Sharing photos, videos, vintage images I've discovered, and -- occasionally -- commentary and thoughts from retired life and travels.

travel

Trail to Nymph and Dream Lakes

January 11, 2012

dream_lakeThis was our second time on this trail segment, which runs from the Bear Lake parking area to Emerald Lake and connects with other Bear Lake area trails.  We had hoped to make it to Emerald Lake if our legs, and the weather, held out.  The weather had been iffy overnight and during the morning.  Trail Ridge Road had been closed closed the night before and remained closed due to snow for the first time in the season. With rain threatening, instead of a hike that morning, we went into Estes Park.  After lunch and walking around Estes Park town center a bit more, we headed back into the park to the Bear Lake area trailhead.

The trail we chose goes to a trio of subalpine lakes – Nymph, Dream, and Emerald – in upper Tyndall Gorge.  The trail is well maintained and rises steadily over most of it’s 1.8 mile  length.  Difficulty is easy to moderate, but can be more difficult for those not acclimatized to the altitude as it climbs to over 10,000 feet.  We had already been in Colorado a week, so the altitude was less of an issue than it might have been otherwise.

tyndallFrom the Bear Lake area trails parking lot (9,475 ft.), the trail climbs steady for 1/2 mile, then levels off at about 9, 700 feet at the south end of  small, lily pad covered Nymph Lake.  The trail begins climbing again in the forest on the north end of Nymph Lake and levels off again at Dream Lake, 1.1 miles from the trail head and at an elevation of 9,912′ ft.  Dream Lake is .35 miles long.  The trail passes along its west shore.

We had hoped to make it all the way to Emerald Lake, 1.8 miles from the trailhead and 10,090 feet above sea level, but we turned back at the north end of Dream Lake due to deteriorating weather conditions.  Weather in the high country can be unpredictable, even in the middle of summer, but this was the middle of September and we’d already had some rain on our hike.  We had rain gear with us. However, it was already 3:30 PM and light rain was falling again, so we decided against pushing on ahead.

Blog posts from this visit to
Rocky  Mountain  National Park:

Selected Information
Resources:

Rocky Mountain National Park
Estes Park
Grand Lake

{ 8 comments }

Estes Park

January 5, 2012

estes_park_streetOn our four previous visits to Rocky Mountain National Park, we stayed one or more nights in the adjacent town of Estes Park. This time, we didn’t, as we were able to get reservations at Moraine Park Campground in the park for the duration of our planned visit.  As a result, we actually spent less time in Estes Park than any other visit – other than traveling through town and stops for fuel and groceries, just a short visit before and after lunch on September 15th, followed by an afternoon alpine hike back in the park.  It was an nice stroll along the street and into some of the shops – and much less crowded than our last visit on Labor Day weekend, 2009.

estes_park

This image is from a photo Karen snapped of me
while I was taking a picture of the Wishful Thinkin’
sculpture  of the cowboy pouring water out of
his boot.

Estes Park, a town of just under 6,000 permanent residents, is a popular summer resort in the Front Range of the Colorado Rockies, though there are plenty of recreational opportunities during the rest of the year. Located at 7,522 feet above sea level, the town is at the east entrance to Rocky Mountain National Park. Tourism has been a primary business for the town for most of its history.  Lodging includes The Stanley Hotel, inspiration for the setting of Stephen King’s novel The Shining.  (We stayed in the hotel during our 2001 visit.)

wishful_thinkin

The word “park” used in place names in the Colorado Rockies often refers to a valley or meadow. Estes Park, then, originally referred to the valley and was named after town founder Joel Estes.

The town experienced severe damage in July 1982 from flooding resulting from the failure of Lawn Lake Dam.

Additional information on the Lawn Lake Dam Failure, July 15, 1982:

Blog posts from this visit to
Rocky  Mountain  National Park:

Selected Information
Resources:

Rocky Mountain National Park
Estes Park
Grand Lake

{ 9 comments }

Forty Years Ago – Charting a New Course

January 1, 2012

navy_1972

(Continued from “Forty Years Ago–A Departure”.)

The flight from Houston had a short layover at Los Angeles International before continuing on to San Diego.  From there it was but a short trip to the San Diego Naval Training Center.

A few weeks earlier, I had ridden with a friend to the Manned Spacecraft Center, where he worked.  He was loaning me his car for the day so that I could look for a job.

Even though I had already had several jobs, I had very little experience at actually looking for a job and, looking back now, I really didn’t have a clue then on how to do it.  I basically spent the day driving around, eventually ending up in a shopping center in Baytown.

I really didn’t start the day even thinking about joining the military, but there I was, at a Texas strip mall that housed recruiting offices for Marine Corp, Army, Air Force and Navy.  With the ongoing Viet Nam conflict, the first two had absolutely no interest for me.  While I don’t remember much about it, my first stop was in the Air Force recruiter’s office.

The stop at the Navy recruiting office was more memorable.  The recruiter talked about a number of options, but there was one that really caught my attention, the Navy nuclear power program.  Not only did it offer interesting opportunities in the Navy, but the job experience gained might later lead to opportunities in civilian nuclear power.  The main drawback was it required a six year commitment instead of the more common two or four year enlistments.

In the ensuing weeks, I qualified for the program through the advanced programs test, passed a physical, and enlisted in the Navy with entry delayed until the end of December.

sign

One of the benefits of the program was that I would be entering the service at E3 pay grade,  a seaman – equivalent to a private first class – instead of seaman recruit (E1).  Completion of recruit training would bring automatic promotion to Petty Officer Third Class, equivalent to corporal.

Three different job fields were included in the program: electronics, mechanical, and electrical.  I hoped for electronics, but I wasn’t going to learn which field I was going to be in until after further testing in boot camp.  Of course, electronics was what most of those who enter the program hoped for and not everyone could get it.

January 1, 1972 was a holiday, of course, so there was no processing of the new recruits.  Instead, we got to watch football games in the receiving and outfitting transient barracks.

{ 12 comments }

Fall River Country

December 24, 2011

Each time we visit Rocky Mountain National Park, we travel the Old Fall River Road from it’s junction with the modern Fall River Road, U.S. Highway 34.  The road is two-way and paved for the first 1.75 miles, passing Lawn Lake Trailhead, Lawn Lake Alluvial Fan, and the Endovalley Picnic Area.   The remaining 9.4 miles is winding, narrow,  unpaved and one-way from the picnic area  to above treeline at Fall River Pass, following the steep slope of Mount Chapin’s south face to it’s junction with Trail Ridge Road.

Old Fall River Road was built between 1913 and 1920.

The Lawn Lake Alluvial Fan is a particularly interesting recent geologic feature.  It was created when flood water and debris rushing down the steep and narrow Roaring River valley from a failed dam at Lawn Lake slowed down when it reached the broader Fall River valley, leaving behind an alluvial fan of debris.  When we first saw it over 20 years ago, the large Roaring River gully scoured by the flow and the alluvial fan were still a fairly fresh scar on the land, with little new vegetation. In the ensuing years, the scar has weathered some and vegetation has moved in.

Additional information on the Lawn Lake Dam Failure, July 15, 1982
estes_park_lawn_lake_flood

Aerial view of Estes Park, July 15, 1982 (USGS)

Lawn Lake alluvial fan from Trail Ridge Road

 

 

 

 

 

Blog posts from this visit to
Rocky  Mountain  National Park:

  • Bear Lake
  • Fall River Country (this post)
  • Trail Ridge High Country (coming soon)
  • Estes Park, Colorado (coming soon)
  • Trail to Nymph and Dream Lake (coming
    soon)
  • Moraine Country (coming soon)

Selected Information
Resources:

Rocky Mountain National Park
Estes Park
Grand Lake

{ 2 comments }

Bear Lake

December 21, 2011

2011 09 12 064 panoThe Bear Lake area of Rocky Mountain National Park is one of the most popular parts of the park.  We’ve hiked several trails in the area, including the 0.6 mile trail around Bear Lake.

The Bear Lake Trail is an easy walk, listed as accessible – available to most people, including those with handicaps. However, the trail is not entirely flat and is more challenging than most accessible trails.  The lake is about 9500 feet above sea level.

Bear Lake is  at the end of Bear Lake Road, eleven miles from the Beaver Meadows Visitor Center.  With several other trails in the Bear Lake area, the parking lot fills early during the summer and weekends.  Bear Lake Route shuttle buses run from a large Park & Ride parking area across from Glacier Basin Campground, with stops at other trailheads along the route.

Blog posts from this visit to
Rocky  Mountain  National Park:

  • Bear Lake (this post)
  • Fall River Country (coming soon)
  • Trail Ridge High Country (coming soon)
  • Estes Park, Colorado (coming soon)
  • Trail to Nymph and Dream Lake (coming
    soon)
  • Moraine Country (coming soon)

Selected Information
Resources:

Rocky Mountain National Park
Estes Park
Grand Lake

{ 9 comments }

A Rocky Mountain Park…

December 16, 2011

Rocky Mountain National Park, to be exact.

After our short stay in the Colorado Springs area, we headed mostly north to our next stop, Moraine Campground in Rocky Mountain National Park.

View from fall river pass

Looking down Fall River Valley from Fall River Pass.

 

2011_trip_map_4th_legThis was our fifth visit to this area – not counting the trip with my grandparents and 17 year old uncle back in 1957 when I was 5 years old.

The drive for the day was about 145 miles.  Unfortunately, it was also through the Denver metro area and there wasn’t much of an easy way around that.  We would prefer traveling through metropolitan areas on a weekend when the traffic is less, but I had been unable to get reservations at the park campground for the duration we wanted any earlier than September 12, a Monday.

We delayed starting out a little while in an attempt to miss the worst of the traffic.

I was in the left hand lane on US 24 not long after we left when I noticed the driver in the next lane holding up a card trying to get my attention.  I don’t remember exactly what it said, but it was basically telling me that I should be driving in the right hand lane.  Now I understand people getting upset when people abuse traffic requirement, including the one where slower vehicles are supposed to stay to the right.  I was driving a 25 foot motorhome towing a car, so, yes, I was going slower than some others. However, I also had a GPS that was telling me that about a mile down the road I had to make a left turn to get on the freeway and, with the heavy morning traffic, I was in the left hand lane early to make sure I didn’t miss it.  The guy made a right turn shortly after that so I wasn’t really delaying him at all.  Just a control freak jerk, I guess.

I’m working on the photos and videos from the several days we were in the Rocky Mountain National Park (RMNP) area.  We were in some locations more than once and I want to group the material from those together, so the RMNP posts won’t necessarily be chronologically sequenced.

More to come.

{ 8 comments }

Mountain Towns

December 7, 2011

After our Pike’s Peak drive, we spent some time looking around the towns of Manitou Springs and Old Colorado City.

Today, the towns are part of the South Central Colorado Urban Area (Wikipedia). Old Colorado City is actually a natural historic district in the city of Colorado Springs that was incorporated into Colorado Springs in 1917.  Adjacent to each other, both towns were on one of the direct routes to the Pike’s Peak area gold fields.

Manitou Springs is the home of the Pike’s Peak Cog Railway.

Information and Resources:

Manitou Springs

Old Colorado City

{ 4 comments }

Flight

December 4, 2011

Newport State Park, Door County, Wisconsin, September 17, 2008

Newport State Park, Door County, Wisconsin, September 17, 2008

Newport, northeast of Ellison Bay, is Wisconsin’s only formally designated wilderness park. With 2,373 acres and 11 miles of Lake Michigan shoreline it offers quiet alternatives to bustling Door County. – Park website

Newport State Park – related sites:

Related post:

{ 13 comments }

Upper Mesa Falls

December 1, 2011

Upper Mesa Falls, Henrys Fork of the Snake River, Idaho

Henry’s Fork of the Snake River, Idaho, September 16, 2007

{ 7 comments }

Cripple Creek, Colorado

November 25, 2011

065-paintedSeptember 9, 2011 – After visiting Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument, we headed on down the road to Cripple Creek.  In 2004, we had rented an A-frame cabin near Cripple Creek and, on this day trip, decided to drive through the area again.

Cripple Creek sits in a high mountain valley just below tree line at about 9,500 feet near the western base of Pikes Peak.  For many years the valley was consider to be of little value for anything more than grazing cattle.  A mini gold rush was caused in 1884 when three con men salted gold in a prospect hole near Mount McIntyre, 13 miles west of Mount Pisgah.  The men planted a fake claim sign and invited the press.  In the excitement over news of a new gold strike, the papers mistakenly identified Mt. Pisgah, near current day Cripple Creek, as the location of the strike.  Experienced miners quickly determined the strike was a fake and the incident became known as the Mt. Pisgah Hoax.  It gave the area a bad reputation, prospectors avoiding it for many years.

A persistent prospector, Bob Womack, came to Colorado in 1861 with his father at the tail end of the Pikes Peak Gold Rush.  While they didn’t do well, they liked Colorado well enough to bring out the rest of the family, purchasing the Levi Welty homestead in Pisgah Park, where Cripple Creek would later be established.  Womack dug hundreds of holes search for gold, becoming known as “Crazy Bob” and a drunkard.  In 1890,  Womack dug a narrow shaft into Tenderfoot Hill, finding gold ore.  Womack called the discovery the El Paso Lode.  It later became the Gold King Mine, eventually producing $5 million in gold.

In 3 years the population rose from 500 to 10,000.  Though the mines of Cripple Creek produced a half a billion dollars of gold ore, Womack profited but little and died penniless in 1909.  (See more on Cripple Creek history at Wikipedia.)

Unlike many of the historic gold camps and towns that have faded into ghost towns, Cripple Creek reinvented itself in the 1940s as a tourist destination.  In 1991, Cripple Creek was one of a small number of towns opened to legalized gambling by Colorado voters.  Casinos now occupy many of the old historic buildings and gambling revenue has revitalized the area.

Information and Resources:

 

{ 4 comments }

← Previous Entries