If Yellowstone is birthday cake, the Grand Tetons are ice cream. The two go together like rivers and mountains. The Tetons are just a few short miles to the south of Yellowstone (although the distance between the two will feel much farther as you crawl along the two-land highway). Really, you shouldn’t visit one of these parks without also seeing the other.
A nice upside of the Grand Tetons is that it’s usually a lot less crowded. While the Grand Teton National Park doesn’t have quite the geyser contingency of its northern neighbor, it does have MOUNTAINS. This must be among the most visually striking mountain ranges in all the world. When you see it for the first time, you’ll realize you’ve seen it a thousand times. The Tetons play starring roles in numerous television and print advertisements.
There’s plenty of wildlife in the Tetons too. Although I’ve seen more bears in Yellowstone, I’ve seen more moose in the Tetons.
The nearby town of Jackson, Wyoming is charming and filled with the requisite “upscale cute” shops that seem to populate all scenic resort communities. There’s a small movie theater, a number of excellent restaurants, and a central park where they have a regular “Old West” style gunfight (using guns that, thankfully, fire blanks).
In the winter, Jackson transforms into a posh ski resort. In the summer, you can still ride certain ski lifts to the top of nearby slopes, and take in the view.
In the Tetons, we chose to camp in the Gros Ventre park about 15 minutes outside town. It’s an older campground with smallish but well spaced sites that were designed in the 1960s. Gros Ventre only offers dry camping, so you’ll need to ration water, and shut off your generator at 9PM. Even though the lack of water and power were issues, we camped in Gros Ventre for a week. We must’ve been having a good time.