In September Grand Targhee Ski Resort in Alta Wyoming, scheduled a dh race, and we were going. When my dad, my friend and riding buddy Mackay Hare and I were driving up there, we could see the Tetons from a ways away, they were covered in snow. It was September and the Tetons had a foot of snow! I remained optimistic, but my dad was not. A race down a snowy and muddy track would be way fun, it would be like a European enduro. Riding in the mud is very different. It makes an ok course into a very fun and technical one.
We got up to the Grand Targhee parking lot, and it was as expected, snowy. After eating a bit of lunch and checking out a suds and spuds festival, we went to the people in the ticket office. They seemed optimistic about the race as well. We also learned that their was less snow on the Jackson Hole side, and that the trails over there should be fairly dry. Mackay remembered riding some trails on Teton pass, but we did not know exactly where they were. It was our only option to ride, so we bombed up and over the top of Teton pass. When we started to drive down, we watched for a trail entrance. Someone saw a trial, by a dirt parking lot, and we pulled in. After a bit of walking it turned out that this was a biking trail, and a sick one at that. At the start of the trail there was a little sign that said Jimmy's Mom, just below that their was a 15 foot boulder, that had a step up and a step down off of it. We hustled back to our truck, and Mackay and I got all our gear on and went down the trail.
The trail was fun, but a little traversey. It spit us out on to a gravel road, when we were going down the road, we were paying close attention to the sides to make sure we did not miss the trail. We found a trail head, but it said walkers only on it. About 100 feet away we found another trail head, and this one said Power Line Jumps, which sounded good to me. About 15 seconds down the trail we we stopped at a rock drop, it had about 3 different lines you could take into it which lead to 2 lines out. Futher down the two trails merged, and there was another drop which was followed by some jumps. After about 40 seconds of jumps and drops the trail cut left and back into the woods. We came to another road that split with a uphill 4 wheeler track and the road. Mackay, who had ridden this trail before knew that you had to go up the 4 wheeler track, then it comes to the trail again. We hiked up the dirt road and came to the trail. This trial had lots of jumps, and drops as well. We came to the parking lot at the bottom, and guess who was sitting their waiting for us, my dad.
We buzzed back up and took another run and this time met some older locals who told us about another trail called the parallel trail. It started higher up on the pass and joined the Jimmy's Mom trail down by the powerline jumps. It turned out to be a pretty sweet trail.
That same night, Mackay had a plan, more like a social agenda. For a thirteen year old kid he sure knows a lot about the Driggs area. He probably should run for mayor. First stop showers and clean clothes. Then it was off to Teton Thai.
My dad, having sampled Thai food in all the West Coast cities where thai cuisine is outstanding, was just a little skeptical. Mackay, however, is a very smart kid, and we figured that all his hype about Teton Thai had some reasoning about it. Inside the resteraunt there were lots of people, and it was going to be a long wait, but we luckily got a seat at the bar. In front of us there was a cool opaque glass panel. My dad likes hot food, and he quickly asked questions about the 1-5 heat scale. After our waiter gave him the lo down, he ordered some kind of noodles with a 4 on spice, which was supposed to be really hot. We got our food, I ordered soup with a 1 for hotness. My soup was great, and dad seamed to enjoy the suffering that his noodles brought him. I tried one of his noodles, and yes only one. It tasted amazing, but the flavor was soon over taken by burning. I ate some more, and the flavor was once again followed by overwhelming heat. Thankfully the heat was calmed by water, and I felt relieved.
Mackay's next thing to check off from his agenda, was to go see his relatives. I felt sick earlier in the day, and I stared to not feel so good again on the drive over to his relatives. By the time Mackay had directed dad to the house in the dark, (which means Mackay has some serious navagation skills) I was in no mood to do anything. So I made the decision to stay in the truck and try to sleep. I do not know how much time passed, but lying in the car must have done a bit of good. I heard a bomb, and turned my head out the window to see a big firework light up the dark sky. Then another and another, I could see a dude running around in the field about 100 yards away lighting fire work after firework. Each time a morter exploded it would light up the ground and each time the light would dim, I could see the outline of the Tetons against the pitch black sky. Evidently this friend of Mackays is one of the largest fireworks distributors in the US and his display did not disappoint. Once the party was over, Mackay and my dad came back to our truck. Mackay seamed a little bit disapointed that I didn't come and enjoy the party, but I was feeling seriously sick. We took the road back up to Targhee and crashed at our hotel.
The next day we awoke to a bluebird sky. The people in charge of the race called it off for reasons that did not make sense to us but we were psyched to go back and ride the pass some more. On the way there we met up with my bro Christian and we hooked up for some runs on the parallel trail with Mackay, Christian, my dad and myself with Christians dad driving shuttles. Around 1 or 2 in the afternoon we were forced to call it quits because Christian ate it on the hip jump, broke his jaw and got a concussion to boot. Teton pass has some sweet trails and I can't wait to get back to ride the Lithium trail.
A short video of the powerline jumps.
