Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado ~ Day 5

Today is our last day enjoying the Rockies and the Estes Park area - we decided to take a short hike in the morning, so we could enjoy the shops in the afternoon. 

Our hike was a short one - just a 3 1/2 miler to/around/back from Bierstadt Lake. It was much colder this morning - when we started it was 50-degrees and overcast.....brrrr!! The hike was interesting if only because we were hiking on the "other" side of the park from Day 1, and so we saw different views. 

 The lake was nice -

 

The wildflowers were starting to open as we were hiking out.......
 

On the drive back to town, as saw this guy......

Today's elevation was a bit higher than yesterday's hotel room elevation, but much lower than our previous hikes in the Rocky Mountains.

We walked around town for a couple hours after our hike - enjoyed some ice cream and the shops.  Overall this was a great five days - even the rainy one!

Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado ~ Day 4

This day is definitely called Rainy Day!  😮

Today had a 90% chance of rain and thunderstorms, so we planned to not hike today, which was a good thing because it started raining around 11am and did not let up. We took a short walk to/around Lake Estes, had breakfast in town, and before we could meander town some more and enjoy the shops, the rain came and it poured. All. Day. Long. 

Today's highest elevation - taken in the hotel room! 😆

Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado ~ Day 3

Let's call this Rock Day - rocks under feet and a long vertical rock scramble at the end. 

Today we hiked to Chasm Lake - with a goal of being done, or at least being below treeline, by the time the thunderstorms started, predicted to begin around noon. But first, we had to let some elk by as we drove to the trailhead:

We started about 7:15am for this 8.6 RT, 2,456 elevation change hike though both sub-alpine forest and alpine tundra. Photos along the way....... 

This was the rock scramble at the end....

And then we were at Chasm Lake with Long Peak in the background - Long Peak is the highest point in Rocky Mountain National Park at 14,259-feet.

 Yup - another selfie. 

We hung out for a bit having a snack, then started hiking out. We did get rained-on as we hiked out, but no thunderstorms. At least now we could justify carrying rain jackets everywhere we've been hiking! 😆

Oh, and there were privies along the route that were super cool (for a privy) - they were made of rock and had no ceiling....

 

Our highest elevation of today....

So yet another great day in Rocky Mountain National Park!

Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado ~ Day 2

Let's call this Alpine Day. 😀

Knowing that rains and thunderstorms were heading our way, we took advantage of clear skies to drive to the west side of the park via Trail Ridge Road - taking a hike and small walk along the way. 

After driving for a while, our first stop and only real hike, about two miles round trip, was along the Ute Trail which traverses alpine tundra. It was super cool and very different than yesterday's lake hiking.

Once we got back into the car, we passed a huge herd of elk - maybe 200-300....

We then stopped at the Alpine Visitor's Center where there is a walkway (all stairs) to a pretty high (and windy) point:

 (This was our highest elevation of the day.)

Here is the view of the ranger station. Why the large tree trunks on the roof? Well, to hold the roof down in the high winds - yowza!

 We continued our drive and found ourselves in the 2020 East Troublesome Fire:

 On the way back to Estes Park, we saw a moose having some dinner.....

So another great day in Rocky Mountain National Park! We saw (literally) hundreds of elk and one moose!

Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado ~ Day 1

(Yes, we are a few days behind on blog posting - we've been hiking so much that there hasn't been time to go through photos! 😀) 

So Day 1 in the Rocky Mountain NP - let's call this Lake Day.  We began thinking, "Let's have an easier day, just a few miles." Well, that turned into about 12 miles (and 7.5 hours) since we just kept going and going!

We started in the Bear Lake area and hiked about 1/2 mile to Nymph Lake:

Then another 1/2 mile past Nymph Lake is Dream Lake:

About 3/4 of a mile past Dream Lake is Emerald Lake:

The trail ends here, so we went back the way we came, turning a bit south at Dream Lake to hike 1.1 miles to Haiyaha Lake:

 

Just a  cool tree - probably a few hundred years old - no exaggeration.

 Lake Haiyaha......

This was our intended stop for the day, but we were so enamored with the scenery and enjoying the hike so much, that we decided to continue on to some more lakes in the area. From Lake Haiyaha, we hiked 3.6 miles to The Loch:

(Not The Loch - just an unnamed lake along the route.....)

 

We were minding our own business as we walked along the trail, when an elk walked right in front of us:

We let her take her time passing in front of us, then then continued onto The Loch:

Here we are!

We continued towards Sky Pond, but decided not to hike up the waterfall to Sky Pond - yes, you climb up a flowing waterfall. If it had been earlier in the day without so much run-off, we may have tried it, but it was about 2pm by this time and the water (which comes from a melting glacier and it was a hot day) was pretty strong (and cold). (You climb up the right side of the water in this photo.)

We were rewarded for our decision, as we were hiking back to Glacier Gorge, we saw this elk. (We actually passed him lying down earlier in the day - he was in tall grass and we could only see his antlers, but now he was up-and-about.)

 

Then it was 4.6 miles to Glacier Gorge...

Past Alberta Falls....

So it was a great hiking day with lots of wonderful scenery! We hiked by four different elk along the way, which was also cool. Our highest altitude of the day: