Our first day - we camped at the North end of the park and got in a sunset hike before listening to the Ranger talks. (I haven't mentioned Ranger talks since they aren't something you photograph - but they are one of my favorite parts about national parks. Sometimes they are designed for kids - but I haven't been to one talk where I didn't learn something new about the area. We heard several talks this trip, from the formation of the Sand Dunes and rocks, to interactions between the raven & wolf, and native american use & beliefs of the land).
But we hiked along a lake and some beautiful ponds - where we spotted 4 Moose bathing in the lake... Here's an interpretive picture of one...
Okay - they were too far away to make a good picture :)
But this picture of a bear turned out... it's baby cub is in front of it playing in the bushes. This is another very dangerous situation - Moma Bears with babies are nothing to mess with!
The next day we took a bigger hike into a canyon in between two of the mountains... we took a ferry across Lake Jenny to save us some time... It was really a fun hike because I had done this hike with my Mom, brother & sister when I was 8 or so. We had started together - but the hike was really difficult for me - so my mom and sister were hanging with me but my brother ran up ahead. It turns out that I wasn't going to make it to the look out point, and we took a wrong turn and went to a waterfall instead of the original destination of look out point.
Here is the waterfall we had stopped at - with Paul in front this time...
On the way back down from the trip years ago, since there was no more going up for me at that time, my mom, sister and I ran into so many people that said "Oh - you must be the family that is lost - we met your son and he said you were lost and didn't know where you were." So my little brother told everyone we were lost - when in reality we just had picked an alternate route... it was pretty funny - we meet him back at the ferry at the bottom... looking at the picture below one can see that the trail gets a little more difficult - I'm actually not convinced even my brother made it to the top...
But the lookout at the top of the trail wasn't the beautiful spot - it was the trail going into the canyon the next 4 miles. We didn't make it the whole way in because we started the trail late - but it was definitely the best trail of the trip!
After hiking as long as we thought we could with making it back to camp safely before sundown - we turned around... it was sad to leave what we knew would only be more beautiful views - but stumbling through the darkness wasn't an exciting idea either. And it was at this point that we couldn't hitch a ride with the ferry that took us out, and would half to hike the two extra miles around the lake. The lake trail was still gorgeous - but we really love being in the mountains!
Above is the view near the end of the trail and close to our campsite - when we got back our feet were so soar that we went to soak them in the lake. Since it is all snow melt from the mountains it was nice and cool... so nice - that ankle deep wasn't enough so we dove in for a refreshing twilight swim just as the stars were coming out! It was a fantastic evening!
1 comment:
Awesome pictures guys! Sounds like a fun trip ... I think I might have to add it to the list. I've always wanted to do a national park tour of the US. Must've been wicked!
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