Mountains and Pirates and Bears, Oh My

For the first time since we arrived, the view from our room is sunny and clear, and since it snowed last night, it's also pretty awesome. I know I'm a terrible tease to keep telling you this stuff with no photos, but I'm just trying to prove that you don't need pictures when you have language that is pure poetry.

Just kidding. Our Wi-Fi access is so inconvenient there just hasn't been time to load the photos, but hopefully the Old Faithful Inn (where we're going today) will be more tech-savvy. Yeah, right. But for now just take my word for it that four or five snow-covered peaks that seem to be rising directly out of the lake make for a pleasant vista.

David is doing his last...well,whatever it is that he's doing; I immediately glaze over when he starts to explain...and will be done around lunchtime. He managed to get us a late check-out so Jarrah and I are not on the streets. Jarrah and I just returned from a leisurely breakfast up at the lodge, and I suppose we need to start packing up this typhoon-aftermath of a room pretty soon.

Last night, David was finished around 6:00, so we decided to drive north a bit (Jarrah and I had driven to the park's southerly border already) for dinner. We went to Colter Bay Marina, and enjoyed ourselves with the unlimited supply of rocks for throwing in the lake. Which would be another side of Jackson Lake, because that is one big-ass lake. Several of the resorts make use of its charms. Once again, the cold spurred us back to the car, and then we discovered that the resort's restaurant was closed, either for the evening or the season, hard to tell.

An aside: I have realized that I am mortally and irrationally afraid of meeting a bear. Seriously, just seeing the paw print “Be Bear Aware” signs everywhere is enough to throw me into a panic. I haven't let Jarrah venture five feet down any of the clearly marked trailheads because I'm certain that a bear is waiting around the corner, holding out a bag like a trick-or-treater. I read the “what to do” instructions obsessively, and can tell I would be unable to follow them: “Do not run or scream. Back away slowly and try to stay downwind.” Hello? Wouldn't you have to be on 'ludes to follow this advice? We haven't seen any more wildlife since the elk herd of the first night. Jarrah suggested they are all indoors, enjoying some hot chocolate.

Because David needed a change of scenery, we headed back to Signal Mountain, but that was less successful than at lunch—the service was glacially slow, and David looked ready to use his cornbread for a pillow, which is how I felt. Jarrah regaled most of the tables (without their permission) with loud tales of pirate treasure, and did crack me up every time she instructed us to say “ARGH!” which is how she is hearing “ARRR!” She fell asleep on the way back, and all of us were in bed before 10:00. I wish I can say we slept well, but once again there was a lot of coughing, and maybe I was giving David a lot of kicks because by the morning he was in bed with Jarrah. I would have thought, based on past experience, that her kicks would be worse.