Day 1: Flying into Jackson, WY

Our trip began today, Saturday, June 12. We flew out of Reagan in D.C. to Denver where we caught a connecting flight up to Jackson, Wyoming, which is hands down one of the coolest places you can fly into. You see the Rockies as soon as the plane begins descending, then you notice the enormous expanse of open prairie with lone houses every few miles. These are the sorts of houses that instantly make you jealous of the people inhabiting them.
Pictured on the edge of the wing is Cloe, the deer fawn who accompanied us from Denver to Jackson. Frontier airlines has one of these animals featured on each of their flights.

The airport in Jackson is basically a huge cabin with security scanners, a baggage claim, and a lot of people with cowboy hats inside. It is exactly the kind of airport you would expect in Wyoming at the base of the Rocky Mountains. We rented a silver Chevy Tahoe (definitely the largest car we have ever been in) from the Hertz rental car agency and we left the airport. On our way out, we took a picture in front of this sign:and this one:

Before driving to our hotel, we stopped at a nearby arts museum with cool architecture and sculpture out front. We didn't go inside the museum but we did stop to take pictures of a bunch of marmots we saw. They are basically fat squirrels.
We also stopped at the Visitor's Center for Jackson to find out about all the awesome things that you can do here (ex. white water rafting, horseback riding, etc.) and to check out some souvenirs. My mom took the opportunity to check out some birds she had never seen before flying around the elk reservation outside of the center and Allison took the chance to read the book, "There's a Hair in My Dirt! A Worm's Story". I walked upstairs past a wildlife exhibit to find an old historian reciting the story of Lewis and Clark and Sacajawea to a group of about two dozen elderly adventurers. I found out that the guy telling the story was actually a writer/historian and long-time activist for the Sacajawea dollar (side note: he is currently lobbying the U.S. government to abolish the $1 bill and replace it with the coin in order to save taxpayers money spent each year on destroying $1 bills). Anyway, the guy was so entertaining that I stayed up there to listen to him finish his entire story.

We left the Center a little while later and reached our hotel around 5. We are staying at The Lexington, a beautiful little hotel in the middle of town.

From the hotel we went to Billy's, a burger joint recommended to us by the hotel concierge. If you ever come to Jackson, we all recommend that you stop at Billy's and get a burger. They were delish.

We spent the rest of the afternoon and evening walking around Jackson, stopping in shops to look at more souvenirs and t-shirts. We also did a little bird watching and reading with the locals.




We finished the day by walking to the Dairy Queen at the edge of town where Julio made us a few of the finest Blizzards and sundaes. The walk back was freezing but the trip to DQ was definitely worth it.
Of course, the day would not have been complete without a family picture under an antler arch:
Tomorrow, Grand Tetons!