Rocky Mountain National Park, CO

ROCKY MOUNTAINS:

Day #64 (October 3, 2022): We have thoroughly enjoyed our time in Wyoming’s sister national parks: Yellowstone and Grand Teton. There is such amazing beauty and wildlife to behold in Wyoming’s northwest corner. The distinct steep-sloped mountains in the Teton Range are my favorite mountains. I just love the straight line of sharp, sawtooth-like peaks. And of course, Yellowstone is unlike any other place on earth with its diverse array of geothermal features, landscapes, and wildlife. Although bittersweet, it is now time to head to our next state to explore: Colorado. First stop: Rocky Mountain National Park.

Although we probably could have made the drive from Grand Tetons to Rocky Mountains in one day, we decided it was better to stop part-way in Rawlins, WY, at Western Hills RV Park. During the truck ride across the state of Wyoming, we did “car-school,” as we do on almost every travel day. We worked on math and grammar, studied the state of Wyoming, finished our unit on American history, and started a family read-aloud—Indian in the Cupboard. Today, however, was super distracting because the drive through the state of Wyoming was so incredibly breath-taking and magnificent. Every little bit, someone would exclaim, “Quick, take a picture!” or “Where’s the camera?!” or “Take a picture!” The area near Shoshone National Forest (the nation’s first national forest by the way) was simply spectacular (Bucket List noted) with its snow-dusted terrace-like mountains and chiseled buttes, and then the Wind River Reservation was like another “Badlands” with its rounded sand-art-like hills.

After parking the rig in Rawlins, we ate at Ichiban and shared a Japanese Hibachi table with a couple from Michigan who was also traveling from Yellowstone and Grand Teton to Colorado. We thoroughly enjoyed our dinner and conversation with them.

Day #65 (October 4, 2022): Emily’s favorite thing about the otherwise-no-frills Western Hills RV Park was the very classic 1980s playground. It was complete with swings, rings, trapeze bar, tall slide, teeter totter, and merry-go-round! The group favorite: the merry-go-round, of course! Although our stay was brief, the kids loved how simple, yet so fun the playground was and wished they had had more time on the merry-go-round. Such fun!

It was another fruitful day of car-school, studying about the state of Colorado and continuing our read aloud, in addition to our daily schoolwork. As we continued our drive across the very rural state of Wyoming, we spotted many wild pronghorn along the highway, questioned and theorized about the seemingly-random-yet-actually-strategically-placed sections of tall fencing along the highway (turns out, they are snow fences, something unfamiliar to us Tennesseans), and passed many, many cattle ranches (more than half the state of Wyoming is ranch land actually).

We arrived in the early afternoon to Estes Park, CO, parking just outside the entrance to Rocky Mountains National Park at Spruce Lake RV Park. After parking and setting up camp, we headed to the Beaver Meadows Visitor Center to watch the park movie and to gather maps and information from the ranger on duty. Then we drove Bear Lake Road at 4:00 with our timed entrance pass and saw elk and mule deer. Having seen so much wildlife already and so recently, we weren’t as enthralled as other visitors, and we were scratching our heads as we passed by car after car of people parked with folding chairs lined up along the road, I guess hoping to see more elk come out at dusk.?? It looked like they were waiting on a parade to start! During all our wildlife adventures, we had not seen folding chairs (and some even with picnic tables and dinners) enter the scene until here. These folks are serious!! No wonder you now have to have a timed ticket to enter this specific part of the park! I don’t know. This all seems a little over the top! LOL!

Day #66 (October 5, 2022): With the quickly approaching ending of our first leg, Emily needed a day to catch-up on some paperwork and other To Do’s. The kids did a morning virtual music lesson and their daily schoolwork, and then headed outside to explore the campground’s playground and mini golf. Sadly, “dodge the dog poop” was more the object of their mini golf game on this poorly kept mini golf course.

Day #67 (October 6, 2022): After morning schoolwork, Emily and the kids drove into Rocky Mountain National Park for a little exploration. On a hike in Beaver Meadows, they spotted elk, magpies, grouse, and a woodpecker. Afterward, they enjoyed the exhibits at Fall River Visitor Center and the adjacent gift store/souvenir shop next door.

The highlight of the day and one of the most memorable points of our trip thus far, was hiking Oldman Mountain, located just outside the national park in Estes Park. Although the trail itself is very short (0.6 mile round trip), virtually the entire trail is rock climbing and rock scrambling. The top of the mountain looks like a man’s bald head with minimal trees and vegetation on its summit. The All-Trails app was very helpful for this not-marked trail, but even with the app, it was still a bit unclear where the actual “trail” was. The kids enjoyed looking around and seeing if they could find what they thought was the best way up or down the mountain. This made the hike all the more exciting and adventurous, of course. The views at the top were amazing and super rewarding! It was such a special moment. This hike sparked a love for hiking and rock scrambling, and from this point on, the kids were eager to take on any hike that included any sort of bouldering and scrambling.

Day #68 (October 7, 2022): Highway 34, the main road through Rocky Mountain National Park, is appropriately called Trail Ridge Road. The road is well-named as it traverses the upper ridge of the mountains and is quite narrow at its summit. We enjoyed stopping at the various pullouts and overlooks and taking in the mountain views and scenery. At one of our stops, we spotted our favorite Rocky Mountain animal: a small pika, a little-bit-bigger-than-a-hamster-like rodent that lives amongst the rocks and crags of this region. We paused and watched it nibbling sparse grasses as it scurried amongst the rocks.

Just past the highest point on the road (12,183’), we arrived at the Alpine Ridge Visitor Center, another very appropriate name for the highest visitor center in the entire national park service (@ 11,796’). We went inside to see the brief exhibits for about 15 minutes, and as we walked to the car, headaches and nausea hit Lily and Emily. Evidently, altitude sickness was hitting us after our abrupt 4,000-foot-change in elevation in an hour’s time. We loaded back into the car, cracked our windows for some fresh air, and drove down in elevation toward the Kawuneeche Visitor Center. Wow! How amazing altitude sickness can set in and then let up, based on one’s elevation! Unfortunately, the scenery on this portion of the drive was less picturesque since it consisted mostly of charred remnants of trees due to the extensive 2020 fires. We watched the film in Kawuneeche’s Visitor Center, looked at its exhibits, and then drove the same road back to Estes Park.

We parked in downtown Estes Park to peruse the variety of locally-owned small shops and restaurants. Our favorite was The Taffy Shop where we watched a mesmerizing machine pulling saltwater taffy. We purchased an assortment of taffy flavors to enjoy. It’s hard to pick a crowd favorite amongst our family. We each had a favorite flavor; some top flavors included lemon, vanilla, cinnamon, and peppermint. The reality is, however, every flavor was delicious! The taffy was so soft and fresh; it melted in our mouths! Yum!

Day #69 (October 8, 2022): Today is a prep and pack day for our returning trip to Nashville. We washed the truck and cleaned out the inside of it, packed our suitcases, and played Cribbage & War, all while keeping an eye on… a visiting older lone bull elk who spent the day in our campground resting and grazing on the grass! An elk in Rocky Mountains just like a bison in Yellowstone! So cool!

Day #70 (October 9, 2022): We drove 1.5 hours to the Denver airport, disconnected and parked our rig at a third-party parking lot, dropped Mac off at his boarder’s house nearby, picked up an afternoon treat at Andy’s Frozen Custard, and then headed to our hotel. Carry-out from Ted Montana’s Grill was delicious! Bison burgers, bison chili, and bison short-ribs all were delicious!

Day #71-80 (October 10-19, 2022): An early, uneventful, direct flight from Denver yielded a nice, early landing in Nashville at 9:35 am CST, and for the next 9 days, we spent our time visiting with family and friends, catching up on work and mail, planning and fine-tuning our next leg’s reservations, celebrating Neil’s 13thbirthday, and going to a variety of doctor well checkups. Bethany was sick with strep the last 2 days of our visit but was feeling better for our return flight back to Denver on the 19th.

An early flight from Nashville yielded an even earlier arrival time to Denver at 7:35 am MST. Wow! How about that for an early start to the day?! We reunited with Mac, our truck, and our RV and drove south to Colorado Springs, picked up a Walmart grocery order (delivered right to our RV door…so nice!), and parked at Mountaindale RV Resort.

We spent the rest of the day unpacking, resting, and settling back into RV living as we have now officially embarked on Leg 2—The Southwest Loop—of our year-long journey! What a blast Leg 1 was! These first few weeks have been priceless, filled with so much fun and adventure, new sights and experiences, and oh, how they have flown by! If time could slow down just a bit, that would be nice…and helpful. It’s hard to keep up! Ha! Nonetheless, we are so excited and thankful for the rest of our journey!