Colorado, Part 2 - Rocky Mountains

On the road again... Saturday, September 8 we jumped back into our rental car and this time went northwest to the Rocky Mountain National Park. After making a pit stop for breakfast burritos at Rocky's, we made our way to Estes Park. We thought we might enjoy the town a bit, but it was overrun by kilts - apparently the annual Scottish Festival is a pretty big deal there. So we moved on to Trail Pass Road.

Jacob really enjoyed driving on this road. I think he may have been missing his bike as we saw many motorcyclists on our drive. The weather was perfect that day- hardly any clouds in the sky- so we stopped often to take photos and stretch (though our rented Subaru Legacy was roomy enough, the seats weren't the most comfortable).

We tried to look for wildlife as we went (apparently, we just missed some deer at this spot)...

... but did see some beautiful plant life as well.

The views were constantly breath-taking (or perhaps it was the altitude?).

So we (I) took lots of photos, though they really don't do justice to the majesty of the sights.

The expanse of the mountain range really is mind-blowing! On the right, the taller peak in the above photo is Long's Peak (14,255 ft).

Perhaps the fantastic views contributed to the fact that even Jacob smiled for this photo!

Not so much for this one, but at least you can see more mountains in the background.

We loved seeing the moon rising above the rocks. We could easily see the reason behind the "Rocky" in the name of this mountain range. In fact, as we continued to drive, we saw numerous signs warning us to "watch for falling rocks," as well as warnings about avalanche areas when we passed the ski runs.

Eventually, we got up above the treeline. The character of these mountains continued to change as we drove along.

At this stop, we could see few trees but some glacial lakes. We took a break also when we got to the top, at a place called Alpine Pass, where we ate lunch and did a little souvenir shopping.

On the way back down, we parked at the Continental Divide (separating the drainage to the Atlantic from the drainage to the Pacific) and took a little hike.

This is where I really felt the altitude as we did this easy climb. Seemed like I was always 3 steps behind Jacob!

One of my favorite views was of a patch of bold color in the midst of all the evergreens. Brilliant!

And Jacob's favorite view came when he spotted a herd of elk along the side of the road. We didn't see any bulls among them, but it was still fun to watch them graze.

The view that most made us think of Micah was the tunnels! He's been very interested in tunnels ever since he drove along 696. He would have loved driving through these! We even were impressed to see rock climbers by some of the tunnels. Additionally, as we drove along the river, there were many fishermen as well.

We decided to take a little break in the small town of Golden. This cute college town (home to the Colorado School of Mines), gave us a good chance to stretch our legs.

Golden is also the site of Coor's Brewing Company - the single largest brewing site in the world. Although we didn't take the factory tour, we could see that the complex was simply huge.

One of the more unique sights in Golden was the M on the side of Mt. Zion, overlooking the town. It was painted there by students of the Colorado School of Mines (though one story says the M is to show Texas that it is a mountain, since it was assumed that Texans didn't really know what a mountain was). Our view of the giant M (104 ft x 107 ft) was enhanced by the paragliders drifting by.

What a special blessing for us to have a chance to see God's beautiful creation in the Rocky Mountains. We're thankful for these memories to share with just the two of us - before our family soon expands!