Channel Mike

Friday was a mixture of good and bad, but turned out to be a day with many memories made. That's good. Rather than try to see how many miles we could put away, we took the opportunity to explore Rocky Mountain National Park. We intended to visit on the way to Utah, but settled for seeing it now. We also were able to take a bike ride in Frisco Friday morning that was very nice. I remember why I love the mountains so much.

Friday morning seemed pretty rough when we started out. Everyone in the room was awake around 5:15am. Emma woke up and came over into the bed with Audrey and me. Jak was sleeping in the window. So I moved over to take the empty bed. Jak then got upset and started into the bad attitude. I didn't know it until the afternoon that he was upset that I took his spot in the bed. By 5:30, everyone was back asleep and they slept until after 8:00. Nice. We then had breakfast at the hotel and left by 9:30.

I was tempted to get on the road and drive all day to Kansas City or St Louis, but Jak was being very good and he really really really wanted to go to the Rocky Mountains. He also really really really wanted to ride his bike in the mountains. I wanted to see the Rockies, too; and I thought a bike ride might put everyone in a good mood for the drive. So I caved and took them around the corner to a paved bike path that went all the way around Dillon Reservoir, to Breckenridge, to Dillon, and back to Frisco. We didn't ride the whole thing, but what a cool atmosphere. There were quite a few people riding bikes all over. People were walking dogs. There were older people, younger people, kids in strollers, and most of them very nice. While riding, we saw ducks in the reservoir; we saw chipmunks crossing the trail. There were trees everywhere, and all with a backdrop of mountains in every direction. There were wild flowers between the trees in purple, yellow, and red. We passed a beaver lodge as we crossed a bridge. It was a fantastic diversion and all of us enjoyed the ride.

From Frisco, we headed east on I-70 for a little ways, then north on 40 through Winter Park, Fraser, and Granby and on to the national park. The drive was cool. The climate was my favorite, green pine trees and steep massive mountains. If I could pick any ecosystem to live out the rest of my life with no other considerations, it would be the pine tree covered mountains. Even with so many of the trees brown from pine bark beetle damage, everything was incredible. We had the windows open sniffing the pine scented air and Audrey and Emma giggled as the wind ruffled and ballooned their blankets.

We entered the park through the south-western route, stopping at the Kawuneeche visitor center. The visitor's center was on a site with a running stream and trees. The kids had as much fun running around outside of it as they did anywhere else in the park. After Jak set up a small bridge over the creek made of three small logs, Emma crossed it and Audrey stepped in up to her knee. She didn't complain and by the end of the day, she had dried out. The trees were spaced far enough apart that kids could all run through them. There was no underbrush. And until Emma fell and scraped her knee, we had a great time exploring.

We continued into the park and stopped at the Alpine Visitor's Center for lunch. There was a trail there, the Alpine Ridge Trail, that was sort of like stairs that went to the top of the unnamed mountain. The entire thing was above the tree line and we found ourselves struggling to get enough air as we hiked the trail. Emma fell and skinned her knee again. Same knee, different spot, one more band-aid. About half-way up, she fell off of the edge and fell on her chin and chest. She cried as I carried her the rest of the way up the trail to the top. Audrey kept asking for me to carry her, too, but that didn't happen. She hiked and worked and did a great job for a tired kid. We got to the top and could see mountains for as far as we could see. Range after range melted into the distance in every direction. We continued on down/across to the other side of the mountain where we could see a group of elk grazing. It was getting cold and Emma was nuzzling into me for warmth, so we turned back to head back to the visitors center. Audrey was stopping about every 20 yards to take a rest so it took us quite a while to make it back. By the time we were within about 50 yards of the parking lot, Audrey fell off of a log she was balancing on and scraped her knee, too. At this point, I was able to put Emma down and carry Audrey the rest of the distance to the car. After fighting everyone through the restrooms, we were on our way again. This time, it was to the end of the road and Bear Lake where a short hike around the lake was waiting for us.

Audrey and Emma both fell asleep for this drive, and I think Jak slept a little, too; it's so hard to tell with his winter hat over his eyes. We saw a couple of foxes running through a meadow on the way. We kept our eyes peeled for bears, but didn't see any all day. We were able to see quite a few elk. just a couple of deer, some interesting birds, and the two foxes. We arrived at the Bear Lake trailhead at about 4:30pm and before we got 100 yards down the trail, both girls were asking for me to carry them. I refused firmly and Jak worked his heart out getting them excited about the hike. They responded well and had a wonderful time as we took nearly two hours to complete the 0.6 mile loop around the lake. I'm certain that everyone hiked at least two miles as they climbed off the trail one way, off the trail the other way, up a rock here, and down to the lakeshore there. Even with their nonstop chatter, things were pretty peaceful. We could hear birds in the trees and chase birds and chipmunks around. There was a mother duck with ducklings following her around that stole Audrey's heart. As we were finishing our hike, it was starting to sprinkle. The rain drops left an interesting texture all across the lake as small rings formed in a random pattern. Is that an oxymoron? Perhaps there was no pattern, just random rings growing out from the raindrops' impacts. Cool whatever you call it.

We were able to eat dinner at Chipotle in Longmont, which kept Jak and me happy. Emma ended up dumping rice and cheese over her head and all over the floor. I didn't see exactly how she did it, but after the standard lecture about not using hands, then after seeing them eat out of their bowl like a trough, giving them the modified lecture about using a fork, I turned around. I turned back and half her dinner was on the floor, some of it in her hair. The bowl with some of her food still in it, was still on the table, so I have yet to come up with a hypothesis about how she actually pulled it off. However she did it, she and Audrey thought it was masterful and were both laughing through most of dinner.

We had little luck finding a hotel in Denver. I won't elaborate because it's boring and miserable, but we ended up finding a place to stay in Aurora, just east of Denver. We're all now settled in and preparing for a long drive to St Louis tomorrow.