Another day, another post! At least it’s on time today! 😀

After breakfast at the hotel we set out to find a Post Office as I wanted to post a birthday card. Well, it took a while because the instructions we were given were very complicated and we ended up going round in a circle! After locating the Post Office we set off from Salt Lake City for another long drive, albeit only five hours today! It was an interesting one too, not like yesterday on one long boring road.

The day started at 68 degrees and was variable as we travelled north but it’s now 61 and sunny. I have to say it’s very pleasant indeed and tomorrow is forecast to be even better. The only snow we’ve seen is on the mountain tops so fingers crossed it stays that way.

We passed through Idaho (that was unexpected) and lots of open range country with cattle. We travelled along the Old Oregon Trail

that was laid by fur traders and trappers from about 1811 to 1840, and was only passable on foot or by horseback. By 1836, when the first migrant wagon train was organised in Independence, Missouri, a wagon trail had been cleared to Fort Hall, Idaho. We also drove along the Pioneer Historic Byway

that retraces some of the steps taken by Idaho’s early pioneers and early-day Yellowstone Park visitors.

We had a nice singalong en-route, it was first of all Si’s spinning playlist (an acquired taste for some) and then something a little gentler ……………. John Denver! You remember I told you yesterday that we had a different lady speaking on the sat nav and how curt she was, no respect at all for the elderly? 🙁 😂 Well, we’ve decided to call her Brittany!! 😱 (Apologies to any Brittanys reading this blog!!)

Entering Wyoming home to Jackson and the Grand Teton National Park and our destination.

After our long drive we arrived here, our home for the next week, at Dornans Spur Ranch

and what can I say, it’s Heaven. We are staying in a log cabin, well it’s more than a basic log cabin actually, about fifty yards from the Snake River.

What a fabulous find this place is. Some of you will remember back in 2013 when we stayed in a log cabin, 8000 feet above sea level just outside Yellowstone National Park and it was such a dreadful experience I vowed never to do log cabins again? Well, I’m glad we took a chance on this one.

It’s a family-run business and it was Evelyn Middleton Dornan from Philadelphia on leave from her job in a war plane factory during World War 1, who came out in 1918 to visit a friend, Maude Noble, who operated Menor’s Ferry (the ferry building is still located on the west bank of the Snake River across from Dornans) who started it all. The visit left a deep impression and three years later, the war over, Evelyn returned to the Tetons and homesteaded on the east bank of the Snake River and staked a claim to just over twenty acres south and east of the ferry Noble ran and the homestead eventually became Dornans Spur Ranch and has been in the family ever since. There are just 12 cabins and ours is called Willow.

I don’t expect many of you remember the film Spencer’s Mountain, released in May 1963, (it was for forerunner for the TV show The Walton’s). Well, Dornans and some of the family members running it at the time were extras in the film.

We had originally booked about a year ago to stay at the Old Faithful Lodge Cabins in Yellowstone but changed our minds in February and decided to stay in the Tetons. I didn’t expect to be able to find anywhere as most of the good places are booked at least a year in advance but we found Dornans and they had just one cabin available for this week. We were so lucky. Besides the cabins there are three restaurants, a nationally famous wine shop (we’ve just been in there and my goodness, I couldn’t begin to count how many bottles of wine they have, but I’ve just read they have over 1500 labels), a gift shop (think I may take a little look in there), a deli, a grocery store, a bar and a place to hire bikes, canoes and many other things.

Before I forget, I said I would post a photos of our ‘trusty stead’ and here she is plus a few other interesting things we saw during our journey!

Well, day one completed. I’m being told that tomorrow we rise at 5 a.m. so that we can get to Oxbow Bend to, hopefully, see the sun rise. This should be interesting ……….. me rising at 5 a.m.!! 😱

More tomorrow! Thanks for reading and for posting comments.😀