Fun on Grand Lake

We took advantage of great weather, and the beautiful lake. We rented paddle boats and went out into the lake.A beautiful view of Mount Baldy from the middle of Grand Lake.

Andrew and Russ rented a kayak instead of paddle boats.


Andrew's favorite part of the trip was go karts. He's now asking for the keys to the car.....
We went back into RMNP during the evening. The elk are always easy to spot. We did see some moose, but didn't get any photos, as they went back into the brush quickly.

More vacation photos

We hiked to Adams Falls, which was on the far side of Grand Lake. It was a gorgeous hike. The falls were larger than I expected. This was Matt's favorite part of the trip ~ he likes waterfalls.

Beyond the falls is a meadow.

We went miniature golfing in town.

We stopped at the beach ~ the water is COLD! But it did have some sand to play in.
Took a hike and saw a deer.
This was the meadow past Adams Falls at sunset. We knew we would see some wildlife at dusk and we were right!

On the far side of the meadow was a bull moose!!! Just what we wanted to see. He saw us, so we didn't go any further. My camera is zoomed in all the way, so it's a little shaky. This might be the moose that ran some hikers up a tree and held them there for a half hour earlier in the week.

Rocky Mountain National Park

We drove into Rocky Mountain National Park. The road on the Grand Lake entrance was under construction, so some was gravel while they were re-paving the road. Some parts were down to one lane, and a pilot car would navigate a row of cars. When we went in the evening, the workers weren't there, so it was 2 lanes. We hiked in the valley that runs along the river.
Such green valleys and blue skies!


James liked climbing the big rocks.
We saw lots of elk ~ they were easy to spot every evening in the valley. Yes, the trees are brown and dead. The pine beetle has been destroying certain pine trees, so it changes the landscape. The beetles only eat a certain pine tree, and leave the rest. It's sad to see so many dead trees, but the forest is ever changing. The park ranger said it's allowing other plants to grow, that normally don't get as much sunlight. What will it look like in 50 years?
We drove further up the mountain. This is the valley from above. You can see the winding river. This isn't even close to the top of the mountain.

I'm back!

I'm back after being gone on vacation. I"ll have to sort through the photos and post some later. Here's the kids on the last day - it was cloudy that afternoon, but we had no rain while we were there. It was sunny skies and nice temps ~ great for moose hunting! :0)