Now, no one said all duty at the White House is all bad. This past summer (2002), I had to cover the VP in Wyoming, and boy does he like to fish. This is the Snake River along Jackson Hole, Wyoming.
The mountains in the background are a part of the Rocky Mountain range, specifically the Teton Mountains.
The view was spectacular all along the river.
During the week he was there, I did have one day to sight see on my own. I took the opportunity and headed up to Yellowstone. This photo to the right is Old Faithful right before her big moment.
There
she blows.
I was a little shocked to see the destruction still evident from the Yellowstone forest fire back in the 80's.
The two pictures above are of the same lake.
I had the opportunity to go hiking. I (unwisely) chose a trail rated "severe". It started at 7500 feet and went up to 14500, a 14.7 mile round trip (ouch).
Along the way I met some new friends.
This one was a moose that was not too happy I woke her out of an afternoon nap.
This doe acted like she wasn't worried about me one bit. She just kept eating and watched me pass no more than 15 feet from her.
This was the summit of Static Mountain. On the way down I found out why they named this one Static Mountain. I got caught in a passing lightening storm and while I stopped under a rock ledge to wait out the storm I watched the lightening strike the adjacent cliff close enough to see the lightening turn from white to bright neon pink/red as it struck. Later I realized I was standing looking over "Death Canyon". To sum it up, I was looking over Death Canyon while climbing down Static Mountain, in the middle of a lightening storm, alone.... not too smart.
As I was coming back down, this was the view of the top. Notice the sunshine. This was only about 20 minutes after the storm. They would come and go so fast.