Day-8 Jul-15-09

Up and up and up, that was the theme for today!

We left our hotel in Estes Park, and within a few miles we were at the entrance to the Rocky Mountain National Park. Trail Ridge Road runs through the park, and claims to be the highest continuous road in the US (there are higher roads, like Pike's Peak, and Mt. Evans, but the roads at each of those locations are dead ends). When we topped out, the GPS showing about 12,200 feet above sea level. The GPS has the ability to take screen snapshots, here is one while at the top of Trail Ridge Road...

Here is one more showing some of the tight switchbacks on the way...

The road is about 40 miles long within the park, with roughly 8 of those miles above 11,000 feet, so you are up there for quite a while. The temperature at hotel was about 80, while at the top of the park, the temperature was 51 !! I was surprised that there were still a lot of snow fields at the higher elevations. The snow in these spots appeared to still be several feet deep. It was also very windy in various places, which made keeping the bike in my own lane difficult at times. Oh yeah, the lack of guard rails, and extremely steep drops within a foot of the roads edge, help to keep you focused at keeping the bike on the road :)

While traveling through the park, we saw numerous animals, including a couple of wolves right along the roadside, and lots of elk.

Below are some photos from up in the park...

These first 2 are some of the wildlife we saw while driving to the top.

The photo below shows how much snow is still in the upper elevations. We saw a lot of people getting out of their cars and running through the snow fields.

At these elevations, you are also above the timberline. Note how the trees just stop when you get up this high.

Below is an example of how the road just drops away, with no guardrails in sight !

Almost forgot, you also cross the continental divide while in the park.

Lennie gets bored easily while in the back seat, so she tends to pictures of just about anything she sees. Below, she took a picture of the cockpit of big red while we were riding through the park.

After Rocky Mountain National Park, we traveled through Berthoud pass which hits just over 11,000 feet, and is the home to Winterpark ski resort.

We also crossed Loveland Pass, which hits just over 12,000, and is home to Arapaho Basin (A Basin), Keystone, and Copper Mountain ski resorts.

A-Basin has a peak which hits 13,050 feet, and is the highest commercially ski-able terrain in the US. I remember skiing here with my sister and brother-in-law (Sue and John).

Having skied all 4 of these areas, it was interesting to see the ski areas in the summer.

Enough for today, it's time to go out and get some dinner. The hotel desk told us about a great BBQ place just down the street... mmmmm BBQ !

Tomorrow we will head across Independence Pass which is home to Aspen ski resort, then travel over to Montrose CO, which will be our home for 2 nights.