Taste of the Rockies

We woke up early this morning – like 4:30AM early – and made the 75 minute trip up to the Rocky Mountain National Park. The weather was perfect, the company was well-behaved and the photography was pretty darn good. A great day!

First we stopped at Bear Lake and took several photos of Hallett’s Flat-top across the smooth surface of the lake. At over 9700 feet above sea level, there was still plenty of snow around and it was actually kind of chilly.

After we got done at Bear Lake, we headed over to Sprague Lake. I’ve been there several times in the past and was hoping to get another great reflection shot but unfortunately, the wind started kicking up and the lake was full of ripples.

We got in the car and drove up Trail Ridge Road to the Alpine Center. Measuring just under 12000 feet, this is truly tundra conditions! The wind was howling, there were banks of snow 8, 10 and 12 feet deep! Despite this – the photography opportunites were phenomenal – including a pretty decent panorama (below)

We were all getting hungry so we decided to head back down the mountain – one last stop though. Horseshoe Park. The importance of this site probably isn’t well known outside the state of Colorado. In 1982, a devastating flood occurred When the Lawn Lake Dam broke unexpectedly at 5:30AM. The water from Lawn Lake sped down through Horseshoe Park before sending up to six feet deep water through the town of Estes Park, CO. Several people were killed. The flood created an alluvial fan of debris at Horseshoe Park. While this is definitely a sad day in the history of Colorado, the geological outcome is quite spectacular. More information can be found here.

Finally, on the way home we stopped at Five Guys Burgers. We’ve heard good things about the burgers and fries and if it’s good enough for POTUS, it’s good enough for us! Maybe not the best burger I’ve ever had – but pretty darn good!

Bonus! We arrived back at our humble abode in the midst of a hail storm. Luckily there were no tornados in the area – but there was a covering of hail throughout the backyard. Needless to say – Sidney the Beagle was NOT happy.

Click to see full sized panorama

(Click on photo to see full sized image on Flickr)

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