A Day of Driving

Today was pretty much a day of driving. We covered several hundred miles, which in colorado is saying something. We drove along the peak to peak highway toward leadville, then drove the collegiate peaks highway to buena vista and then across the state west toward Ouray. Ouray is a very cool little town and I'll hopefully have some good pics tomorrow.

This is the view outside of our window at the Lodge at Cordillera. I could definately get used to this.

This is a view of the lodge from the road.
Leadville is an old town with alot of mining and cowboy history. The views around the town are incredible, but Matt and I agreed it wouldn't be that cool to live here. Too far from civilization!

This is the Delaware Hotel where Doc Holliday liked to stay, back in the day. Matt says that Doc Holiday came here after the shoot out at O.K. Corral. Alot of history here.
Another picture of downtown Leadville.

This is a picture taken from Black Canyon of the Gunnison national park. Not much to do here but alot of pretty scenery.
The San Juan mountains were shining pink when we first saw them. Tomorrow we'll get to explore closer up.


Some mule deer grazing beside the highway. They seemed pretty tame and we probably could have got closer up to take this.

Tonight we arrived in Ouray about 8P and had some authentic, authentic Italian. Like straight off the boat from Venice. Yummy. We haven't had one bad meal the entire time we've been out here. If nothing else can be said of us...we can sniff out some good eatin'!!

BEST DAY EVER!

Ok. Today was a great day. We saw alot of cool stuff today.

7AM breakfast at "The Egg & I" in Estes Park...yummy omelets and such.
8AM hiking to Alberta Falls in RMNP
10AM back to Estes Park for souvenirs and lunch
1PM drive over trail ridge road toward Grand Lake
3PM drive the "Colorado River Headwaters Scenic Byway" toward Edwards, Co
6PM arrive in Edwards to stay at the Lodge and Spa at Cordillera where we ordered room service and soaked in the outdoor hottub


wheww!! what a day! and these are the highlights......


Entrance into RMNP. I think this is Long's Peak, which is over 14,000 feet above sea level.
As we were driving into the park, we almost hit this elk. It was crossing the road. Why? I don't know but I'm sure there's a joke about it.
A mountain stream beside the road to the Glacier Gorge Trailhead. Matt and I wanted to take three hikes this morning but we only got to one before we had to head out. We kept stopping to gawk at the scenary so it slowed us down a bit....but totally worth it.

Action shot! It was very cold this morning. My hands were so frozen that I could hardly hold the camera, so Matt took over. I was so afraid I was going to drop it and owe my sister like 2000 dollars.

I set up the tripod and ran across the road with the timer on....I think it turned out pretty cute. If I get injured on this trip it will most likely be running to get in a picture while the camera is on timer mode!
This is at the start of our hike to Alberta falls. Not a long or particularly difficult trail but at this elevation, we were sucking wind regardless. We talked on the way about how our dads would be leaving us in the dust!

Matt loves these mountain streams. We've almost filled up a 4Gig memory stick on mountain streams alone.
A look up from the ground. All the yellow trees you see in the pictures are Aspens. They are unbelievably beautiful.

This trail was very nice and well maintained. We had it pretty much to ourselves this time of year.


Another action shot carrying the trusty tripod. That thing rocks and is super light.
Ahhhh! Alberta Falls.

Matt got this shot of a squirrel guarding his nut. Very cute little critter...too bad he's probably rabid!

View from the top of Alberta Falls


Ok, this is the start of Trail Ridge Road. This road goes over the rocky mountains and tops out at elevations of over 12000 feet.
Another good tripod shot where I almost broke a leg trying to get in the picture. I'm also pretty sure we were breaking the law by standing on the "fragile mountain tundra" but we tried to be very careful. This is above treeline where the weather is so harsh no self respecting tree will grow.

The snow never melts up here.
This is called "Huffers Hill" because you pretty much need an oxygen tank to make it to the top.
A pretty alpine lake I think was called Lake Irene.
This is Grand Lake on the other side of Trail Ridge Road. This would be a great place to spend a week or two in the summer time.
Well that's the highlights of the day. Hope you enjoy!

Bugling Elk

This is a short clip of an elk bugling. The high pitch screaching sound supposedly attracts women. I guess they haven't discovered expensive dinners and fast cars! ha!

Day Two: Fall in the Rockies

This morning we woke up in Boulder Co at about 85 degrees, sunny, and warm. Tonight we viewed elk in RMNP at about 40 degrees, windy, and COOOOLD!!!! This pictures are out of order because I do not have any clue yet how to work this blogger thing, but oh well.




This is Matt viewing the elk. The one boy elk has about 10 to 20 other female elk in his "harem." Yeah, that's the word they use. The boy elk is all souped up on testosterone and makes this sound that is supposedly a bugle. I think it sounds more like when your brake pads are worn out and you touch your breaks...yeah, that squeal pretty much sounds like the elk. It was raining like crazy when we got to where the elk were so we had to sit under the hatch of the back of the trailblazer wrapped up in blankets.
Matt did not want his picture taken here....probably because he knew it would be blogged later!
A boy elk getting his game on.
On the road to Bear Lake, RMNP.
Beautiful clouds on the way to Bear Lake. (Fru, I used my new polarizer, looks good eh?)

This was taken on the Peak to Peak highway on the way to Estes Park. As we rounded the corner, we saw all these cars pulled over and then we realized why. The pictures in no way do this justice.

I think this mountain is called Mount Meeker.
A very strange but beautiful castle-looking house near Estes Park.
These are all the girl elk waiting for a male to come bugle at them, I guess.

This picture was taken on the way out of Boulder this morning.
Our first glimpse of fall, so we had to pull over.


These are all the people pulled over to see the fall foliage. It was mania!

We had a very full day and are exhausted. Tomorrow we'll do some hiking in Estes Park and head over Trail Ridge Road toward Vail!