Playing tourists in Estes Park and on Trail Ridge Road--a near perfect day

I know it has been a while since I have posted.  Right now I am back in my hometown in Colorado visiting family after dropping Marika off at university, and I do hope to have more time to post regularly once we are back home again.

In the mean time, today we went out and did some typically tourist things with Rio and a visiting German friend and we saw some amazing wildlife, and a lovely rainbow and I want to share the photos with anyone still checking in to see if I ever write something.

We started the day with a brief stop in the old mining town of Nederland, where we poked around outside of the mining museum and checked out the old steam shovels:

We found Mary Ann, but where is Mike Mulligan?

Continuing on, we made a brief stop at Saint Malo church, where David spent many happy summers at camp:

Next, we stopped at The Stanley Hotel in Estes Park.  This is the hotel which inspired Steven King to write The Shining, and where he stayed while writing the novel.  It is also simply a gorgeous hotel (with a cool old elevator as well):

After visiting the hotel, we headed into Rocky Mountain National Park to drive up Trail Ridge Road (a paved road which climbs to a remarkable 12,000 feet--well above timberline).  It was a bit cloudy, marring the views of surrounding peaks, but it was still the BEST day I have ever had up there--we saw an incredible rainbow (note: I do not even own or know how to use photoshop--the rainbow really was that bright) and tons of wildlife up close.  Enjoy the photos:

If you look closely, you can see a deer in this photo.  Three were in the area, but my little point and shoot only managed to capture one.

It's not every day that you get to look down on a rainbow!

One of many adorable chipmunks

Wildflowers at 12,005 feet

 One of a handful of Marmots running around in the rocks (they're pretty big, almost like a beaver)

The two rams were just majestic!  Closest I have ever seen them outside of a zoo.

We saw two decent sized elk herds at a distance, and then these three bucks (below) who were willing to get closer to people than I was comfortable with (see bottom photo).  There was even some bugling in their standoff!

I hope you enjoyed the photos.  It was an absolutely banner day for wildlife viewing.  In addition to all of the above, we saw, but failed to capture on camera, many picas, lots of other birds (including lovely red tailed hawks) and even a black bear.  I think I saw as much today as in any 10 past trips combined.  What a great introduction to the area for Rio.

--Hadley