Tetons ??'s

jalichty wrote:
One other thing about the two campgrounds. Colter Bay has a general store along with a set of public showers and laundry facilities while Gros Ventre does not. As well, Colter Bay has a couple of restaurants. One thing we have never seen, though, in Colter Bay is Moose, of which we saw a number at Gros Ventre when we camped there about three years ago.

I agree with all that. I’m sure there are moose in the area but we didn’t see any. We did see bears. 3 different ones over 3 Days. One through the RV Park! Didn’t see one bear in Yellowstone in 4 1/2 Days! We loved the Colter Bay Area. Beautiful views of the lake and Mountains!

One other thing about the two campgrounds. Colter Bay has a general store along with a set of public showers and laundry facilities while Gros Ventre does not. As well, Colter Bay has a couple of restaurants. One thing we have never seen, though, in Colter Bay is Moose, of which we saw a number at Gros Ventre when we camped there about three years ago.

Both Colter Bay and Gros Ventre will assign you a site when you check in, but if you find one you prefer after driving around, you can go back and they will usually allow you to change spots. We have a number of sites we like at Colter Bay and usually ask if they are available before we go in. If so, we pay for the site and go park. If they have to assign us a site, we will go look it over and, if we find something, empty, that we like more, we'll just go back to the station and ask to be assigned that spot. It's usually pretty easy to do. Colter Bay is our favorite spot as we go up to fish on Jackson Lake as it sits very close to the marina where we launch our boat. It's also closer, by about 20 miles, to Yelowstone National Park compared to Gros Ventre.

Although we haven't tried it yet ourselves, there is one spot I know of to boondock with views of the Tetons. Load Google Earth and do a search for the Cunningham Cabin Historic Site. Directly across route 191 from the U-shaped entrance is Forest Road 30310. Follow this road aways on Google Earth and you will see the boondocking sites.

I have tried to get into the Grassie Lake roads site several times and they were always full. If you travel down the road about five miles you'll cross a dam and there is a site on the left across the dam.

There are some nice sites up along the upper Gros Venture about 15 miles.

Appreciate the responses!! Am aware of the early time of year for some boonies sites, will see how the weather goes for the next couple of weeks!! Don't think we will be in the Teton area till after Memorial day itself, likely Tues or Wed.

Probably will use Gros Ventre, more central, don't need to be close to Y/Stone since we are planning 5-6 nights at Bakers Hole to explore the park. We generally prefer to camp in the boonies, not established sites, but on a trip like this, we probably will wait to hit the backroads on our way back in Idaho areas.

Our favorite campground for the Tetons is Gros Ventre. We always drive right past the Ranger station and tour the loops to find the site(s) we like that don't have a dated occupied notice on the post. We then go back to the Ranger station and ask about availability of our #1 choice, which we already know is available. In the 2nd half of May the campground should be nearly empty, so you will have many good choices. There will be fewer choices on Memorial Day weekend.

At Colter Bay there is a sign-in station where you must stop to have a site assigned before entering the campground. Maybe just our bad luck, but there has only been one time when we didn't have to go back to the entrance station to ask for another site due to off level or too short for us to fit. FYI, the sites at Colter Bay are shallow pull offs along the sides of the loop road, similar to parallel parking. The sites at Gros Ventre are all back-in.

I wouldn't recommend towing beyond the first few miles of Grassy lake Road. We drove in as far as 10 miles in our 24ft Class C a few years back and should have turned around after maybe 3-4 miles. The further in we went, the worse the road got. That said, there were several nice looking campsites in the first few miles along the decent road.

re grassy lake road....if you're thinking about the first half dozen sites along the creek, they might be accessible...the others on up the road might not be.

gros ventre: what we do is enter the campground and go and park at the amphitheater parking lot, un hook and go find a couple places with our towed...then go to the office and request the site we want. if no one has beat us to it, we're good to go.

It's probably too early for grassy lake road. Still too much snow.

There are two options at Colter Bay. Colter Bay RV Park where you can make a reservation, but not pick the site; and Colter Bay Campground which is first-com-first-served.