Trail Ridge Road ~ On Top Of The World

Or:

"How I spent my Saturday: A back to school picture essay."

As you might have guessed...this is a very picture heavy post.

We took a drive up Old Fall River Road to Trail Ridge Road through

Rocky Mountain National Park this past weekend.

You CAN take the paved road the entire way to the summit,

but how much fun would that be?

 

Please just sit back and enjoy this photo journey

as my witty repartee is a little lacking today. :)

I went with this guy.  :)

See this curvy ONE LANE dirt road?

It is only one way - UP.

Here it looks pretty tame.

Even this isn't bad.

But we haven't gained much altitude quite yet.

Is this gorgeous or what?

Looking back toward the valley we came out of.

We certainly weren't alone on the mountain.

Here you can see how sometimes there were huge

drops from the side of the road. :)

Here's a better picture showing the distance and depth we could see.

I swear this little guy posed for me.

He climbed right up on that rock and just WAITED for me to take his picture.

I was happy to oblige.  Especially since he's about all the wildlife we saw!

See that white stuff?

Yep.

That's SNOW!

You can see the summit house in this picture...we're almost there.

If you look closely, you can see the dots on the road that are actually cars.

Some of these pictures below...I did nothing to alter the skies.

A little contrast adjustment and levels...it was just that blue.

These two pictures look similar...but this was turned facing the other direction.

Do you know what these are?

Anyone?

Anyone?

Bueller?

They are snow poles.

Do you see those red ribbons?

Just imagine having that much snow to deal with.

Trail ridge road is only open a few months in the summer.

It's no wonder, huh?

Okay, SO, we did see some elk. Kind of.

In the center of this picture you see a whitish dot.

That's actually two bull elk sparring.

There's another lounging nearby, I won't make you play I Spy.

I would have loved to show them to you closer...but...

...that was as far as my camera could zoom.

We were actually looking at them from this distance.

See the yellow circle?

That's the elk.

The only reason we knew they were there was that by some

miracle someone spied them through the viewfinder thingy.

 

Someone remarked that there needed to be little oxygen vending machines around.

 

 

It was about this time that the ugly doll that lives

in my car decided he wanted his picture taken, too.

World traveler that he is.

 

Definitely on top of the world.

 

We stopped at the picnic ground here to eat our lunch.

 

Then took the trail around the lake.

 

Oh, look...there's that guy again.

I think he's following me.

 

Beeeee-u-tiful!

 

Well, after this we started down the mountain.

It was getting late and we wanted to do some walking

around the tourist town of Estes Park before heading home.

 

So here is a parting shot from Scrammy...he sends his love.

And wishes he weren't afraid of heights.

 

Did you enjoy this picture tour?

 

I know my photos are not all great...

but,

if you are interested in any of them for personal use,

please email me and I will be happy to send you a non-watermarked copy.

 

Have a great holiday weekend!

Go find some adventure!

 

©Kelly