Wed Aug 05, 2009 7:35 pm Rocky Mountain National Park
In mid July my wife and I went to Colorado for a reunion and spent a week afterwards in RMNP. We lucked out with the weather - not too hot or buggy - it wasn't until we got home that we found that!
Like all national parks this time of year it was crowded, but early morning starts to see the sunrise, a nap in the middle of the day, then evening sunset hikes, helped us find some solitude.
The proximity of Estes Park (a town, not a park) makes shopping, eating out, and camping easy. I recommend staying at one of the campgrounds in town - for a couple bucks more you get showers which are sorely lacking in national park campgrounds.
We did a variety of the standard easy day hikes. The highlight for me was an early morning jaunt up below Longs Peak (the highest in the park) to see sunrise on Chasm Lake. It was fun looking up at the steep wall of the Diamond and remembering back about 30 years ago when I climbed it. It was strange to be in this park with fantastic rock and not even rope up for a pitch.
The photo themes that developed through the week were . . .
Clouds: Lakes:
My favorite evening was spent wandering alone among dead Limber Pines off of Trail Ridge rd. at dusk.
I'm not much for driving, but we enjoyed the trip home (thanks to AC) when we cut across CO over to UT, then up. I love the big sky feel in the desert.
Joined: 12 Aug 2006 Posts: 2489 | TRs | Pics Location: state of confusion
Thu Aug 06, 2009 9:56 am
As usual, you have great photos there, Jim!
I have only spent a few days in that park, on Memorial Day weekend back in '93, right after Trail Ridge Road opened. In addition to doing a little skiing (including a nice drop across a road switchback with a free ride back up ), we found a nice dry hike along the crest up there off the road - talk about high pleasure/grunt ratio! We kept stopping for lounging breaks at especially good viewpoints, and at each and every one, we'd see coyote poop. They clearly found value in great viewing positions as well - presumably more for the food, but who knows, perhaps they have aesthetic appreciation for the views too! One day I want to get back there to do more exploring.
You cannot post new topics in this forum You cannot reply to topics in this forum You cannot edit your posts in this forum You cannot delete your posts in this forum You cannot vote in polls in this forum You cannot attach files in this forum You can download files in this forum
), we found a nice dry hike along the crest up there off the road - talk about high pleasure/grunt ratio! We kept stopping for lounging breaks at especially good viewpoints, and at each and every one, we'd see coyote poop. They clearly found value in great viewing positions as well - presumably more for the food, but who knows, perhaps they have aesthetic appreciation for the views too! One day I want to get back there to do more exploring.