Finally Rockies.. we meet... face to face...

Date: July 5, 2008
Weather: Nice during the day with showers and crazy wind at night
Health: good – running on beer chili
Morale: Growing tired of RV’ers
Food: Lake Estes beer- gross
Current location: Mary’s Lake Campground outside of Rocky Mountain National Park
Next Landmark: Grand Lake CO- western entrance to Rocky Mountain National Park
Miles Travelled: approx. 2500

First- let us tell you how Jess’ dreams came true at the Sierra Trading Post Outlet Store! It was amazing bargains everywhere you turned on Keens, Merrells, everything your heart could imagine!!! We ate at a great restaurant where Ro ate with a fork the size of his head.


We learned some things- so let us share some wisdom. First of all, don’t expect to get a walk up campsite in Rocky Mountain National Park on a 3 day weekend which also happens to be the 4th of July. We ended up at Mary’s… luckily walked in as someone cancelled. Not only do we have water, electic, and cable, but we have no use for them but alas have paid for them! Not to mention the ice cream social Jess thought was free due to the amount we paid for this site, but no- you have to pay!! Enough ranting….

Plus sides are that Jess was almost run over by a huge elk last night. While walking back from the bathroom, it ran right in front of her- thinking it was a dog or something like that, she shone the light and found an elk 3 feet away. There was a stare down, a friendly introduction, and he dashed into the firework ridden night. It was very cool.

Russ had similar encounters with the wild, but while driving, almost taking out a grey wolf, a red fox, and a huge elk. A huge elk- how do you miss that???

We went on a great hike today to the Loch Vail. It was pretty amazing. Jess realized she is more out of shape than she thought- especially in higher altitudes (which note- also makes her tipsy from 1 or 2 beers). Russ realized that adventure racing has given him a nasty case of trail rage. The defining moment came when he almost pegged a senior citizen with his trekking pole for going to slow in front of him and the large group of Asian tourists was almost pushed down a canyon. There was a brief intervention on the trail, and we continued to the worst brewery ever- the Lake Estes brewery. Never recommend you go- if only for the beer chili nachos that we did enjoy- but the beer was not great… kinda a mix of soap and…. soap.















Rowan set out to befriend a chipmunk that kept us company during lunch. He laid his raisins out on the rock and waited for him so he could hug him. The chipmunk was too fast for Ro to hug and eventually made off with all of the raisins.






Maybe if I just leave this box here....






Or empty it while I keep watch with my trusty stick...






Oh Chippy.... I'm pretending I'm not watching......




Overall, the scenery is amazing here and thank goodness- we scored a campsite in the national park tomorrow night- so we will be signing out of RV land- no offense to other RV lovers- we’ve just had our share of drunk ones this lovely 4th of July weekend. We just had a RV neighbor stumble over and go on and on about our cutest son ever… have we ever seen him before? No…. I think we will be locking the poppy tonight.