKEPACKING APPEALS TO ME BECAUSE YOU CAN COVER A LOT OF COUNTRY MORE QUICKLY THAN YOU CAN ON FOOT." caption here

COURTESY PHOTO

Jen Reddy carries camping gear on her bike as she explores off-the-beaten-path roads and trails in the West.

to many in the Jackson area.

She’s a member of Teton County (Wyoming) Search and Rescue, part of TCSAR’s short-haul team, an avalanche instructor, and a talented freelance illustrator (find her work at jenreddyink.com and on stickers plastered around town).

She’s also an endurance athlete who quietly chalks up notable accomplishments on her bike and skis.

Reddy moved to Jackson 20 years ago to pursue ski mountaineering, and much of her early focus was on ticking off challenging lines in the Tetons.

A former ski racer from the East Coast, she fell in love with powder and the vastness of the West’s mountains, and sought out objectives that were difficult but also aesthetic and unknown. “I pour over maps and Google Earth looking at the landscape, trying to find projects that are interesting and eyecatching,” Reddy says. “I love exploring.”

About four years ago, Reddy went bikepacking—think backpacking, but you carry all your gear on a bicycle—for the first time. That experience tapped into the same sense of exploration she felt in ski mountaineering.

Again, she found herself spending hours looking at Google maps, piecing together dirt roads. “I like to find routes that take me through terrain I wouldn’t see otherwise,” Reddy says. “Bikepacking appeals to me because you can cover a lot of country more quickly than you can on foot. The silver lining of Covid forcing us to stick closer to home is that, after 20 years living in Jackson, I’m going places close by that I’ve never seen before.”

Reddy’s excursions, many of which she does solo, are long and arduous, although you wouldn’t know it from talking to her. She says she does not seek external acknowledgement, rather she looks for a depth of experience a lot of people don’t get in life. “I like to see what I can do,” she says. “There is such richness in being outside working hard. I feel sheer joy when I have finally completed a route. Before that, it’s all about perseverance. Just putting one foot in front of the other.”

Reddy says she used to be driven by competition, but that shifted six years ago after her husband died by suicide. At first, after his death, long bike rides or long hours on skin tracks were terrifying because of the silence she was forced to endure, but that has changed. Now she finds that silence healing. “I used to be super competitive,” Reddy says. “Pushing myself was about aggression, force. Now it comes from a place of compassion. It’s softer. It’s more, ‘Of course you can do this,’ instead of, ‘You have to do this.’”

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B R A D LY J . B O N E R

RYAN BURKE

Ryan Burke stands on the summit of Teewinot Mountain.

RYAN BURKE, 40, IS A MENTAL HEALTH COUNSELOR IN

RYAN HAS TAKEN THE MENTAL AND PHYSICAL LESSONS LEARNED IN THE MOUNTAINS TO HELP CREATE A WELLNESS PROGRAM CALLED MINDSTRENGTH PROJECT.

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private practice who specializes in helping people cope with addiction. He says his work inspires him in the mountains. Burke figures if people can face the daily, lifelong challenges of living with addiction, he can get through whatever temporary, self-inflicted challenge he chooses to pursue in the Tetons.

In the summer of 2014, Burke completed the Picnic, the Moranic, the Buck Mountain Triathlon, and his own creation, the Around-the-Clock triathlon, which included a 114-mile bike ride, a five-and-a-half-mile swim around the circumference of Jenny Lake, and a run from Paintbrush Canyon to Teton Pass over four mountain passes. It took 30 hours. The following year he did what he calls the Perception Traverse, another invention of his, which included 22 Teton peaks, 82,000 feet of vertical, and 65 miles. He did it in four days. In 2016, he did a seven-day traverse—which he named the Fight or Flight Traverse—that included summiting 50 Teton peaks with 102 miles of hiking, running, bushwhacking, and scrambling up and down 122,000 vertical feet. Burke has climbed the Grand Teton three times in a single day and traversed the spine of the Wind River mountains in a week.

The evening after his first Picnic—when most people would be on the couch resting on their laurels—Burke

COURTESY PHOTO

played a game of soccer with some friends. That made him realize he probably could have gone farther and faster, and so began his hunt for the next big test. He’s taken the mental and physical lessons he learns in the mountains to help create what he calls the MindStrength Project, a neuroscience-based wellness program that helps people create healthier habits and resiliency.

He offers the program on a sliding scale, asking that his clients pay only what they can afford.

Burke says his work, rewarding as it is, still drains him, so his adventures in the mountains are like a cleanse. He returns hungry, skinny, and ready for more—at least after he’s eaten a lot of pizza and ice cream. “I used to think I had to prove something,” Burke says. “Prove it to myself, to get the girl… Now I’m married, and all I get from her is a shoulder shrug. My motivation has shifted. It’s now more of an emotional release valve from the despair I hear as a therapist.”

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B R A D LY J . B O N E R

JULIA HEEMSTRA

JULIA HEEMSTRA HAS ALWAYS BEEN AN ATHLETE. SHE

grew up swimming and running competitively, and learned to climb in her teens. When she moved to Jackson after college, she fell into the typical Teton routine: climbing in the summer and backcountry skiing in the winter, all while working as the director of the wellness department at St. John’s Medical Center. She says she felt competent and comfortable in the mountains, but her accomplishments didn’t really set her apart from all the other mountain athletes running around the Tetons, until she decided to try the Grand Picnic (see sidebar, p 112). “I was curious really,” Heemstra says. “I wanted to see what I could do.”

What she could do was become the first woman to complete the route solo and unsupported, earning the record for fastest-known female time in the process. Less than a month later, she tackled the Moranic (see sidebar). Again, she was

solo and unsupported, and this time she not only became the fastest woman, she became the fastest person, smashing the existing record by over an hour.

Heemstra downplays her accomplishments. She says she wasn’t out to break records. She just wanted to complete the routes safely and in good style. “To be honest, I felt as if I had to make my peace with Mount Moran and Leigh Lake,” Heemstra says. She’d had an epic on the mountain early in her career, spending two and a half days on a route she and her partner had expected to finish in one. They ran out of water and food before finally making it to the bottom safely. Later, in 2014, she was crossing Leigh Lake after a ski descent on Mount Moran, when she and another member of her party broke through the ice. They were 400 feet from shore. Every time she tried to clamber out, the ice would break away in front of her.

“I was pretty sure this was the way I was going to die,” Heemstra says. But another member of their party pushed his skis across the ice, giving Heemstra something solid to pull on, and she, and the other individual who’d punched through, were able to get themselves out. Those two events weren’t her first encounter with risk in the mountains. She’d also been humbled by the loss of her longtime boyfriend, Steve Romeo, who died in an avalanche in 2012. She knows all too well just how serious mountain adventures could be. One misstep, one miscalculation, one lapse in judgment is all it takes to turn a fun day into an epic, or worse. As a result of this knowledge, Heemstra says, she doesn’t rush to move quickly. Her speed comes from being methodical and prepared. “I’m moving fast only because I never stop moving,” Heemstra says.

Heemstra grew up in South Africa, moving back to the United States for high school and later college. She has always felt drawn to the country where she spent her childhood, and she’d return to South Africa often to visit her father who lived there until his death a few years ago. The

WHEN THEY AREN’T GOING BIG…

BRUCE HAYSE

CHARLIE THOMAS

JULIA HEEMSTRA

n F AVORITE PLACE

n FAVORITE TWO-HOUR ADVENTURE:

n FAVORITE PLACE FOR A

TO GET LOST: Somewhere in Yellowstone National Park

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Old Pass Road to climb the big rock, hike the History Trail, bike up the road, or ascend the ice-climbing tree (a dead tree Charlie climbs with crampons and ice tools)

LONG RUNS OR HIKE: Northern Gros Ventre Mountains

KAARE IVERSON

Julia Heemstra climbs in the Cirque of the Towers in the Wind River Mountains.

5TH ANNUAL GREATER YELLOWSTONE discrepancy between her life in Jackson and the life she saw so many people living in South Africa began to wear on her, however. She felt she needed to get involved in something that was bigger than herself and that had more meaning than a speed record in the Tetons.

She stumbled upon her most-recent project when she learned that schools in many parts of South Africa did not have clean water, which meant they were forced to close their doors, leaving thousands of children without access to education. She connected with a nonprofit that gave her 10 water filters to take to South Africa. Those filters helped get 6,400 students back in school. Heemstra was on fire. Suddenly she’d found something that fed her desire to make a difference. She even figured out a way to use her mountain skills to help her cause. In 2021, she climbed the Grand Teton seven times in 29 days to draw attention to her work and raise money to complete water repairs at seven schools in South Africa. Heemstra says the Tetons give her energy to pursue her philanthropic work.

“The mountains restore my heart and soul,” Heemstra says. “My perspective on what my athletic accomplishments mean has changed. I come back from South Africa so depleted. I get tons out of my work there, but it’s hard and exhausting. The mountains are what heal me. And then I’m ready to go back again.” JH

CRANE FESTIVAL September 12-17 Teton Valley, Idaho Crane Tours - Film Workshops - Art Show

IN A LANDSCAPE: Classical Music in the Wild™ A benefit concert for the Teton Regional Land Trust

September 17th For more information on the week's activities and concert tickets go to: www.tetonlandtrust.org

NEWS SIN

1909

JEN REDDY

RYAN BURKE

n F AVORITE GRAVEL

n FAVORITE CLIMB: Direct South Buttress,

RIDE: Gros Ventre Mountains around Fish Lake Mountain southeast of Togwotee Pass

Mount Moran, Grand Teton National Park

n FAVORITE HIKE: Symmetry Spire, Grand Teton National Park

n FAVORITE RUN: Sink or Swim Trail, Snow King Mountain

Come stay overnight in Teton Valley!

Photo credit: Paul Allen

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WHEN DID CAMPING GET SO HARD? More people discovering the joys of car camping means campsites are getting harder and harder to come by.

// BY MOLLY ABSOLON

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Y

R YA N D O R G A N

ou can’t get much better than sitting in front of your camper van staring off at the Teton Range as the sun sinks and the mountains turn pink. “We were stoked to finally see the Teton Range in person,” wrote Brie Goumaz on her blog about vanlife, Chasing the Wild Goose. “They are just as majestic as described and more breathtaking than I could have ever imagined. They sit towering over you with snowcapped peaks so tall you’re not sure if it’s truly the peak or if the clouds are covering up just how high they really are. Add in the crisp fresh air and miles of room to roam free and uninhibited for a wondrous vanlife in Jackson experience.”

Wondrous as such experiences are, it isn’t a surprise they’re growing in popularity. This growth has brought pressure on the carcamping scene around Jackson Hole for locals and visitors alike.

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THE INCREASE WAS PRETTY PHENOMENAL. SOME CAMPGROUNDS WERE AT

173

PERCENT OCCUPANCY FOR [LAST] SEASON. ­—LINDA MERIGLIANO

R YA N D O R G A N

“All of the usual spots are gone,” says Larry Hartenstein, who has enjoyed car-camping adventures in the area since moving here in 2000. “It used to be that you could head out on Friday after work and get something at Shadow Mountain, or up Curtis Canyon, or in Granite Creek, but do that now, and you’re not getting anything. Now I’ll go midweek and get up early and go directly to work.”

Ten years ago, Michelle Escudero’s family used to make the 2.5-hour drive to Jackson from their home in Lander at least once a month in the summer. Escudero’s daughter went to a Teton Science Schools summer camp, while Escudero and her husband would catch a Grand Teton Music Festival performance and hike in Grand Teton National Park. Often, they’d go out for a nice meal in town before heading out to Shadow Mountain to camp. It was a relaxing, fun way to take advantage of the “big city” amenities of Jackson while still getting outside in nature. But not anymore. “Jackson is such a pain to find camping that it really isn’t worth the stress,” Escudero says. Not exactly the sentiments shared on vanlife blogs or #vanlife Instagram posts.

“We’ve had people come to us in tears,” says Linda Merigliano, the wilderness and recreation program manager for the Bridger-Teton National Forest, which manages a total of 400 campsites in the Jackson Ranger District. These sites can be found in 12 developed campgrounds, in designated dispersed-camping areas (like Shadow Mountain, Curtis Canyon, Pacific Creek, Phillips Ridge, Toppings Lake, and Spread Creek), as well as in unregulated dispersed-camping sites along Fall Creek Road, Slate Creek in the Upper Gros Ventre, and Buffalo Valley. “They just want to find someplace to spend the night. We are bursting at the seams. The increase is pretty phenomenal. Some campgrounds were at 173 percent occupancy for [last] season. Our campground concessionaires are doing their darnedest to accommodate people by putting in temporary campsites in parking areas, really anything they can do to increase the number of sites available to people.” Hartenstein says, “I’ve definitely shared some camp spots over the past few years. It was late and we were out of options, so we asked people already at sites if they’d be OK if we shared their site. We’ve shared sites with some real fun people and had some people say ‘no’ as well, and I get it.

Sometimes you’re camping to get away from people.”

In Grand Teton National Park, where five campgrounds and one RV park together offer more than 1,000 sites, the increase is less dramatic. This is partially because none of these sites are free, but mostly because there is no room for increased use; it’s been decades since you’ve been able to drive into the park’s Jenny Lake or Gros Ventre Campground after lunch and not find all of the spots already occupied.

Dispersed campsites in the Toppings Lake area and others in the BridgerTeton National Forest east of Grand Teton National Park can fill up quickly on a typical summer day.

SET YOURSELF UP FOR SUCCESS Use campsite apps with a grain of salt. The crowds, bugs, dust, mud, and rough roads usually don’t show up in photos. Know your vehicle and drive only where you know it is capable of going.

Check out the websites of the Friends of the Bridger-Teton (btfriends.org) and the BridgerTeton National Forest (fs.usda.gov/ btnf) for information on camping spots as well as guidelines on how to camp responsibly when you are in the area.

Read signs and obey regulations.

Ask questions. Be polite. Put out your fires and be a good neighbor.

ONLINE VERSUS REALITY These days there are countless online apps and websites that provide information on free campsites, including Campendium, Dyrt, Ultimate US Public Campground, Loverlander, freecampsites.net, and All Stays Camp and RV, among others. Open Campendium and one of the first photos that pops up shows a shiny Airstream camper parked in a field of arrowleaf balsamroot with the Tetons bathed in alpine glow in the distance. It’s gorgeous, and, understandably, makes people want to camp there.

As Steve Johnson wrote on Boondocker’s Bible, an online blog that caters to free campers, in June 2020, “Why did I even think that such a storied and amazing place like the Grand Tetons actually had plenty of open camping available? Why did I let myself be convinced by Campendium reviewers that this was such an effortless area to find free camping? It’s kind of like that feeling you get when you spend three hours with a timeshare salesman, only to end up with a couple of gift certificates for Denny’s. I felt tricked.”

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his boom in outdoor recreation and public land visitation is not limited to Jackson Hole. According to the Outdoor Foundation’s 2021 Outdoor Participation Trends Report, in 2020, 7.1 million more Americans participated in some form of outdoor recreation than in 2019 (for a total of about 200 million Americans doing something outdoors). Fifty-three percent of Americans ages six and over participated in outdoor recreation at least once in 2020, which is the highest participation rate on record. While these numbers do not speak to car camping itself, they coincide with a spike in the sales of recreational vehicles, from traditional RVs to fifth wheels, campers, or a van like the Mercedes Benz Sprinter. In 2021, approximately 576,065 of these were sold, more than 140,000 more than in 2020. (And 2020 sales were 6 percent higher than 2019’s, despite a nearly two-month shutdown due to Covid in that year.)

While many of these vehicles are used recreationally, the U.S. Census Bureau estimated in 2019 that more than 140,000 people were living full-time in vans or recreational vehicles; this is a 38 percent increase from three years before.

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THE BTNF’S CAMPGROUND DATA PERCENT SHOWS A INCREASE IN THE NUMBER OF PEOPLE AND A 58 PERCENT INCREASE IN AVERAGE CAMPSITE OCCUPANCY BETWEEN 2016 AND 2020.

Last summer at the Bridger-Teton National Forest’s Toppings Lake dispersed-camping area, shown above, traffic counters recorded up to 300 to 400 vehicles each day.

According to thewanderingrv.com, about 1 million people are living in recreational vehicles in 2022.

Dave Anderson, a guide, writer, and photographer who lived in his van, Magic, with his wife for five years before settling in Las Vegas, says vanlife was appealing because it offered the ability to roam. “The biggest thing we love about Magic is the freedom to work wherever we happen to be parked, live comfortably, and pursue our passion of climbing,” he told Adventure Journal. Anderson is not alone. A recent Google search for “vanlife” yielded 18 million results, and there are more than 12 million Instagram posts tagged #vanlife.

The BTNF’s campground data shows a 44 percent increase in the number of people and a 58 percent increase in average campsite occupancy between 2016 and 2020. The data is less robust for its dispersed-camping areas (see sidebar for definition), but monitoring records maintained by onsite ambassadors indicate that the designated dispersed sites at Shadow Mountain, Toppings, and Curtis Canyon were usually full early in the day during the core summer months.

“There has been a seismic shift in the volume of people we

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www.jdhcoutfitters.com are seeing utilizing the forest,” says Scott Kosiba, the executive director of Friends of the Bridger-Teton National Forest, a nonprofit that supports the BTNF. “People are drawn here by the parks, and it never occurs to them that they might have to plan ahead. We get a lot of people arriving here at 7 p.m. expecting to find a campsite. We are trying to get the message on how to recreate responsibly out, but how do you reach people who are not already seeking that information? How do you get to people when you don’t have entrance gates? Our ambassadors are our last line of defense before someone burns the forest down or leaves out food and attracts a grizzly bear.”

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RESPONSIBLE CAMPING In September 2021 a military-style vehicle repurposed as a camper fell off the road up Curtis Canyon in the Bridger-Teton National Forest.

JULIE BUTLER

CAMPFIRES: CHECK FOR RESTRICTIONS. Carry extra water and a shovel to ensure fire is dead-out and the ash cool to the touch before you leave your campsite. Bring your own firewood so you don’t deplete the area around your campsite.

SECURELY STORE ALL FOOD, ANIMAL ATTRACTANTS, AND REFUSE IN A VEHICLE OR IN A BEARPROOF CONTAINER. Use bear boxes where they are provided. Jackson Hole is inhabited by both grizzly and black bears. Keeping food and garbage away from bears protects them and you.

HAVE A PLAN FOR HOW TO DISPOSE OF HUMAN WASTE. Most dispersed sites do not have bathrooms or pit toilets.

Be prepared to deal with your own waste in a sanitary way that does not impact the environment or the people around you. (There are an increasing number of portable options available for this purpose from simple WagBags or Cleanwaste Go Anywhere Toilet kits to portable canister toilets.)

ABIDE BY RULES AND REGULATIONS. Stays in the national forest are limited. In some places you may stay a maximum of five nights, in others you may stay up to 14. Residing on the forest is illegal.

STAY ON DESIGNATED ROADS AND ROUTES. KNOW THE LEAVE NO TRACE PRINCIPLES. Minimize your impact on the land, on wildlife, and on other visitors. (lnt.org) This list is adapted from the Friends of the Bridger-Teton National Forest.

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Kosiba says he’s seen a change in the type of camper looking for a site in the BTNF. There’s more diversity in experience—specifically more people who are new to car camping and don’t yet know how to minimize their impact on the land and other users. Last year, visitors in a 30-foot converted military vehicle tried to drive to the BTNF’s Curtis Canyon Campground. On the road to the campground, the driver passed a sign stating the road was not appropriate for rigs of that length. The campers never made it to the campground; they got stuck when their vehicle fell off the side of the road, which switchbacks up a steep hillside. Merigliano says the rescue effort was involved and dangerous, and indicative of the challenges she, her staff, and the volunteer ambassadors who patrol the BTNF to educate visitors, face as they try to mitigate the impacts of increased visitation.

Merigliano says that last summer, the BTNF used three metrics to determine if the season was a success: “We couldn’t have an escaped campfire. We couldn’t have a habituated bear, and everyone had to survive the season. And we achieved that. I’m really proud of everyone pulling together.” Based on these three things, which many land managers would agree are pretty basic, the BTNF’s summer last year was successful. But BTNF employees and ambassadors still extinguished 44 hot campfires, cleaned 686 fire rings, and issued 150 designated-site-requirement violations and 103 food-storage violations.

“It’s a challenge,” Merigliano says. “We’re constantly trying to adjust. There’s a lot more pressure on staff, and we’ve got to ramp up enforcement capabilities. Also there needs to be more conversations happening in the community,” she says. “We need everyone to be an ambassador. If you hear someone is coming to Jackson, ask them if they have a plan. If you see something that looks weird, call us and let us know.”

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THE MANY TYPES OF CAMPING People use the term “camping” loosely. It can range from living in an RV complete with a shower and toilet to setting up a tent after carrying all of your gear 15 miles to the middle of nowhere. Here’s a breakdown of different camping options available around Jackson Hole.

Grand Teton National Park and the Bridger-Teton National Forest maintain DEVELOPED CAMPGROUNDS for RVs, vans, and tent campers. The amenities offered vary by campground and can range from hookups, bathrooms with flush toilets and running water, and dump stations to pit toilets and picnic tables.

In response to crowding at its dispersed-camping sites and campers creating new sites by parking on any flat area they could find (and disturbing the land), the BTNF took the step of DESIGNATING CAMPSITES WITHIN DISPERSED-CAMPING AREAS. At these sites, which are free and first-come, first-served, you can pitch a tent next to your car or sleep in your van, camper, or RV (if your vehicle can handle the road). These sites do not have any facilities beyond the occasional fire ring. Find this type of campsite at Shadow Mountain, Curtis Canyon, Toppings Lake and Spread Creek, and Pacific Creek.

In response to increasing demand, the BTNF has opened two UNDEVELOPED CAMPGROUNDS—Moran Vista and Blackrock Meadows—that offer space for large recreational vehicles and porta potties for a nominal $10 fee.

In many parts of the national forests around Jackson, campers may use pullouts along forest roads to camp freely. While these DISPERSED FRONTCOUNTRY CAMPING sites are not formally designated, campers are requested to use hardened, previously used areas rather than creating new sites by driving into pristine areas. Such camping does not include any amenities, so campers must be self-sufficient and abide by forest regulations such as fire bans.

In Grand Teton National Park, backpackers must camp in DESIGNATED BACKCOUNTRY CAMPSITES. Reservations can be made in advance through recreation.gov ($45 nonrefundable processing fee). In addition, two-thirds of each camping zone in the park is saved for first-come, first-served permits, which are available for $35 at one of the park visitor centers.

In the national forests around Jackson, DISPERSED BACKCOUNTRY CAMPING is allowed. This includes wilderness camping in the Wind River Mountains, the Absarokas, and the Gros Ventres. Some regulations—distance from water and trails, fire bans, etc.—may apply, so check into regulations before you hit the trail.

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COMMERCIAL RV PARKS AND CAMPGROUNDS offer the most developed camping options and typically include amenities such as showers, hookups, laundromats, and picnic tables.

I

n an attempt to handle the crowds and limit the impact, the BTNF and GTNP have made changes in their camping policies. Last summer GTNP implemented a reservation-only system for all campgrounds in the park through the website recreation.gov.

According to GTNP public information officer CJ Adams, this change was a success. “If you look back at the summer of 2019, we had long lines at the campgrounds,” Adams says. “People were showing up early in the morning, hoping to get a site when someone left.

That resulted in a lot of traffic congestion. The reservation system improves the visitor experience by streamlining the camping process and giving visitors the ability to plan ahead.”

Plan ahead is right. Sites in GTNP can be reserved up to six months in advance. A quick scan of recreaton.gov in February showed the park’s Jenny Lake campground, which has 51 drive-to, tent-only sites and 10 sites for walk-in camping, was already fully booked during its six-month reservation window.

The Bridger-Teton operates 12 fee campgrounds in the Jackson Ranger District on a first-come, firstserved basis and has mapped roughly 400 dispersed sites in the district. Around Jackson, however, in 2020 the BTNF did away with the free-for-all, campanywhere-you-can-get-off-the-road system that had been the norm for decades. Now, “boondockers”— people looking for free camping—have to be in one of 150 designated-dispersed sites if they want to camp at Shadow Mountain, Curtis Canyon, Pacific Creek, or Toppings Lake and Spread Creek. These sites are still free—and still considered part of the total number of 400 dispersed sites—but they are clearly identified as campsites, and are meant to concentrate use on hardened, previously impacted areas and prevent further degradation of the landscape by people creating their own pullouts and camping sites by driving off the road wherever they see a flat spot.

Finally, last summer the Forest Service created two new dispersed-camping areas—Moran Vista and Blackrock Meadows. Moran Vista was formerly a gravel pit; in the winter, Blackrock Meadows is a snowmobile parking area. Now the former has plenty of space for big-rig RVs as well as vans; there are also porta potties on site. The BTNF charges a $10 fee for these sites to help cover its costs, and the sites are available on a first-come, first served basis.

Most important, Merigliano says they rarely fill to capacity and that these new areas are much better than they sound and have been popular with people who just want a place to park overnight.

A campendium.com reviewer who stayed at Moran Vistas last July gave their site five stars and wrote, “We stayed here because all of the Spread Creek spots were full. It is a large gravel parking lot, so rigs of any size can fit…. Can’t beat the views and proximity to all that Grand Teton has to offer. Everyone was quiet and respectful. We would definitely stay again.”

In addition to designating camping areas, the BTNF and Friends of the Bridger-Teton ambassadors have amped up their education efforts. Call the BTNF, and you’ll get an automated phone message with camping information. Walk

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past the BTNF office in downtown Jackson, and you’ll see a signboard indicating where you might find a camping area to spend the night.

Kosiba says he’s trying to get real-time occupancy data online so visitors can check an app on their phone to see if there are campsites available before they start driving up a rough road in search of an open spot. In the meantime, he often sends campers south or east of Jackson Hole; the entire BTNF is seeing increasing use, but the pressure is not as acute in the campgrounds in the Snake River Canyon (East Table, Station Creek, Little Cottonwood Group Campground, and Wolf Creek), up the Hoback River (Granite Creek, Kozy, and Hoback Campgrounds) around Pinedale and Cora, or on the Shoshone National Forest on the eastern side of the Continental Divide, as it is in Jackson Hole.

“Our key message is that you have to plan ahead,” says Merigliano. “Just because it’s a national forest doesn’t mean it’s wide open, and there’s no one there. This place is super popular. It could well be full. We’ve been working with Friends of the B-T, Jackson Hole Travel and Tourism, the chamber of commerce, and local businesses to get the word out that people have to be prepared, and you may have to be flexible.” JH

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PHOTO ESSAY

Ansel Adams // BY BRADLY J. BONER

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FOUNTAIN GEYSER POOL

In the late 1930s, the U.S. Department of the Interior was considering a body of murals to adorn the walls of its newly constructed headquarters, the first building in the nation’s capital to be designed and built by the Roosevelt Administration. The focus of the murals would be historic sites and landscapes preserved in America’s national parks, which are administered by the National Park Service under the umbrella of the Department of the Interior.

Department officials commissioned landscape photographer Ansel Adams, who had already gained renown for his striking black-andwhite photographs of the landscapes of the American West, to create the images. Over almost two years from 1941 to 1942, Adams made more than 200 photographs in national parks and monuments including Grand Canyon, Grand Teton, Kings Canyon, Mesa Verde, Yosemite, Carlsbad Caverns, Glacier, and Zion National Parks and Death Valley, Saguaro, and Canyon de Chelly National Monuments. Adams also visited the country’s first national park, Yellowstone, just before the project was halted in the early autumn of 1942 as World War II consumed the nation’s resources.

The Department of the Interior’s collection of Adams murals includes almost 30 images of Yellowstone National Park taken in the summer of 1942, 70 years after the park’s establishment. Adams’s mastery of composition and printing capture landscapes rendered timeless by those determined to preserve them for future generations.

Even today, they inspire reverence for these special places and cement Adams’s legacy as an advocate for environmental stewardship.

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YELLOWSTONE LAKE AND MT. SHERIDAN

CASTLE GEYSER CONE

ABIATHAR PEAK IN THE PARK'S NORTHEAST CORNER JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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PHOTO ESSAY

LOWER YELLOWSTONE FALLS

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JUPITER TERRACE, MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS

OLD FAITHFUL GEYSER

YELLOWSTONE LAKE

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PHOTO ESSAY

OLD FAITHFUL GEYSER

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JUPITER TERRACE, MAMMOTH HOT SPRINGS

ROCKS AT SILVER GATE

FIREHOLE RIVER

ROARING MOUNTAIN

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YELLOWSTONE AT

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A herd of American bison graze along the Firehole River in Yellowstone National Park.

CHERYL CALLEN

Photo from PhotoShlter Lattice

t is part of Cam Sholly’s weekly routine to confront concerning headlines: park wolves getting shot when they wander outside the park, grizzly bear conflicts, bison gorings, derelict infrastructure, yet another record visitation year, yet another tourist making a bad decision by a hot spring. The list goes on.

Amid that noise, Sholly, the superintendent of Yellowstone National Park, is fond of taking a step back and reminding people just how far their park has come. “The health of the ecosystem is better than it has been since before Yellowstone became a park,” he says. “Remember, we’ve only really put the pieces back together over the last 50 years.” The assemblage of those pieces starts with the restoration of the big, toothy mammals on which Yellowstone today hangs its reputation. Functional populations of wolves were wiped out of Yellowstone by market-driven bounty hunters’ poisons and bullets by the 1920s, then were successfully reintroduced in 1995 and 1996. Some 31 wolves taken from western Canada (joined by 35 more released in central Idaho’s wilderness complex) and released in the park proliferated and have since spread to Oregon, Washington, California, and, most recently, Colorado.

By the time of Yellowstone’s centennial in 1972, its grizzly bears were just getting out of the dumps, literally. Hunted down outside the park and hooked on garbage to the joy of bearcrazed tourists, the region’s grizzly population hit a nadir of 136 animals in 1975. Shortly after, the Endangered Species Act was signed into law, charting a policy path for conservation, and it worked for grizzlies. Today there are 1,000-plus grizzlies dwelling in Yellowstone and well beyond. These are just two of the successes. Bison and bald eagles were also brought back from the brink of extirpation. And Yellowstone has made headway on myriad of other environmental challenges, from protecting its geothermal features from people to waging a battle against nonnative trout.

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Yellowstone’s resources are as healthy now as they’ve been since the park was founded, but that wasn’t always the case, and we have work to do to ensure they stay that way for future generations.

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COURTESY PHOTO

Grizzly bears feeding at an open dump in Yellowstone National Park in 1970. The practice, which dated back to the park's earliest days, has long since been considered folly and phased out.

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YELLOWSTONE HAS MADE HEADWAY ON A MYRIAD OF ENVIRONMENTAL CHALLENGES, FROM PROTECTING ITS GEOTHERMAL FEATURES FROM PEOPLE TO WAGING A BATTLE AGAINST NONNATIVE TROUT.

Wolves are protected inside Yellowstone National Park, but once they leave its boundaries, they are fair game for hunters and trappers. During Montana’s 2021-22 season, at least 25 wolves that dwell primarily in the park were killed outside the park.

This complex puzzle is today visited annually by almost 5 million people, and celebrated globally with publicity, including an issue of National Geographic dedicated entirely to the park: the 170-page May 2016 issue included stories on everything from the park’s microbes to the reintroduction of wolves. One hallmark of 2.2-million-acre Yellowstone and its surrounding interconnected mass of federal lands—about 22 million acres collectively known as the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem—is that it still has all the wildlife that inhabited the Yellowstone Plateau prior to the arrival of Anglo-Americans. And it’s not just terrestrials: the region’s native fisheries are also as intact as any in the Lower 48. Look no farther than the headwaters of the Snake and Yellowstone Rivers to find robust populations of cutthroat trout, the native species. The ecosystem overall, like Sholly says, has improved, and the land itself and its wild inhabitants are now less compromised by human activity and extractive industries than they were at Yellowstone’s golden anniversary in 1922 or its centennial.

Yellowstone was created on March 1, 1872, when President Ulysses S. Grant signed the Yellowstone Park Protection Act, which stated the government was: “To set apart a certain tract of land lying near the headwaters of the Yellowstone River as a public park.” The boundaries were somewhat arbitrary. Essentially, the government, using findings from Ferdinand Hayden’s 1871 expedition, drew a square on a map that included Yellowstone Lake, the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone River, Mammoth Hot Springs, and several geyser basins. Even if the park’s boundaries were rather arbitrary, the action by the U.S. Congress in creating it was historic. Yellowstone was the nation’s first landscape protected for preservation’s sake alone, and its designation begot a new way of thinking about how Western settlers ought to treat the frontier’s expansive open spaces.

The tale of Yellowstone’s history is not all honorable, however.

Scott Christensen directs the Greater Yellowstone Coalition, an advocacy group based in Bozeman, Montana, and says it’s certainly worth celebrating Yellowstone’s wins this sesquicentennial year.

The park and its partners, he says, put an immense amount of time,

energy, passion, and money into restoring wildlife like bison and grizzly bears and wolves, which are now integral to Yellowstone as we know it. “But we also need to recognize that the creation of the park came at the expense of removing the native people,” Christensen says. Today, there are two reservations within the GYE where the tribes have persisted: the 2.2-million-acre Wind River Indian Reservation, home to the Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho; and the 520,000-acre Fort Hall Reservation where the ShoshoneBannock tribe dwells along the region’s southwest flank. Although these are the nearest contemporary Native people, there are 49 tribes still existing today with some kind of ancestral connection to Yellowstone.

Although a traditional bison hunt is permitted in Montana just outside Yellowstone’s northern boundary each winter, the native people’s traditional use of the park itself has been functionally severed since around the time of the park’s creation. “The actual creation of the park isn’t really anything to celebrate for indigenous people, because there’s some dark history there,” says Wes Martel, an Eastern Shoshone tribal member who recently joined the Greater Yellowstone Coalition to lead a new tribal bureau based on the Wind River Indian Reservation. “Over the

WILLIAM HENRY JACKSON / U.S. GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF THE TERRITORIES

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U.S. Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland visited Yellowstone in August 2021 and has made a commitment to listen to historically underrepresented communities, including Native peoples, when shaping policy for national parks.

The artist Thomas Moran stands on Minerva Terrace in July of 1871 during the Hayden Survey's excursion into the Yellowstone region. William Henry Jackson's photographs, Moran's artwork, and scientific specimens collected on the expedition helped convince Congress to establish Yellowstone as a national park in March 1872.

decades, Congress and the courts have systematically excluded us from having any type of involvement with our aboriginal homelands. When you go back to the treaties and the aftermath, that really shows the deceit and vindictiveness and the evil approach that the colonizers and the Christians had.”

What is worth celebrating to Martel are the tribes still around today. Their presence provides him with hope that the first people’s ancestral connection to Yellowstone can be repaired. “We need to reconnect to the park,” Martel says. “When indigenous people want to go out and gather and utilize our traditional homeland in a traditional way, they get fined. What the Park Service defines as a violation, we define as a relationship.” To that end, in early June, tribes are convening on the Wind River Indian Reservation to discuss their roles with the national park going forward.

The National Park Service is also engaging in that dialog. “We’re trying to get it right, too,” Sholly says. “We’re putting a heavy emphasis on the tribes and the tribal presence in this area prior to Yellowstone becoming a park, and we want to make sure we’re doing a better job in the next 150 years.” Like tribal relations, Yellowstone’s land and wildlife management in the late 19th century was also a long way off from the

ideals of today. For starters, there was no federal agency nor federal funding to guide the park down the path toward conservation. For Yellowstone’s first 14 years, civilian superintendents were in charge, and they were poorly equipped to dissuade poachers who thinned out ungulate populations, souvenir hunters who pilfered geyser basins, and developers who built commercial camps near hot springs. Finally, in 1886 Congress appropriated resources to help administer the park. That year, the U.S. Army came in to help—specifically, men from Fort Custer under the command of Captain Moses Harris—and the military personnel stuck around for 32 years, until Yellowstone’s jurisdiction shifted to the newly created National Park Service. This new federal agency, a product of the 1916 Organic Act, didn’t have all the answers, either, though. “We failed miserably early on,” Sholly says. “We got it wrong. Look at the extirpation of predators that occurred just 100 years ago. We were feeding bears out of garbage dumps in the ’60s.” (The once-popular practice, which made grizzly viewing easy, was disbanded in 1970, when Yellowstone closed the dumps “cold turkey,” leading to a spike in bear mortality).

It was only once Yellowstone hit the century mark in the 1970s that the National Park Service, and American JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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During the peak of summer, a couple of thousand people watch each eruption of Old Faithful Geyser.

society more generally, changed course.

The catalyst was a suite of a couple dozen laws Congress enacted to protect land, water, and wildlife, says Luther Propst, who founded an environmental think tank, the Sonoran Institute, long before being elected as a Teton County commissioner. Those policies, like the Endangered Species Act and National Environmental Policy Act, were the product of a nationwide environmental awakening that emerged from widespread contamination of the United States’ lands and water. Propst says the policies “worked pretty well” at reigning in the worst effects of industries—like logging and mining— that, at the time, most threatened the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.

In modern times, as the traditional extractive industries that once exploited wildlands in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem largely faded into history, the threats have changed. “Now the West has changed dramatically,” says Propst, who has worked in the wildlife and conservation world for 30 years.

“New West” threats, he says, have taken their place: wealthy retirees subdividing pastures into lots for second homes, remote workers piling into Western resort communities in the aftermath of the pandemic, tourists showing up in unprecedented numbers, and recreationists who are multiplying and pressing deeper into wild places. “We

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Challenges facing Yellowstone National Park managers include mitigating crowding and congestion at the park’s most popular areas, such as the Midway Geyser Basin.

do not have a framework for dealing with this new generation of threats,” Propst says. “At its core, it’s a lot easier to regulate a discreet industry than it is to regulate us and ourselves.”

Threats people pose to Yellowstone start with our ever-growing headcount.

Around the globe and in northwest Wyoming, we’re continually increasing, both in numbers of residents and visitors. Sholly can run the million-visitor increments off the top of his head: 1948 was the first time Yellowstone hit 1 million, in 1965 it drew in 2 million sightseers, and the 3-million threshold was eclipsed in 1992; the 4-million mark was passed in 2015. Technically there were 4.86 million visitors logged in 2021, though park officials caution that the figure was inflated by some lodgingrelated methodology quirks.

But, by no means is Yellowstone always overrun. Within the park, there is no evidence that visitors are directly causing significant ecological damage at present, Sholly says. The vast majority of visitors don’t travel off boardwalks and the most heavily trodden trails.

But infrastructure in parts of the park is increasingly stretched to the max, especially in the peak of summer. “The facilities really haven’t changed substantially since the ’60s, yet the number of visitors has more than doubled in just the last 40 years,” says University of Utah law professor Bob Keiter, who’s

published extensive literature about the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. “I remember early on when I was at the University of Wyoming, it was a major news story when Yellowstone surpassed 2 million visitors. Now it’s more than doubled.” Covid-19 seems to have exacerbated past trends. Where the numbers go moving into Yellowstone’s next 150 years is tough to predict, but there are practical limits that will put a stop to the exponential growth. “There’s a point where you cannot allow more people to come in,” Sholly says. “It’s not necessarily because of massive resource damage. It’s because of gridlock.”

Threats to Yellowstone also emanate from outside the park. Recreation is booming—be it backcountry skiing, mountain biking, trail running, or backcountry bowhunting for elk—and the pressures from those pursuits are not insignificant, argues Dennis Glick, who recently retired from the Bozemanbased community-planning nonprofit FutureWest. “I think that the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem is as threatened by the development in recreation that’s happening right now as it is threatened by climate change,” Glick says. “That might seem like a radical statement, but I believe it’s absolutely true.” He worries that those who keep an eye over Yellowstone are doing too little too late to address the cumulative impacts of human recreation, which range from

B R A D LY J . B O N E R

On a busy summer day, the line of vehicles at Yellowstone's southern entrance can be almost 100 cars deep.

backcountry skiers displacing bighorn sheep from their Teton Range winter habitat to trail building throughout the region infringing on elk calving grounds. “The rapid increase in the number of people recreating in our region is definitely a cause for concern,” says the Greater Yellowstone Coalition’s Christensen. “I know what it feels like to pull up to a trailhead with 100 cars at it; I know what it feels like to try to put my raft in the river and be the 20th car in line at the put-in.” He called for a large investment in studying the effects of recreation: “Let’s understand what the real impact is in these hotspots, and let’s address it.”

The idea of managing Yellowstone as a region—and term the “Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem”—was introduced as long ago as the 1960s. The phrase can be traced to John and Frank Craighead, famous grizzly biologist brothers who called Jackson Hole home. “It was used by the Craigheads, in conjunction with their 1960s grizzly bear study,” Keiter says. “Then it was picked up by the conservation groups.” A couple decades later, a federal collaborative known as the Greater Yellowstone Coordinating Committee attempted to strengthen the ecosystem concept and pursued giving it some regulatory teeth. That committee is composed of all the federal land managers in the region plus the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. In the

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­— CAM SHOLLY, YELLOWSTONE SUPERINTENDENT

late ’80s, the coordinating committee launched a high-profile “Vision” exercise to establish region-wide management goals and planning protocols.

“That scared some people, and the politics were such that during the George H. W. Bush administration, they ended up killing it,” Keiter says. Afterward, the Greater Yellowstone Coordinating Committee developed a reputation as ineffective, with little influence over the ecosystem.

Propst, Glick, Sholly, and Keiter all told Jackson Hole magazine that a key to upholding Yellowstone’s and the GYE’s ecological integrity in the long run will be effectively managing its natural resources and human-related threats across boundaries. Keiter, the law professor, says that today the state and federal agencies are failing to cooperate when it comes to managing Yellowstone’s wildlife, which know no boundaries. “Better collaborative relationships are going to be essential,” he says. During Montana’s 2021–22 wolfhunting season, for example, at least 25 wolves that dwell primarily in the park, but sometimes wander outside, were killed by state-sanctioned hunters and trappers. That hunter harvest—a record high in the 27 years since wolves were reintroduced—was enabled by the Montana Legislature, which went over wildlife managers’ heads in 2021

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“WE’VE GOT TO CAREFULLY ANALYZE WHAT WE DID RIGHT AND WHAT WE DID WRONG IN THE LAST 150 YEARS,” Lower Falls in the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone is the park's tallest waterfall.

and changed the law to prescribe aggressive hunting seasons on Yellowstone’s doorstep. It worked. Yellowstone’s habituated wolves were easy targets. The hunt eliminated a fifth of the park’s approximately 125 wolves, disrupting social dynamics among the wolves that remained. Yellowstone wolf watchers from around the globe were outraged, and so was the Park Service, whose objections fell on deaf ears.

Also looming are private land threats outside of the federal agencies’ authorities. Nearly a third of the ecosystem is privately owned, and the development of that land is intensifying.

A 2018 peer-reviewed study in the journal Ecosphere found that the human population doubled and housing density has tripled in the GYE since 1970.

Both measures of development are projected to double again by 2050. Policies guiding growth across the ecosystem are a patchwork due to jurisdiction issues: the region spans three states and 25 counties. Foremost, rapid growth along the ecosystem’s fringes threatens ecologically important resources. If growth of fast-growing gateway communities like Bozeman, Montana; Teton Valley, Idaho; and Jackson Hole continues at rapid clips, the worstcase-scenario picture of the Yellowstone region 150 years from now is grim. “We’ll have some islands of wild-

land and wildlife, but we’ll no longer have a functioning large wildland ecosystem,” Glick says. “And I think that’s what makes Yellowstone so special.”

In this hypothetical scenario, he says, tourist satisfaction—which remains high today—will suffer. “For example, driving down the Paradise Valley in Montana [north of the north entrance to Yellowstone at Gardiner, Montana] is jaw-droppingly beautiful,” he says.

“But if it becomes strip development and rural residential sprawl, that will diminish the visitor experience.”

In a general sense, Yellowstone’s superintendent wants to see the big sesquicentennial be much more than just a celebration. It’s a good time to reflect on the past, he says, and take everything they’ve learned—including beyond park boundaries—to chart a plan for the next century and a half.

“We’ve got to carefully analyze what we did right and what we did wrong in the last 150 years,” Sholly says. If we do that and make hard decisions, Glick is optimistic about Yellowstone’s future. “Every day I am encouraged by the number of people I get to interact with that care deeply about the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem,” he says. “I’m not naive enough to think that we can save it all.

But I have hope that we will, as a community, make good decisions on behalf of this place.” JH

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WILD AND MILD ADVENTURES

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DOG-FRIENDLY ADVENTURES

Dog Heaven? // BY SAMANTHA SIMMA

Jackson Hole is as much of a playground for dogs as for people.

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fter years of forgoing foster fails while hosting sleepovers for dogs that were available for adoption at Jackson’s Animal Adoption Center, my partner and I gifted ourselves a puppy with dark mascaraed eyes, a boxy head, and soft, grey-flecked fur at the height of the Covid pandemic. Since then, Timber—a mutt off the Wind River Reservation whose DNA reveals traces of Australian cattle dog, rottweiler, American pit bull terrier, great Pyrenees, and St. Bernard—has shifted

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my summertime pursuits from summiting peaks in Grand Teton National Park to trail runs and hikes on the dogfriendly trail systems around Jackson.

Timber may not be able to appreciate Jackson’s iconic views, but I’d be the first to assume that the hiking, camping, biking, backpacking, and socializing opportunities available to him as the dog of a Jackson local have enriched his life. Selfishly, hiking alone will never again be quite as fulfilling as going with Timber in tow.

areas where dogs are welcome, welcome many other " Many users, too. When sharing trails, bike paths, camping sites, and more with other outdoor users, it is important to respect their space and needs as well as your dog’s.”

KATHRYN ZIESIG

— EVA PERRIGO, A CERTIFIED DOG TRAINER AND BEHAVIORAL COUNSELOR, AND OWNER OF STAR DOG TRAINING, WHICH EMPLOYS FORCE-FREE TRAINING METHODS

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DOG-FRIENDLY ADVENTURES

ZACK HUDSON

CACHE CREEK/SNOW KING TRAIL In East Jackson, the Cache Creek/Snow King trail network includes about 20 miles of single- and double-track trails for hiking, mountain biking, and horseback riding. Due to its proximity to downtown—less than one mile from the Town Square—and the great views of the Tetons some of the network’s trails offer, this area is busy with humans, dogs, and wildlife. It might cause anxiety in an introverted dog, especially since most dogs here are off-leash, and also in owners whose dogs are inclined to chase wildlife. (If you want to minimize interactions with wildlife and other dogs, a nearby option is the National Elk Refuge Road; here it is required that all dogs are leashed and, even though it is on a wildlife refuge, there are rarely any animals on the road.) For social dogs though, the Cache Creek trail system is a dream—scents abound, there’s a creek to cool off in (and drink from), and, after leaving the parking lot, leashes CACHE CREEK/SNOW KING are not required.

The Emily’s Pond Levee Trail, a wide, gravel path that runs north alongside the Snake River just east of the Highway 22 bridge over the Snake River, might be the single most popular dog-walking spot in the valley. There are trails heading north and south on the levee on the west bank of the Snake River, too.

Local pet store Pet Place Plus has a robust “Pet Resources” section on its website (petplaceplus.com) that includes information on dog-friendly lodging and hikes and contact details for local groomers, trainers, and veterinarians.

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ELISE MAHAFFIE

EMILY'S POND LEVEE TRAIL

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LEONOR GRAVE

SKI LAKE SKI LAKE

Ski Lake is the most easily accessible alpine lake in the valley and possibly dogs’ favorite adventure. Halfway up Teton Pass, a two-mile trail climbs about 800 feet to a lake from the Phillips Pass Trailhead. Almost all dogs at the lake opt for a swim; the chilly water—Ski Lake is fed by snowmelt—is a harder sell for humans.

“LEASH” IS NOT A BAD WORD Part of what makes Jackson Hole so special for dogs is that, in most places, they don’t have to be leashed. But that doesn’t mean they should always be off-leash. “If there is wildlife in the area, dogs should be leashed no matter what,” says Eva Perrigo, a certified dog trainer and behavioral counselor, and owner of Star Dog Training, which employs force-free training methods. “It only takes a second for a dog to start chasing. Even if you have a reliable recall, the dog has already initiated the chase and stressed out the wildlife.” A dog-wildlife interaction isn’t just bad for wildlife, but possibly also for dogs; in 2016, the Jackson Hole News&Guide reported the story of a local man whose dog, Memphis, was severely injured while the pair were jogging on a popular trail above Cache Creek. Having startled three moose, the dog was stomped on by the bull among the trio—resulting in a traumatic brain injury and damage to her internal organs.

In busy multi-use areas like Cache Creek, consider using a leash if you’re uncertain how your dog will react to other users and dogs. Also, if you see another dog on a leash, Perrigo says it is your responsibility to leash your dog as well. “We don’t know why that dog is leashed, it could be sick, injured, old, or aggressive. If any of these are true, they have just as much a right to be out and about as you do, so your duty is to respect the space they are asking for,” she says.

LIVE WHERE

JOHANNA LOVE

HISTORY TRAIL

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At the Trail Creek Ranch Trailhead at the base of Teton Pass, the History Trail was a wagon trail, but today is a 2.5-mile hiking trail and horseback riding trail that climbs about 2,000 feet to the top of the pass.

NO POOCHES IN GRAND TETON NATIONAL PARK In Grand Teton National Park, dogs are not allowed on trails or pathways, inside visitor centers, or in park waters. Service animals, defined as those “used for the sole purpose of aiding a person with a disability and clearly marked as a working animal,” are permitted.

Dogs providing comfort or emotional support to their handlers do not qualify. “We recognize and appreciate that dogs and their owners share a special bond,” says CJ Adams, Grand Teton National Park’s public affairs specialist. “However, the park is a designated natural area, and its purpose is to preserve and protect the park’s natural conditions, scenic beauty, and wildlife.” Pets have the potential to disturb wildlife—or become prey; yes, an eagle can carry off a small dog.

There’s also the risk of a dog becoming lost in the park. “These regulations are enforced to protect you, your dog, park resources, and other visitors,” Adams says.

While it might be tempting to leave your dog in the car while you take a hike in the park, please don’t. Mountain temperatures can feel deceivingly mild to pet owners. Every summer, a handful of dogs left in cars parked in the valley die from heatstroke. On days you plan to visit the park, “make plans with a dog sitter or book a day of play and overnight boarding with Dog Jax or Homestead Hounds,” says Jess Farr, program director at PAWS of Jackson Hole.

Mother Nature IS A PERMANENT RESIDENT

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It’s all about YOU!!

NANCY MARTINO

Associate Broker, CRS,GRI nancy.martino@compass.com | 307.690.1022 80 W. Broadway | Jackson, WY

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GAME CREEK

ELISE MAHAFFIE

Some trails at the Jackson Hole Mountain Resort are dog friendly.

What's not dog friendly? The 11 miles of trails that are part of the resort’s downhill mountain biking park, where riders descend at high speeds and often catch air. Instead, try the hiker-only Wildflower Trail that connects the base area to the top of the Bridger Gondola, where there’s water for dogs and food for humans (at Piste and Off-Piste Market). Know that dogs are not allowed to ride the Bridger Gondola though, so be prepared to walk back down.

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Between Jackson and Hoback Junction, you and your dog can hike, bike, or run from the Game Creek Trailhead, which, because of its distance from downtown Jackson, is quieter than most other trailheads. Dogs can drink and play in the creek, and small patches of aspen and pine forest provide welcome shade; leashes are required on the first mile of trail.

If your dog wants to swim and skip the hiking all together, consider Slide Lake in the Gros Ventre Mountains on the east side of the valley.

Here, a campground and day-use area at the lake’s eastern end offer lake access.

OLD PASS ROAD

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KATHRYN ZIESIG

JACKSON PEAK

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Want to summit a mountain with your dog? Neither Table Mountain nor Sleeping Indian require any technical climbing skills, but both lack water and, for their second half, also lack shade. The hike up 10,741-foot Jackson Peak passes Goodwin Lake at about its halfway point and, while you will eventually get above the tree line, there’s shade for a mile or so past the lake.

SAMANTHA SIMMA

WILDFLOWER TRAIL

As its name implies, Old Pass Road was the highway to the top of Teton Pass until 1969. Today, it is closed to cars and a favorite with hikers and road cyclists.

(The old road is paved all the way from the Trail Creek Ranch Trailhead to the top of the pass.) Dog owners find that this is a less congested—albeit more challenging—alternative to the valley’s pathways.

Don’t feel like going all the way to the top?

One mile up the road from the trailhead, Crater Lake has a bench for humans to sit on while dogs swim in the tiny lake.

POOP FAIRIES In an average year, PAWS of Jackson Hole disposes of over 30,000 pounds of pet waste from the trash barrels located at the Mutt Mitt stations they maintain. There are 26 Mutt Mitt stations maintained by PAWS—distributing 1.5 million mutt mitts (aka dog waste bags) per year— along local trails and pathways. Part of the nonprofit’s Education/Outreach Program, which includes multiple efforts to encourage responsible trail usage, are Poop Fairies, an effort started in 2019 by Jane Frisch.

ELISE MAHAFFIE

“The Poop Fairies are a group of people who decided that dog poop left behind was a community problem they wanted to put their effort into,” says Jess Farr, PAWS’s program director. “When nutrient-dense dog poop is left behind, it eventually winds up in our waterways. Outside of the pure yuck factor, cleaning up after your dog is one the best things you can do to leave no trace when hiking with your dog in the wilderness.” While these volunteers help to combat the negligence of some dog owners, ultimately the positive and clean trail experience of all trail users depends on the cleanup efforts of individual dog owners. In 2015, the Bridger-Teton National Forest put local dog owners in a time out—temporarily closing trails in the Cache Creek drainage to dogs in order to mitigate an out-of-control waste issue. Follow the winged adventures of the Poop Fairies as they steward a cleaner trail experience at @jhpoopfairy on Instagram. JH

SUMMER AT TARGHEE PLAN YOUR NEXT TRIP TO TARGHEE & BRING THE ENTIRE FAMILY

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RIDE THE TETONS JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

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EXPLORE CIDERY TOUR

Highpoint A taproom in Teton Valley // BY SUE MUNCASTER

// PHOTOGRAPHY BY BRADLY J. BONER

Highpoint Ciders are on tap in Victor, Idaho.

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O

ver Teton Pass from Jackson Hole, in Teton Valley, Idaho, visitors can find top-notch bike trails, endless hiking, some of the best trout waters in the nation, and small towns deeply rooted in Western heritage. For decades, a stop at the Victor Emporium for a huckleberry milkshake was the best way to celebrate a long day’s exploits here. Nothing against the Emporium, but we’re excited to now have a more grownup alternative, the Highpoint Cider Taproom (and yes, kids are welcome).

Here, sit inside the airy taproom where the current ciders are on tap, or grab one of the picnic tables outside.

Wherever you sit, it’s likely you’ll find yourself next to locals dressed in shorts and flip-flops tossing dice or playing cards. On a Tuesday evening, you’ll be hard-pressed to find a seat during the wildly popular weekly trivia night.

Co-founded by brothers Andrew and Alex Perez, the Highpoint Cider Taproom opened in late April of 2021, but the brothers started conceiving of the venture in 2017. At that time, Alex, the older brother, was living in Boston and working remotely for GE. And he was tired of the

Co-founded by brothers Andrew and Alex Perez, the Highpoint Cider Taproom opened in late April of 2021. city life. He decided he wanted to live in a ski town—Jackson—for a year or two.

It wasn’t long after he landed in Wyoming that he saw there was a lack of cider options in the area, and the West in general. Back in Boston, Alex had frequented craft cideries like Citizen Cider and Prospect Ciderworks, which was owned by a friend. (Both of the brothers’ fondness for hard cider came from their father having Celiac disease, an immune reaction to gluten. Most beers have gluten, but cider is naturally gluten-free.)

In Boston, Alex had mentored at a venture accelerator, where he took early-stage ideas and created business plans for them.

In Wyoming, he decided to put an idea for a local craft cider company through this process. “It seemed like a better idea the more I looked at it,” he says. “The difference between craft beer and cider is there are approximately 10,000 brewpubs in

Highpoint Cider co-founders Andrew and Alex Perez named their forklift “MAC” after their grandmother, Mary Ann Crisp, whose orchard they picked and pressed apples from as kids.

THE CIDERS All three of Highpoint’s flagship ciders are gluten-free and low in sugar. The sweetest cider, Transplant, has only six grams of sugar per pint (versus 27 grams per pint in a typical mass-produced pint of hard cider).

Transplant cider is a sweet, semi-dry New England-style cider.

Tram-line is dry-hopped, a process that doesn’t add bitterness (which wet hopping can do) but does add hop aroma and flavor.

The Spur cider is also semi-dry, and infused with ginger.

Highpoint also does one-off batches of cider, like Mothertrucker (created last summer when a truck showed up late, and the juice had started to ferment on its own) and Sweater Weather, which paired hand-pressed blood oranges and a blend of warm spices.

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the USA, and only 1,000 super-small, local cideries.”

In early 2018, Alex called Andrew, who has a degree in biochemistry from the University of Vermont and was burning out in a management consulting job in Burlington.

He told him about his idea for a craft cidery. Andrew was intrigued and three weeks later flew out to visit his brother and see if Alex’s idea really had legs. It did. That August, Andrew moved to Wyoming to make cider. Beyond their sound business plan, the brothers were additionally inspired by childhood memories: it was a Perez family tradition to press apples at their grandparents’ orchard in the tiny town of Mount Vernon, New Hampshire.

“My grandparents would get a real kick out of this,” says Alex. “Looking back, I realize I had a subconscious connection to apples and cider.”

Making cider was not as easy as the brothers had imagined, though.

Andrew says they foolishly thought they could learn to make decent cider in a couple of months. For their

first batch, they experimented with four brands of apple juice bought at Jackson Whole Grocer and followed the instructions in the few available books about making cider.

“Everything we did in the beginning was janky and amateur hour,” says Andrew. Eventually the pair started talking to others within the cider industry. They spent the next two years—during which they made 250 five-gallon batches, about enough to fill two eight-person hot tubs—honing their technique and getting the right taste.

By April 2021, they had three flavorful, easy-drinking, low-sugar ciders that were a reflection of what the market wants. "Not only is it an alternative to beer, it’s like champagne in a single-serving can,” says Alex. Since then, their taproom has become a convivial community space that is home to weekly trivia nights and bingo, monthly story slams, and random events like pop-up yoga. In the 2021 Best of Teton Valley survey, Highpoint won “Best Pour.”

In the 2021 Best of Teton Valley survey, Highpoint won “Best Pour.”

The Highpoint Cider taproom in Victor, Idaho, is open Tuesday through Sunday.

THE PROCESS Twice a month, a truck delivers about 5,000 gallons of freshpressed juice from a variety of apples grown in Washington state. (It takes about 250,000 apples to make 5,000 gallons of juice.) At the cidery, the juice is transferred to two 2,500-gallon fermenters into which is also added champagne yeast—the yeast the brothers found, through trial and error, to work best. The yeast converts natural sugars into alcohol and CO2.

Fresh fruits, spices, and hops are also added. A mechanical centrifuge eventually separates out any remaining yeast, which allows the cidery to use as few preservatives as possible.

About a a month after the fresh-pressed juice goes into the fermenters, the cider is ready to be carbonated and canned.

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A SHORT HISTORY OF CIDER MAKING

of Jackson Hole

Bring out the best in every bottle

Western Wyoming’s only climatecontrolled wine storage facility.

Although barley beer and grape wine predate cider by millennia— archeologists found 13,000-year-old traces of a wheat-and-barleybased alcohol in the floor of a cave in Israel—cider has a long history.

55 BC | Invading Romans discover Celts enjoying cider made from apples that originated in forests around Kazakhstan. The drink quickly spreads throughout the Roman Empire.

1600s | European settlers in New England have difficulty growing grains and barley, but apples grow easily. Cider quickly becomes popular in the colonies.

1800s | In apple-growing regions, people (including children) drink a pint or more of cider per day; it is safer to drink than water, which carries cholera, typhoid fever, dysentery, and E. Coli, among other parasites and diseases.

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Early 1900s | A new wave of immigrants to the U.S.—many from

Germany—bring their love for beer. The U.S. now includes lands on which barley grows well; beer is less expensive to produce than cider, and the latter’s popularity begins to wane.

1920–1933 | Prohibition closes almost all of the cideries in the country.

Late 1990s | Inspired by the craft beer movement, craft cideries start to grow in popularity.

2012 | Chasing Paradise, which specializes in meads and hard apple ciders, is founded in Teton Valley. (facebook.com/RobDupre01)

2016 | Farmstead Cider is founded in Jackson, Wyoming. The cidery uses apples foraged from trees that would otherwise be attractants for bears. (farmsteadcider.com) 2021 | Highpoint Cider taproom opens.

DETAILS The Highpoint Cider Taproom (7565 Lupine Ln., Unit D & E, Victor, Idaho) is open Tuesday–Sunday from 1–9 p.m., and kids are welcome. Tours are available if scheduled in advance (307/264-2151). The taproom doesn’t have a restaurant but serves chips and guacamole; some summer days, a food truck will stop by. Find Highpoint on draft at Grand Targhee (Trap Bar), Four Seasons Jackson Hole (Handle Bar), Gunbarrel Steakhouse, Coelette, StillWest, and Thai Me Up, and in cans at most restaurants in Jackson Hole and Teton Valley. Buy six-packs at The Liquor Store, Smith’s, Whole Foods, Victor Valley Market, Broulim’s, and Hoback Marketplace, among other retailers. highpointcider.com @highpointcider JH

E M I ’S OVER T K A E R B

For a couple years now, we’ve been (mostly) hard at work remodeling the Brewpub.

This summer, we’ll finally be ready to invite you back.

STAY UPDATED @snakeriverbrew • snakeriverbrewing.com

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Walk

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and Learn // BY KELSEY DAYTON

Daily walking tours of downtown delve into the valley’s history.

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tanding under the towering cottonwoods inside the Town Square in downtown Jackson, it is easy to become distracted by the throngs of visitors posing under the elk-antler arches and filling the boardwalks. But take a tour with Morgan Jaouen, and you’ll learn there is more to downtown than the gift shops, art galleries, and phenomenal people watching.

For example, on a tour Jaouen will point to a building, like one on Center Street on the Town Square’s eastern side. Exterior signs indicate it is home to the Jackson Hole Mountain Resort store, Hines Jewelers, and Wilcox Gallery II. But it’s also the oldest building on the Town Square—older than the square itself. “It was built in 1896 and was originally a community-gathering space called ‘The Clubhouse,’” Jaouen might say. “Everything from dances to meetings were held there, and for a time, it even served as the post office.”

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try to tell the foundational story of a real " We Western town that continues to this day.”

Back at the Jackson Hole Historic Society and Museum, where this walking tour starts, there is a 1907 photo of The Clubhouse. It stands alone, seemingly in the middle of nowhere with nothing else around it.

“Many visitors to Jackson Hole know Jackson as an Old West town turned modern day tourist attraction but don’t really understand what that means,” says Jaouen, executive director of the Jackson Hole Historical Society and Museum. “There is so much more to Jackson’s story.” The historical society, whose mission is to compile, preserve, and share Jackson’s history through information, stories, photos, and objects, has for decades offered walking tours to show more of the story. “We hope they share the town’s history in a tangible and visceral way,” Jaouen says. “The tours really connect people to this place. It’s an accessible and affordable way to, in only an hour and whether you are just visiting or you just moved here, form a deeper connection with this place.”

Jesse O’Connor started as a volunteer tour guide in 1998. All of the guides, and there are about five each season, are volunteers or employed at the museum. O’Connor is a tour guide by profession, working in Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks since he arrived in the area in 1980. For him, the historical society’s walking tours are about showing people the real Jackson.

“It was, and is, a real town, rather than just a famous and fancy place for tourists,” he says. “The real town is peeking out from the corners where you least expect it. More important than the names, dates, and numbers is the town’s underlying story. We try to tell the foundational story of a real Western town that continues to this day.”

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PRICE CHAMBERS

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2. Jackson Hole Historical Society and Museum. People sometimes think of the West as relatively young, but its history goes back much further than the fur traders and explorers that first came and named the area. The area was home to Native Americans long before the Town of Jackson came into being; the earliest signs of human habitation in Jackson Hole date back 11,000 years.

CENTER STREET

1. Legend has it that in 1939, Joe Ruby was playing in a card game when an argument escalated to a shooting that led authorities to ask Ruby to leave town and never return.

He sold his nondescript bar, J.R.’s Saloon, to Ben Goe, who changed the name to the Cowboy Bar and spent the next years remodeling the interior with burled wood and adding a neon sign featuring a cowboy on a bucking horse atop the exterior. Jaouen says Goe was already likely thinking about tourism when he made his design choice. Jackson had been branded “Last of the Old West,” and tourism had become a driving force in the economy by 1920 with the popularity of local dude ranches. “I think the bar’s design was very much driven by a ‘let’s present ourselves as a Western town,’ mentality” she says.

3. Today, this building is the Jackson Hole Playhouse, which puts on musical shows in the summer (and its actors perform in the nightly shootout on the Town Square), but, when it was built in 1915, it was a livery stable. Between then and now, it was a Model T Ford dealership, a post office, a mercantile, and a bowling alley. The building appears to be built of stone, but it’s really stamped metal siding. When it was built, importing stone was too challenging without access to a railroad, Jaouen says.

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4. There are rumors of gambling paraphernalia locked

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away in the basement and secret tunnels that run below the Wort Hotel, but O’Connor says he’s never seen either.

In 1915, Charles Wort paid $100 for four lots in downtown Jackson, Jaouen says. It took Wort another 26 years for his dream of a hotel in Jackson to become a reality. In 1939, he brought in red stone quarried from near Slide Lake in the Gros Ventre Mountains for the façade. He finished the building in 1941. Today, the halls of the of hotel are lined with photos documenting the building’s history. “The Wort does a really great job telling its history in its hallways, and we always encourage people to go in and learn more,” Jaouen says.

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5. This structure doesn’t have unique architectural features that might catch the eye, but the American Legion Hall, which was constructed in 1929, has an important place in Jackson Hole history. It was in this log cabin that, in the 1930s, a congressional subcommittee convened to investigate land fraud tied to the purchase of homesteads surrounding the earliest iteration of Grand Teton National Park, which was founded in 1929.

O’Connor calls the it “the biggest and messiest battle of open space in the Lower 48.”

COURTESY PHOTO

6. The era of the “Pet-

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ticoat Rulers” is one of Jaouen’s favorite moments in Jackson’s history. In 1920, months before Congress ratified the 19th Amendment giving women the right to vote, Jackson elected an all-female town council. What is today Cafe Genevieve was Councilwoman Genevieve Van Vleck’s home from about 1911 until 1936. “A lot of people have heard the story of the all-women council, but it really comes to life when you see where the people lived,” Jaouen says.

THE DETAILS The tours run from Old West Days weekend, an annual event that starts two Saturdays before Memorial Day, and continue until the end of September.

They begin at 10:30 a.m. and start from the Jackson Hole Historical Society and Museum (225 N. Cache St.; 307/733-2414). Each tour is capped at 12 people.

Tickets are $10 for adults, $6 for veterans and students; jacksonholehistory.org JH

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&Wild at Jackson Hole Mountain Resort

Whether your idea of an adventure is a cocktail or rock climbing, JMHR has you covered. //BY LILA EDYTHE

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R YA N D O R G A N

ackson Hole Mountain Resort is one of the best ski resorts in North America.

Over the last 15 years, it’s added activities and amenities that make it just as much fun in summer as when its mountains are covered in snow. Here are some of our favorite mild and wild JHMR summer adventures. Buy tickets, make reservations, and find additional information on all activities at jacksonhole.com.

WILD Inspired by via ferrate in the Italian Dolomites, there are now 15 via ferrate courses on the steep granite walls and outcrops above the top of the JHMR Bridger Gondola. Italian for “iron way,” via ferrate are assisted rock climbing routes; bolts, strands of cable, and rebar rungs are affixed to the rock. Use these manmade features as much or as little as you like. Either way, you’re clipped into a safety line the entire time and accompanied by a guide. From $450 for 2 people for a half-day; daily between June 18 and October 9 (conditions permitting).

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If you’ve ever wondered what it feels like to be a bird, you should consider doing a tandem paragliding flight with a certified USHPA tandem instructor pilot.

These flights take off from the top of the Bridger Gondola. Secured to a pilot and paragliding wing, you’ll briefly run down the mountain until the wing catches air.

Before you realize it, your feet will no longer be on the ground. Once airborne, sit back and enjoy the views and the feeling of flying. Pilots can make these flights as wild or mild as you want; they might do some loop-de-loops if you ask, or they can keep things calm and have you gracefully descend to the valley floor. Flights last about 10 to 15 minutes. Due to conditions, all flights take place in the morning; the latest takes off at 10 a.m. From $395

COURTESY OF JACKSON HOLE MOUNTAIN RESORT

We love that the two most challenging hiking trails at JHMR allow hikers the option of riding a lift down. The 3.9-mile hike up 3,000 vertical feet on the Wildflower Trail ends at the top of the Bridger Gondola, which, if you have knees like ours, you can then ride down (for free!). The most challenging trail in Teton Village is the Cirque Trail, which connects the top of the Bridger Gondola to the top of the tram. From the top of the gondola, the Cirque Trail climbs 1,400 vertical feet over 1.8 miles as it winds through boulder fields and up rocky outcrops. Some sections of trail require scrambling over rocks with your hands and feet.

When you’ve soaked up the views from the 10,450-foot summit of Rendezvous Peak, choose between hiking the 4,137 feet back to the base area or hopping on the tram and letting it carry you back to the bottom of the mountain. Riding down the gondola and the tram are free, the last gondola of the day departs Rendezvous Lodge at 9 p.m., the last tram of the day departs the summit at 5 p.m.

WILD Jackson Hole describes the new (opened last summer) Dirty Harry trail in its Bike Park as “the most challenging in the park,” “a beast of its own,” “a double black diamond trail,” and a “test of grit and stamina.” Lift access, rental bike, helmet, protective body armor, and damage insurance from $169, lift tickets only from $49; open 10 a.m.–5 p.m. daily from June 11 through September 11 (open later on Fridays).

JOHN BOWERS

COURTESY OF JACKSON HOLE MOUNTAIN RESORT

WILD

ANDREW SCHRUM

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Last summer, scenic rides in the JHMR tram were impossible because the tram was closed for the season (routine maintenance). The tram is back this summer, carrying passengers up 4,139 feet in about 12 minutes. At the top, which is 10,450 feet in elevation, you can enjoy 360-degree views, take a seat on the deck at Corbet’s Cabin (and maybe get a made-to-order waffle from inside), and wonder at the tiny wildflowers able to eke out an existence in this extreme environment. Warning—no matter how hot it is in the base area, bring a jacket up here. A JHMR adult sightseeing ticket that includes unlimited rides on the Bridger and Sweetwater Gondolas and the aerial tram for one day is $35, kids $20, 65-plus $27; the tram runs every 15 minutes between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. from May 21 to October 9.

MILD If you want expansive views but worry that the elevation at the top of the tram might be too much for you, do a scenic gondola ride. At Rendezvous Lodge at the top of the gondola (elevation 9,095 feet), you can grab a quick lunch or snack and espresso drinks at Off Piste Market or, if you come up in the evening, order small bites and cocktails at The Deck @Piste. A JHMR adult sightseeing ticket that includes unlimited rides on the Bridger and Sweetwater Gondolas and the aerial tram for one day is $35, kids $20, 65-plus $27; evening Bridger Gondola-only tickets from $15; Off Piste is open 11 a.m.–9 p.m. daily from June 12 to September 11, The Deck is open 4:30–9 p.m. daily from June 12 to September 11.

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COURTESY OF JACKSON HOLE MOUNTAIN RESORT

MILD

COURTESY OF JACKSON HOLE MOUNTAIN RESORT

MAD RIVER BOAT TRIPS LET THE ADVENTURE BEGIN SUMMER 2022

MILD

B R A D LY J . B O N E R

1255 South US Highway 89, Jackson WY 83001 307-733-6203 • mad-river.com

All of the 14 trails at the Bike Park are rated like ski trails—green, blue, and black—and the number of green (beginner) and blue (intermediate) trails outnumber the black (expert) trails. And green and blue don’t mean boring; Lucky Charm, a green, includes a 377-footlong raised wooden bridge that spans a rock garden and winds through a grove of aspen trees. Solitoga, an intermediate, might be the most fun trail on the mountain with huge banked turns. Lift access, rental bike, helmet, protective body armor, and damage insurance from $169, lift tickets only from $49; open 10 a.m.

–5 p.m. daily from June 11 through September 11 (open later on Fridays); jacksonhole.com.

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• • • •

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Piste Mountain Bistro, at the top of the Bridger Gondola, has a wall of windows that frames Jackson Hole 3,000 feet below.

It serves inventive cocktails and its menu highlights regional producers like Cosmic Apple Gardens, Snake River Farms, 460˚ Bread, and Larks Meadow Farms, all of which are in Idaho, and Wyoming’s Haderlie Farms, Carter Country Meat, Lockhart Cattle Company, and Mead Ranch. The fact you get to ride the gondola up from the base area for free with a Piste reservation is icing on the cake. Dinner nightly Sunday–Thursday from 5–8:30p.m. from June 12 to September, reservations required

SUMMER 2022 | JACKSON HOLE

The 1.7-mile Casper Ridge Loop hiking trail starts at the top of the Bridger Gondola and climbs 400 feet over its distance, winding through stands of 1,000-year-old whitebark pine trees and offering up an incredible view of the major Teton peaks along the way. A “lollipop” loop—the first and last bit are the same, but the middle section of the trail is a loop—this trail crosses some of JHMR’s most challenging ski terrain, which is covered in wildflowers most of the summer. A JHMR adult sightseeing ticket that includes unlimited rides on the Bridger and Sweetwater Gondolas and the aerial tram for one day is $35, kids $20, 65-plus $27; evening Bridger Gondola-only tickets from $15.

MILD

ANDREW SCHRUM

COURTESY OF JACKSON HOLE MOUNTAIN RESORT

ANDREW SCHRUM

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Although suspended between 20 and 32 feet above the ground, the Ropes course is not technical. Designed for ages five and up, the multilevel course is a maze of cargo nets, wobble bridges, balance beams, zip lines, tightropes, and suspended, swaying logs, among other challenges—but all with a cable close by that you can hold on to if you need to steady yourself. Also, you’re wearing a harness and clipped into a safety line the entire time. Courses are rated in difficulty from green to black. One-hour tickets from $40; open daily 11 a.m.–5 p.m. from June 11 to September 5; you must reserve your one-hour time slot at the time you purchase your ticket.

SPECIALITY RETAIL FLY SHOP

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ANDREW SCHRUM

offering the most comprehensive fly selection in the area

Guided Fly Fishing trips in

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Redesigned to accommodate revegetation and ongoing construction projects, a free 18-hole Disc Golf course starts to the south of the base of the Wildflower Hiking Trail (follow the trail uphill from its beginning for about 300 yards, then look left and you should see the first basket). The course is diverse, with some holes that are short and technical—think tunnel and tree shots—and others through open fields. Most holes are par 4. Free

Overnight River Camp on the South Fork of the Snake River Beginners and seasoned fish bums welcome www.westbankanglers.com | Located on Teton Village Road Open Daily 8 am - 6 pm | 307-733-6483 | info@westbankanglers.com

THE LAST, BEST PLACES FOR CUTTHROAT TROUT

Photo: Eric Seymour

At the Village Commons, you can see raptors and enjoy live music, although not simultaneously. At 5 p.m. every Tuesday and Thursday starting June 28, the local nonprofit Teton Raptor Center brings resident raptors to the Village Commons for Alive @ Five, where you’ll have the opportunity to meet and learn about the birds of prey. Concerts on the Commons are every Sunday at 5 p.m. between July 17 and August 28. Details about performers were unavailable at press time, but the concerts always seek to feature a diverse lineup. Both events are free, tetonraptorcenter.org and concertsoncommons.com. JH

COURTESY PHOTO

MILD

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YELLOWSTONE GUIDE

A wonderfully random collection of some of our favorite things in and about Yellowstone National Park. //BY SOFIA MCGULICK

ENJOY!

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SANKAR RAMAN

Y

ellowstone’s 2.2 million acres are impossible to fully explore in a lifetime, much less on a summer vacation. That written, you can get a feel for what makes Yellowstone so special in several days. Two loop drives, the Upper Loop and the Lower Loop, hit most of the park’s major sights and allow for varied wildlife-watching opportunities. The 96-mile Lower Loop explores the southern part of the park, which has a higher density of geysers and thermal features, including Old Faithful and Grand Prismatic Spring, than the northern half of the park and is also home to Yellowstone Lake, the largest lake above 7,000 feet in the country. The northern part of the park is seen via the 146-mile Upper Loop and is best known for its abundance and variety of wildlife, especially in the Lamar Valley.

Away from these roads, there are about 900 miles of hiking and horseback riding trails.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK LODGES COLLECTION

The Old Faithful Inn, one of three overnight options at Old Faithful Village, is the most popular hotel in the park.

Built in 1903–1904, the inn is believed to be the largest wood structure in the world; its seven-story lobby has a fireplace and 82-foot-tall chimney made from 500 tons of rhyolite.

Lake Hotel opened in 1891, which makes it not only the oldest surviving lodge in Yellowstone, but also in any U.S. national park.

Yellowstone’s hotels, cabins, and inns book up well in advance, but it is possible to get a room in the park without having planned your trip a year ahead. Because of the cancellation policies for the park’s hotels, “Thirty days and seven days out from when you want to stay in the park are good times to check to see if rooms have opened up,” says Rick Hoeninghausen, the sales and marketing director for Yellowstone National Park Lodges. “You might get lucky.”

Also, know that any hotel in the park can see the availability at every other hotel in the park. If you’re having breakfast at Mammoth, they can check to see if there’s something available at Lake, or vice versa. “While we finish most days sold out, we hardly ever start the day sold out,” Hoeninghausen says.

Five new hotels—all LEED certified—built in 2016 brought the total number of rooms at Canyon Village up to 590. For visitors who want to explore the entirety of Yellowstone, Canyon Village is the most central location. “It’s where the Upper and Lower Loops meet,” Hoeninghausen says.

An added benefit?

The Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone is a short walk from the village.

After a recently finished three-year remodel, the exposed pipes, shared bathrooms, and clanking radiators that had been hallmarks of Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel are gone, replaced with historically accurate wood finishes and larger rooms. Every room now has its own bathroom, and some of these have original clawfoot bathtubs. Mammoth is the best place to stay in the park for visitors most interested in wildlife. Most days, elk graze immediately in front of the hotel’s entrance, and the Lamar Valley, arguably the single best spot for wildlife watching in the park, is a short drive away.

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COURTESY OF YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK LODGES COLLECTION

YELLOWSTONE GUIDE

Two hikes that start at the Bunsen Peak Trailhead five miles south of Mammoth offer very different sights. The four-mile (out-andback) hike to the 8,564-foot summit of Bunsen Peak offers a bird’s-eye view of the entire complex of white mineral terraces at Mammoth, the Gallatin Mountains, Yellowstone River Valley, Swan Lake Flats, and the Blacktail Deer Plateau. The hike to Osprey Falls, a 150-foot-tall waterfall, is twice as long as the hike to Bunsen’s summit.

The first three miles are easy walking on the former Bunsen Peak Road; the last 1.4 miles are steep and narrow as the trail drops 800 feet down into Sheepeater Canyon. In the park, only the Grand Canyon of the Yellowstone is deeper than Sheepeater Canyon. Even if Osprey Falls wasn’t waiting for you at the end of the trail, the walk into Sheepeater Canyon is worth the effort.

Yellowstone’s southwest corner is the least-visited frontcountry area of the park because it is difficult to get to.

Although only about 30 miles as the crow flies from Old Faithful, the drive is almost 100 miles and takes four hours. We think it’s worth it though. The southwest corner is known as “Cascade Corner” for its density of waterfalls, and you can drive to one of the biggest, Cave Falls, which stretches more than 200 feet across the Falls River.

Check out an Inspired by Yellowstone workshop at Mammoth Hot Springs Hotel, Lake Hotel, or Old Faithful Inn. Over several hours, meet local artists and makers including a distiller from Bozeman Spirits Distillery, Yellowstone Agate Jewelry, Native American fine artist DG House, or Tom Murphy, the first photographer to lead photo safaris in the park (he did his first photo tour in the mid-1980s). Workshop leaders also teach you how to do what they do. “The workshops are a step beyond just being a visitor to Yellowstone,” says Karen Tryman, Yellowstone National Park Lodges’ director of retail.

“There is something about Yellowstone that is transformative, and this is a way to help people experience it through that lens.” From $35, yellowstonenationalparklodges.com/workshops/

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Guided scenic/fishing charter boat tours allow you to explore Yellowstone Lake at your leisure. “You tell the captain what you’re interested in seeing, and doing,” says Hoeninghausen. If you opt to fish and you catch lake trout, fish cleaning is included, and many dining rooms in the park will then cook your fish for you. From $103/hour for up to six people, with a two-hour minimum, yellowstonenationalparklodges.com/adventures/water-adventures/

“As hard as it is to get a cabin at Roosevelt Lodge, it’s harder to get a rocking chair,” jokes Hoeninghausen, who, in 1987 was the manager at Roosevelt. The rocking chairs he refers to are those on the covered front porch of the main lodge, which was built in 1920. “Rocking on the front porch of Roosevelt with a cocktail and looking out on the Lamar Valley and maybe seeing some wildlife—that’s classic Yellowstone,” he says. Roosevelt is the smallest property in the park, with only 80 cabins, and is pretty much full all summer. But you don’t need to be a lodge guest to eat at its dining room or enjoy the front porch rockers, both of which are first-come, first-served. “People will drive to Roosevelt from Gardiner, Montana, just to have dinner,” Hoeninghausen says. “It’s that good.” The lodge is known for its ribs and baked beans. yellowstonenationalparklodges.com/restaurant/roosevelt-lodge-dining-room/ Yellowstone once had 98 1936 Model 706 touring buses from the White Motor Company. Eight of them, refurbished to the tune of about $250,000 each, are still around and used for tours today. Their roll-back canvas tops make them ideal for wildlife watching and photography tours, and it is possible for private groups (or families) to rent one. The driver doubles as a guide. Each holds 13 passengers; $991 for eight hours, yellowstonenationalparklodges.com/ adventures/custom-guided-tours-rentals/ Until 2018, the eruptions of Steamboat Geyser, the tallest active geyser in the world, were as irregular as they were infrequent. At one point, it was 50 years between eruptions.

Steamboat, which is in the Norris Geyser Basin, reactivated in 2018, though, and since then has erupted more than 150 times. Eruptions can last up to 40 minutes and shoot water 345 feet into the air.

Stagecoaches transported visitors around Yellowstone from the park’s founding in 1872 until 1917, when they were banned and cars took over the park’s roads. Not only did the transition to cars make getting around the park faster, but also safer: Two of the biggest stagecoach robberies of the twentieth century in terms of the number of people (174 and 165, respectively) and stagecoaches robbed (17 and 25) happened in Yellowstone. In 1908 a robber got away with $2,000 in cash and valuables. In 1914, a robber stole almost $1,000 in cash and jewelry. The 1908 robber was never caught; the 1914 robber was. The last stagecoach robbery in the park was in 1915.

While many movies and series have been set in Yellowstone, very few have actually been filmed in the park. The 1979 movie Star Trek: The Motion Picture was the third feature to be filmed in Yellowstone, but it was definitely not set in the park. Minerva Terrace in the Mammoth Springs area was used as a stand in for the planet Vulcan.

JEFF HENRY’S NEWEST BOOK IS OUR FAVORITE BOOK ABOUT YELLOWSTONE. Starting with Yellowstone’s rocks, some of which are two-thirds as old as the Earth itself, and coming up to the present, including a chapter on the park’s first human inhabitants (Native Americans thrived in the area for 13,000 years before European explorers showed up), author and photographer Jeff Henry presents as complete a look at Yellowstone National Park as is possible in a single volume in his latest book, Yellowstone National Park: The First 150 Years. “It is hoped that [this book] may succeed in inspiring you to further investigate the park’s storied past and fascinating present,” Henry writes in the book’s introduction. It did for us. $39.95

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JUST A FEW THINGS TO DO IN

JACKSON HOLE

Go to jacksonholemagazine.com for more details.

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JACKSON y Walk your dog up Cache Creek (p. 148). y Ride the new Summit Gondola at Snow King (p. 32). y Take a walking tour of historic downtown Jackson (p. 158). y Work on your mobility (p. 96). y Speed down the new zip line at Snow King (p. 32).

y T ry the Workman’s Special at Bubba’s (p. 74). y P eople watch from the outdoor patio at The Bistro (p. 68). y Wander downtown’s art galleries (p. 76). yV isit the new Snake River Roasting Café (p.72).

yH ike up the Wildflower Trail (p. 148). yV isit the Top of the World (p. 46). y P lay disc golf (p. 162). yG o downhill biking at the JHMR bike park (p. 162). y T ake a scenic ride up the tram (p. 46).

YELLOWSTONE NATIONAL PARK yD rive Dunraven Pass, just reopened after nearly three years of construction (p. 166). yC heck in on Steamboat Geyser (p. 166). yG o backpacking (p. 166).

WILSON y Grab a bagel and coffee at Pearl Street Bagels (p. 50). y Take a walk up Old Pass Road (p. 148).

GRAND TETON NATIONAL PARK

TETON VALLEY y Check out Highpoint Cider (p. 154).

y Eat pizza on the rooftop deck at Dornan’s (p. 68). y Take a scenic float trip down the Snake River (p. 42).

yH ike up Mt. Washburn (p. 166). y T ake a wildlife-watching safari (p. 166).

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CALENDAR SAVE THE DATE SUMMER 2022

JUNE

17–19 57TH ANNUAL ART FAIR

JACKSON HOLE This outdoor, juried art fair draws artists and artisans from across the country while raising money for the Art Association of Jackson Hole. On the Center for the Arts lawn. artassociation.org

CHAMBER OF COMMERCE

OLD WEST DAYS

18 PLEIN AIR FEST

Old West Days is a 10-day celebration of Jackson’s heritage and includes Elkfest, the High Noon Chili Cookoff, The Ranch Tour, Old West Brewfest, Cowboy Church, Million Dollar Music Fest, and more.

Plein air painters create works while the public can watch on the National Museum of Wildlife Art’s Sculpture Trail. Collectors bid on the artwork later in the afternoon. wildlifeart.org

23–25 JACKSON HOLE FOOD &

MAY

21–30

Events below are based on information and Covid-19 conditions/restrictions as of mid-May 2022. Please check with organizers to make sure the global pandemic has not further affected their event.

LONE STAR LOOKING GL ASS

WINE FESTIVAL Celebrate food, wine, sprits, and brews at this three-day event. jhfoodandwine.com

JULY

02 JACKSON HOLE HALF MARATHON Take this unique opportunity to run or walk from Teton Village to West Jackson. jhhalf.com 04

GRAND TETON MUSIC FESTIVAL PATRIOTIC POPS Guest vocalist Capathia Jenkins joins the GTMF Orchestra to present a program of Independence Day favorites on the Center for the Arts lawn in downtown Jackson. gtmf.org

23–31 TETON COUNTY FAIR

ONGOING

JACKSON HOLE RODEO A long-standing Jackson tradition, the rodeo shows off Jackson’s cowboy culture. jhrodeo.com YOGA ON THE TRAIL Do downward dog surrounded by sculptures of wildlife art and overlooking the National Elk Refuge at these free hour-long yoga classes at the National Museum of Wildlife Art. Led by teachers from several valley yoga studios, the classes are B.Y.O.M. (bring your own mat). wildlifeart.org JACKSON HOLE PARAGLIDING Tour Teton Village from above. No experience necessary to fly tandem with a professional pilot. jhparagliding.com JACKSON HOLE PEOPLE’S MARKET Browse fresh, local produce while enjoying prepared foods, music, and beer Wednesdays from June into September. tetonslowfood.org NATIONAL MUSEUM OF WILDLIFE ART This museum takes an expansive view of the wildlife art genre with its 5,000-plus-piece permanent collection. wildlifeart.org

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This is the ultimate slice of local life, with games, rides, 4-H competitions, and concerts. tetoncountyfair.com

AUGUST

05–07 57TH ANNUAL ART FAIR

JACKSON HOLE This outdoor, juried art fair draws artists and artisans from across the country while raising money for the Art Association of Jackson Hole. On the Center for the Arts lawn. artassociation.org 06 RENDEZVOUS MOUNTAIN HILL CLIMB This is one of the toughest mountain races out there, climbing 4,200 vertical feet over 6.1 miles. jacksonhole.com

SEPTEMBER

07–18 JACKSON HOLE FALL ARTS FESTIVAL Free and ticketed events celebrate the valley’s art scene. jacksonholechamber.com

CELEBRATING ART IN THE TETONS

38T

H ANNUAL

SEPTEMBER 7 – 18, 2022 307.733.3316 + jacksonholechamber.com

EXPLORE

AS THE HOLE DEEPENS

Curse of the Amateur Tourist // BY TIM SANDLIN

// ILLUSTRATIONS BY BIRGITTA SIF

H

ere’s what happened last summer. All those hundreds of thousands of people stuck at home for a year and a half decided to go outdoors. While Jackson Hole had Covid numbers as bad or worse than wherever they came from, four million folks trapped in rooms the size of a middle school coat closet said, “Let’s go to Wyoming. We’ll be safe there. No one gets sick in Wyoming.”

Tourists rained down on us like locusts on Utah. The town, the Park, even the National Forest were packed tight as Times Square on New Year’s Eve. (Slight exaggeration —ed.)

Restaurant waits for a table stretched into the two-hour zone (Not an exaggeration —ed.) Three hours for takeout pizza.

The tourists didn’t complain. It was better than home.

They were hot, smoky, and crowded, but they weren’t anywhere else that was worse.

Locals, however, complained. Vociferously. The usagainst-them mentality ran rampant, like bedbugs through a preschool.

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By mid-August, Roger Ramsey had had it.

“I’m going so far up the Gros Ventre River I’ll be in places no tourist has ever dreamed about. You want to come with?”

I said, “Let me find my shoes.”

We loaded up the Subaru and drove way back past the last campground where we saw campers from Texas trying to light a fire with nothing but lighter fluid and a log, on to an ancient quarry where a giant abandoned scoop rusted in the sun. High school partiers climb up to throw bottles into the bucket. Locals call it the Tetanus Monster.

As Roger and I bumped down the incline, expecting to find an empty vista with a river running through it, we came upon a subculture reunion of horrific size and shape. Two things dominate National Forest reunions: ATVs and guns.

Multiple seven-year-olds ripped through the sagebrush, screaming, chasing each other on their four-wheelers (which are not toys, by the way —ed.), each kid’s goggles were so crusted with mud they were functionally driving blind.

The women had that glazed facial expression you see late in the 10th hour of a bluegrass festival. Anyone from out of town would assume the Wyoming state flower is the used Pamper.

The sleeveless, neckless men took one look at us and headed for their arsenal. I don’t write detective stories so I can’t tell you the calibers and automatic versus semi-automatic details. They had targets painted like prominent Democrats nailed to the spruce trunks.

Roger said, “Survivalists,” and pulled at U-turn.

As we drove up river to the prettiest spot in Teton County, the Slate Creek waterfall, I mansplained the theory of the Amateur Tourist to Roger. (Can a man mansplain to another man, or without condescension, is it just talking? —ed.)

“Most campers pre-plague, if you can recall that far back, had been here before. They come every summer to the same campground, praying for the same campsite. Or, at least they’ve camped somewhere before. They know this isn’t Disney World where minimum wage minions pick up your trash. They know the animals are real. We never had a bozo punch a buffalo in the face until the last two years.”

“Happens monthly now,” Roger said.

“So, these dim bulbs trapped in a room with their kids decided to go wild. The West wasn’t won by a masked man.”

“You’re forgetting the Lone Ranger.”

“We got a load of urbanites back here have never smelled fresh air in their lives. It affects them like meth.”

Roger leaned over the steering wheel to look up the ridge behind the waterfall. “There’s a big wasp attacking birds up there.”

“Figures.”

We found a skinny man in a Brooks Brothers suit down on the riverbank, peering into what I took as an Etch A Sketch.

“I got me a bald eagle nest.” He pointed to a TV picture on his screen. It showed a metallic thing stomping raven eggs.

You could hear the adult ravens in the background.

Roger said, “If life is a roulette wheel, you’re the double zero.”

Suit guy got offended. “I chased a bear off an antelope this morning. Would have gone viral on Tik Tok if the antelope hadn’t died.”

I said, “We just drove by a bunch of women sunbathing naked about a half mile downstream. Why not send your

drone there and stop torturing wildlife?”

“Bald eagles.”

“I’d rather look at naked women from on high than crack eggs.”

The guy grinned and commenced to twirling knobs and flipping a mechanical thumb. “I’ll be an influencer. Influencers collect groupies.”

We watched as the drone soared up and swooped toward the survivalist camp.

Roger said, “We need to move along.”

I said, “Yep.” As we topped the rise, we looked back at the would-be influencer, walking downstream, staring into his screen.

“What do you figure the Proud Boys will do when a drone buzzes by?” I asked.

We heard a thunder of firearms.

“Shoot down the drone,” Roger said.

“Then come looking for the owner.”

We crossed where the Gros Ventre tops out at a watershed and saw an unusual sight. Imagine a shiny white fish oil capsule the size of a humpback whale. (Too many metaphors in one sentence. —ed.)

“What the hell is that?” I asked.

“You talking about the topless supermodel in the hot tub on the roof?”

“The hot tub next to the helicopter.”

The helicopter pad lifted the helicopter magically from the back end of the RV. The side rails collapsed. The helicopter rotated back to front, freeing the blades.

A man inside flipped a thumbs up to the woman in the hot tub, who came out of the water, tied on the top half of her bikini, and strolled over to the helicopter. She got in, the helicopter lifted off, and flew away over the Gros Ventre Wilderness.

I said, “That’s not my parents’ Airstream.”

Roger sat there in obvious awe. “That’s a Furrion Elysium.

My wife wants one. Three 75-inch TVs, an infotainment system, a fireplace, a wine fridge, and a smart toilet.”

My mind formed a picture. “What makes a toilet smart?”

Roger considered the question. “Hands-free wiping.”

“I’ll have to think about that one.”

We sat there till the helicopter disappeared into the Wilderness, then we drove in silence back to town.

(The Furrion Elysium sells for 2.9 million dollars, cheaper than the median price of a house in Jackson, and it comes with a helicopter. —ed.)

JACKSON HOLE | SUMMER 2022

177

JULY 3–AUGUST 27 SIR DONALD RUNNICLES, MUSIC DIRECTOR JACKSO N H O LE , W YO M I N G

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J AC K S O N , W YO M I N G Property ID: 5RLPW7