Denver
Rocky Mountain National Park
After grabbing breakfast and doing laundry at a coin facility, I headed back to the airport to pick up my next travel companion, Jessica. She had just come in from New Orleans where she spent several days with Mike G (the guy with whom I was hiking in Maine just a week earlier) and other passholders. After throwing her stuff in the car, we headed for the mountains. I've always wanted to see the Rocky Mountains National Park and this AYCJ pass gave me the chance to do it. This mountain chain is only one of two in the world, the other being The Remarkables near Queenstown New Zealand which I got to see in March 2008, that line up exactly north-south for the entire length. It was a bit of a long drive, the the scenery kept getting better and better as we went along. We stopped at the visitor center so I could get my NPS park stamp and a hiking map. It was too late to really start much of a trail, but we did get the scoop of a few good spots for watching the elk. Even though it was cold with occasional snow flurries, we hung around for a while and even really enjoyed the ranger presentation that covered the habits and history of the elk in this area. I wanted to be able to do a scenic loop drive, however the high mountain roads seemed to have just been closed due to high-altitude snowfall, so we were denied the opportunity. After filling up on a good dinner and a micro-brew restaurant in Estes Park, we drove a little outside of town until we found a good spot just inside National Forest property where I threw up the tent and sleeping bags and crashed for the night.
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