By Alex Viveros
Jackson Hole News&Guide
Via- Wyoming News Exchange
JACKSON — Helia Zhang came to Jackson Hole prepared for cold weather, holding a puffy jacket as she and her family took pictures at the antler arches Friday afternoon on the Town Square. Instead, she was greeted by warm weather and blue skies.
“I guess I’m in luck,” said Zhang, whose family traveled to Jackson to celebrate her master’s degree graduation. “It’s really pretty … when I got in here, I’m like ‘oh, so that’s how nature looks like without any human beings.’ ”
The family, who is from China, is one of several groups of tourists that are enjoying an unseasonably warm start to May in Jackson Hole. Businesses in the valley and beyond are faring relatively well, according to Jackson Hole Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Rick Howe.
“That’s what I’m garnering from everybody I’m talking to: Business is stable,” Howe said. “Some people are doing better than others, but nobody is looking at it saying ‘I think we’re in trouble.’ ”
That’s held up with lodging in Yellowstone National Park. Visitation is up compared to this time last year, according to Todd Walton, the director of marketing and sales for Yellowstone National Park Lodges.
“As long as the weather is good, and people can be outside and enjoy Yellowstone, they’re going to come and do so,” Walton said. “Right now I’m looking at a lot of license plates from all over the country, which is really positive.”
The observations come as forces beyond the greater Yellowstone ecosystem may have Americans thinking twice about their spending, including rising gas prices and general economic uncertainty. In Howe’s four-plus decades in Jackson Hole, he believes the valley’s tourism outlook appears relatively shielded from external situations.
“Considering the economic situations that we all seem to be facing right now, we’re pretty stable,” Howe said. “We’re certainly not facing a record year. We’re not having extreme concerns.”
Riley Bauer, 19, and Paige Larsen, 20, planned their trip from Minnesota about two or three months ago. Like Zhang, the college students had imagined that it would be a little colder, and were excited to take advantage of the warm weather.
“We were going to try and paddleboard, get out on the water a little bit,” Bauer said. “Now that it’s a little bit warmer.”
Gas prices were an unexpected expense for the duo. Fuel prices began soaring across the country and in the region in March amid President Trump’s war in Iran.
“It was definitely a little shock that it was going to be so expensive, because we planned a couple months ago, when all this wasn’t happening,” Larsen said. “Definitely every time we fill up, we’re like ‘ooh that burns a little bit,’ especially because we’re college students.”
Yellowstone National Park Lodges were cautiously optimistic that people would keep their planned trips, even amid high gas prices, Walton said.
“As residents, we’re going ‘Oh my God, prices are so much higher than they were last year, and it’s probably going to have a strong impact on tourism,’ ” Howe said. “We haven’t seen it yet.”
The most recent 60-day advance view hotel occupancy data, published on April 30, showed a decrease in advanced bookings for this weekend compared to last year. Advanced bookings were higher for Memorial Day weekend.
To Howe, the data suggests that prospective tourists might be playing things a bit safer this year.
“They’re being a bit more careful in their planning and strategies of when they’re taking trips,” Howe said. “It may have been a slower trigger for people to go ‘Yeah, let’s make that trip,’ but I think people are still coming.”
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