Mount Ida

Mount Ida, at 12,880 feet, is a mild climb by RMNP standards. From Milner Pass it is about a 4 mile hike and a little over 2000 foot vertical gain.
We had heard that people get lost on Mount Ida, and there is a warning sign at the beginning of the trail on that. I brought my gps but didn’t really need it as it is a straight shot south with a final turn to the east to summit. There is a clear edge or ridge to the east that aids in route finding. If one were only going to the summit and back we didn’t understand how they could get lost as long as they had a compass or were not hiking in fog or at night. The land formations in every direction are very distinctive, so it’s imperative to familiarize oneself with those, as well as direction of travel, in order to make a successful return.

The woman the peak was named after, Ida Mae Ptarmigan, was lost back in the late 1800’s and spent the night up there. She survived the cold night and was brought back to safety the next day. She was a chamber maid at the former Alpine Lodge that was near Milner Pass and was known as a cheerful and considerate woman. She had been jilted at the altar by one of the Milner boys prior to this, but later married miner Joseph Baggets. They lived in his cabin along the Colorado River Trail. They never had any children. Ida Mae was a big woman, some say over 300 pounds, and Joe Baggets was just a mite of a man, but they lived many happy years together in the quiet solitude of the river cabin. Ida Mae never went up to Mount Ida again, even after they named it after her and even with Joe’s urging to revisit it. She said, “Once was enough” and preferred staying at home and baking. After she died in 1940 her ashes were spread on the top of Mount Ida, it took a team of mules to carry them up. She is now referred to as Twenty Mule Team Ida, although the exact number of mules used is disputed by some of the old timers. It was later discovered though that her wishes were to have her ashes spread on a hill overlooking her hometown of Whipping Post, Indiana. When it was suggested to Joe that her remains could be gathered and transported to her hometown, he simply replied, “No, once was enough.”

Ok, the story of Ida Mae is fiction, Kathy and I made it up. Forgive us. But we just thought there should be a story about Ida. We did climb the mountain though, and had wonderful views up there. Part of the way up we went with a backcountry staffer who caught up with us. She was from the east side and was only going up part way as she had to get to work later that day. She happened to be from Utica, NY, but came west as a young woman and spent many years in fantastic places like Santa Fe, Jackson Hole and now here. I made a point of telling her she has lived a fairytale life and she agreed. We had to climb over and around a few boulders, they may not have been as large as the state of Rhode Island but they were noticeable. The backcountry ranger we ran into the other day said there wasn’t a boulder field up there, but I guess it depends on how one defines “boulder field”. When we got to the top we saw a few alpine lakes just below the peak, and we enjoyed a mild mountain top experience with little wind even though we had some wind on the way up. We saw storm clouds building up in the distance around 1:00 PM and soon heard distant thunder so decided to move down quickly, getting back to the trailhead before 3:00 PM just as the rain was starting.

The picture is showing Long's Peak taken from the top of Mount Ida.

We also explored parts of a few trails “on top” in the alpine zone with three of our co-volunteers yesterday; the La Poudre River Trail and the Ute Trail. The Ute Trail is an ancient trail used by the Ute Indians that traverses east-west. Parts of it are now on Trail Ridge Road and the Old Fall River Road, We drove the Old Fall River Road also, it is now only open to one-way traffic (and no trailers) from early July until sometime in September when the snow starts to accumulate. The completion of the road in 1920 was the main impetus for the growth of guest ranches on the west side as it allowed for “easier” automobile travel to the west of the park. The road climbs over 3,000 feet in the nine miles that are left of the original route, is unpaved with many hairpin curves and is a very pleasant drive if you are not in a hurry. A section near the top was notorious for getting up to 30 foot drifts which made clearing it of snow an enormous task. Trail Ridge Road was built as a replacement, and completed in 1932. It is the highest continuous paved road in the country, cresting at 12,183 feet. It is part of US Highway 34 but is not open during the wintry months, as it is also a difficult task to keep clear of snow. My Uncle Sam remembers driving Trail Ridge Road in 1946 in his 1936 Model A Ford. The car and Uncle Sam made it, and he remembers being astounded by the views.

More things heard from Visitors:
1. “I saw a moose up on top.” Since moose don’t usually go up in the Alpine zone a few probing questions revealed that it was an elk.
2. “I saw bear scat.” A few probing questions then revealed that he saw pellets the size of pretzel nuggets. Elk.
3. “I saw a beaver.” Since we don’t have beaver on this side of the park, we suggested it was probably a marmot, they can be about the same size. Some marmots have bushy tails as the rp (reporting person) indicated, but they don’t have anything like beaver tails.
4. “Why are all the trees red?” This is another variation of the question about the dead lodgepole pines. They look reddish-brown, depending on how the light hits them.
5. “90% of the people who drive through the park (east-west - Trail Ridge Road) never even stop.” Ok, this was not said by a visitor but by one of the top park officials at a park-wide meeting. I found this hard to believe and questioned a seasoned volunteer and was told that 90% of the people driving through the park don’t go on a trail, but most probably stop at some point. I don’t want to pick on only the visitors, park officials can be confused too.

I don’t want to aid and abet the Ministry of Misinformation that seems to be active in all parks. I hope, other then the Ida story that I have provided correct information, but if I’ve been wrong anywhere I will be happy to correct it.

Other tidbits:
We met some people who owned property inside the park boundary when we were roving the other day. First we met the son who introduced himself as he was waiting for his parents, his sister, and his baby niece by the gate. We met the others as they were driving out and they were all very nice. The property has been in their family for four generations and they want to keep it. It includes a medium size cabin that is pretty old. They are called inholders, but I don’t think that word sounds very nice. All the people who used to have ranches on the west side of the park like the Holtzwarths, were considered inholders. There are only four or five inholdings here now.

There is a really neat surprise at the end of the Cut Rock trail in the Alpine zone off of Trail Ridge Road. The trail is only a half mile long and ends in a pile of rocks that can be easily climbed. When visitors ask us what there is to do on top we tell them to check this out and that when we stumbled on it we were pleasantly surprised. So far all five of those we told about it have wanted to keep it as a surprise too. But since you, poor reader, will probably not get to see this anytime soon, I will reveal what it is here. It is a fixed compass showing all the peaks and major land forms in a 360 degree radius. You simply line up the degree mark with your eye and below the mark is the name of the peak or landform you see in that direction. Very cool. That’s when we first confirmed where Long’s Peak was.

Lake of the Clouds Trip

We went on our second backpacking trip, this time to a campsite near Lake of the Clouds. We intended to hike up to the Lake of the Clouds and up nearby Lead Mountain but changed our plans after seeing what was involved with each. The lake sits at about 11,400 feet of elevation and Lead is over 12,500 feet. After setting up camp the first night, which was at 10,760 feet, we started hiking towards the lake but encountered a huge boulder field that went on forever. There were cairns that we followed but then lost them. As I looked around the boulder field it seemed like we were going through the longest section of it with the route we were taking. Kathy was doing a much better job at rock hopping but this was leg-breaking territory, and we looked for the fastest way out. Glad to be off the boulders, we got back to camp and made dinner at the small lake next to our camp, fighting mosquitoes the whole time. A t-storm and heavy rain hit us that night but we were already in our tent and were snug and dry.

The next day we decided to avoid the boulder field as we headed towards Lead Mountain. We skirted the field to the north, which was very easy going and worked our way up to the bottom of a saddle between Lead and an Unnamed mountain. We had been given directions by one of the rangers to go to the saddle, then follow a contour line around to a point where going to the top would be easier. The guide book said to follow the ridge line, which was a knife edge no wider than three feet in places, but the ranger said don’t attempt that. We went up a soft snow pack, which gave us pretty good footing, and got to the saddle. But we didn’t see any easy route on either side and the only feasible way seemed to be taking the ridge line, which looked scary. It was also a very gusty day and being on the narrow ridge didn’t seem like a good idea. The unnamed mountain however looked very easy in comparison, and was going to be almost as high as Lead. So we went up that and it was wonderful. Kathy decided to name it Consolation Peak. We had views in every direction, including great views of Lake of the Clouds, which showed to be a pristine alpine blue lake. We tarried up on top for a long time, and eventually followed a long ridge line that would take us in a big loop before returning to camp later that afternoon. At the end of the ridge, we noticed dark clouds forming, and thought it best to get down sooner rather than return back along the ridge. So we went down a fairly navigable route which eventually led us into a forest which was slow going but gave us better protection in case a t-storm developed. But one never did form the rest of the day.

We did explore what we thought was a better route up towards Lake of the Clouds that evening, but only got up part way. Even though we thought we had enough time to get up there, my tired legs told me to turn around. After talking with a few other rangers later we found out this would indeed have been a better route. While we were up higher, we saw a herd of three adult Bighorn sheep and three little ones. They grazed at a safe distance from us and we delighted in seeing how graceful the little ones were able to move on the steep slope and rocks.

Our hike out on the morning of the third day was pleasant and took us to some new territory. We were able to see Thunder Mountain very clearly, which we hope to do when we stay at the La Poudre Pass patrol cabin in the near future. We also had seen great views of La Poudre Pass and Long Draw Reservoir, which is where water from the Grand Ditch is directed to. We hiked along a part of the Grand Ditch, which takes about half the water from the headwaters of the Colorado River and delivers it to the eastern side of the Front Range where it ostensibly is used for agricultural use. But it turns out that golf courses are included with water rights, even though they have nothing to do with agriculture. The ditch and its water rights had been established before Rocky became a national park, although the ditch itself was not completed until the mid 1930’s. We came upon a Ditch Company camp of a couple buildings and assorted equipment. No one was around but we noticed a wooden carving of an eagle that had an inscription that said “Larry, 1951- 2010”. We don’t know who Larry was or what his connection to eagles was, but we will try to find out.

Returning down to the Colorado River Trail took us back to Lulu City, where we had been a week before on our of our roves. Lulu City was a short-lived mining town that is now a ghost town, with only a few remnants of cabins left. Today it is a series of beautiful meadows along the banks of the Colorado. It was largely deserted by 1883, less than five years after the first mining started there. Lulu as well as several other mining camps in what is now the park never produced much wealth from mining, which is why Rocky had a better chance to become a national park. Kathy says, “Usefulness protects itself, but you have to fight to protect beauty.” Where areas of mining succeeded in Colorado, they were given over easily to the mining interests. But it took a fight, largely fought by a man named Enos Mills, to protect Rocky and turn it into a national park in 1915.

Rocky has large areas of backcountry and wilderness, even outside the park boundary to the west and north. That is why wildlife is so abundant in the park, including elk, moose, black bear and mountain lion. We love to get into the backcountry, but we always pay a price with the skeeters. Sitting around the campsite at night is not pleasant, but as long as we minimize that we can tolerate them to some extent. T-storms are even a bigger concern, as they can kill you. Getting up on the peaks by noon and starting down by then is what is advised. Even after a storm, things dry up quickly and the relative low humidity makes being active easier. The last fews days have been drop dead gorgeous, with clear blue skies and no rain. But too many days like this will dry the forest out and raise the chance of a fire. There is a fire crew on this side of the park encamped up the road from us, they are currently working at clearing some dead trees. Their presence seems to indicate that the park is very concerned about the threat level of fire.

Moose Attack:
I was driving our motorized cart to transport some visitors from the Holzwarth site back to the parking area when I saw a group of people ahead watching a moose cross the road. I pulled up to warn them to stay back as moose are known for sudden attacks and they can move at 35 mph. About 20 or 25 feet away another larger moose suddenly appeared and rushed at the smaller one. Woah Nellie! Lemme outta here! I drove on and everyone had backed off and fortunately the moose both moved away. The younger moose was probably a yearling and the bigger one may have been it’s Mama telling her offspring it was time to leave and start her own life. Many animals will do the same thing when it’s time for their young to move on.

Things Heard from Visitors here at RMNP:
1. Are there any animals in the woods?
2. I noticed there are two buildings at the Alpine Visitor Center and one has big logs supporting the roof and one doesn’t. Doesn’t the park care whether the one building can withstand the heavy snow?
3. When do the elk turn into moose?
4. What happened to all the trees? Are they dead? (explanation: many of the lodgepole pines are dead from a pine beetle infestation and yes, they look very dead and will eventually fall or burn if a forest fire starts)

As an added note, we learn a lot from the visitors too. They often have knowledge of things we know little of or have experiences they like to relate that benefit us. When that happens, I am grateful.


News and Notes:
1. We often get ‘the look’ when we drive in or out of the Holzwarth Historic Site where our cabin is. Visitors often don’t realize that vehicles can drive the road (past a locked gate) or they don’t know there are a few of us that live there. They give us a long stare or perturbed look and we just smile and wave.
2. “Why did you leave me in the ditch?” “Because I thought you were dead!” This was a conversation our co-volunteer Gater related to us that took place between him and his cousin when they were kids. More to the story: Gater and his cousin used to try to run each other into the ditch while riding bikes. Upon succeeding at that, his cousin hit his head on an abutment and was knocked out. Gater also covered him with leaves before leaving him there. Reminiscences and other musings are shared every Saturday night during our weekly “recovery get-together”.
3. The weather forecasts are difficult to rely on, as it is mountain weather and it can turn stormy any time. Isolated t-storms, hail, downpours, sprinkles or even snow up higher can occur. Typically there is a buildup of clouds during the day from the moisture given off by the forest, and when they reach the breaking point they may burst and drop rain down on us later in the day. But whether they produce rain or not is more difficult to predict than a front carrying storm clouds that may move in.
4. We had to show our id at first to get through the entrance station, but they all seem to recognize us now. We went through the other night and I told the young attendant that I was Johnny Holzwarth and lived up the road. Somehow she knew I was kidding.
5. A cyclist was hit by a truck the other day and broke his collarbone. Two bystanders of the accident had different accounts of it, one said it was the cyclist’s fault and the other said it was the trucker’s fault. Oh well, people’s perception of the same event can vary. We always pay careful attention to traffic coming up behind us when cycling, and wear screaming yellow shirts so we are very visible.
6. A hiker died on Longs Peak on Thursday from a fall. There were vicious winds on top and it is believed he may have been blown off the peak. He had been hiking alone, his brother had been waiting down below at a campground. Our hearts go out to the family. An average of one hiker dies a year on Longs, during bad weather it can be treacherous. When we try to climb it at the end of August we hope for good weather, otherwise we will turn back, promise.

Finally, Some Major Hiking!

We went on a backpacking trip into the backcountry for three days and two nights when we had time off last week. Despite the mosquitoes (we were warned) and rain the second night, it was a great trip. Going up the North Inlet Trail for 8 miles, we turned onto the Lake Nanita Trail and camped at the last campsite, about 3 miles below the lake. Even though we got in early in the evening, I was tired and went to bed a little after 7 PM and conked out. The skeeters were making themselves noticeable. I got up briefly later but returned to bed and managed to stay in it for almost 13 hours total! But the next day I made up for my slothful ways and we hiked about 20 miles, reaching the top of Flattop Mountain where we had great views all around, and saw Longs Peak as close up as we had to date. We tarried up there a little bit, and was also drawn to Hallett Peak, which rose above Flattop. But we wanted to get to Lake Nanita so we didn’t attempt Hallett this time, will do it another time. To our surprise, Flattop didn’t have it’s own peak, it was actually just a large flat area below Hallett. After getting back to our campsite, we packed our stove and some dinner and hiked up to Lake Nanita where we enjoyed the splendid solitude of a high alpine lake, it is over 11,000 feet high. The lake is supposed to be a good fishing lake, but we didn’t have either equipment or a license. We also passed Lake Nonika on the way, another beautiful alpine lake but smaller. On the way back down after finishing dinner, we got caught in a thunder storm with a good soaking rain. Sometimes the lightning was too close for comfort but we were among trees and getting further down as we hiked. At least the rain kept the skeeters away.

We met a trail crew during our backpack made up of volunteers with the CDTA (Continental Divide Trail Alliance) and a NPS trail ranger. We saw them going up to Flattop and after we got back down. They told us that a black bear had gotten into their campsite the previous night while they were trying to eat and they had to try 5 times to scare it away before it would leave. The bear was able to grab some food, not good when bears eat people food. One of our fellow volunteers saw the trail crew a couple days later and was told that the bear had gone into a tent, really not good. We weren’t sure if that was the same night they told us about or another night. We were fortunate that the bear didn’t come into our campsite either night.

We had worked six straight days before this trip, so it was a welcome reprieve for us. Two of the days had been training, including First Aid and CPR/AED. We hope we don’t have to use our CPR training while here at the park, but if we do encounter someone needing it we hope we can help. If we ever radio a problem in to dispatch, we have to use the terms ‘cardiac arrest’ if their heart is not beating or ‘chest pains’ if they are conscious and complaining of that, but we’re not to call either a ‘heart attack’. But the # 1 cause of death in the back country is not from heart problems, but allergic attacks. They usually need an epi needle, which we were trained to administer, using a phony needle.

The hike that really knocked us for a loop was Baker Mountain which is in the Neversummer range. We did it yesterday, July 6 and are in recovery mode today. It is a little over 12,000 feet of elevation, and is in our back yard; we could start the hike right from our cabin. There is no trail up the peak, but we got directions from one of the rangers on going up through a cut. It was about 2000 feet up from where we started the last climb, but was little more than a mile, making it very steep. The top was a big boulder pile, so we scrambled hand over hand to reach it. But it was very mild when we summitted and we had great views. There were clouds over other peaks but not over Baker. Coming down didn’t take as long, and using the two pole method worked well. We got back to our cabin after 7:00, and with the best intentions of getting to a ranger program at 9:00, but we were unable to move much after dinner and called it a day.

A few other items of note:
- A hummingbird poked his beak into our neighbor Cliff’s ear the other day. We have green headed hummingbirds swarming around the ranch.
- The elk that were grazing in great numbers in the meadow near us have now moved up to higher ground. They will come back down in the fall.
- I just read a novel “Bob Flame, Rocky Mountain Ranger” written by Doerr Yeager, who was a ranger himself. It takes place in the 1930’s and provides a good look at a ranger’s life back then.
- A week ago we met a young couple who were music teachers when we were roving. They had a white Subaru Outback, with a silver cargo box on top, and a bike rack in back. It looked almost identical to our rig, with a New York license. We parked them next to each other and took pictures.
- We went to Fireworks display for the Fourth of July in Grand Lake. They attract thousands of people, so parking and driving in town is a big problem then. We parked our car at the Visitor Center in the park and hiked down two miles on park trails to get there and back.

Bits and bytes

We met two Indian guys in the gondola at Telluride. They told us they were musicians and that Allison Krauss had asked them to come up and hang out. The one guy did most of the talking, He also told us to watch out for a group he had just formed, Bad Medicine. Bob Dylan, who he said controls Capitol Records, was going to sign them to a contract. He also said he was breeding his friend with the good teeth with horses. Maybe they were kidding us, but I will give them the benefit of the doubt and check to see if their band ever emerges.

We watched a Friday evening wrangler show where one of the seasonal rangers performed as though he were one of the old wranglers who worked at the Holzwarth ranch. He spun some tall tales that had us laughing, led some singalongs and let the kids roast marshmallows, Kathy joined in with that. She made two of the most perfect golden marshmallows, I ate one.

When we were giving a tour at the Holzwarth ranch, a 93 year old woman named Velma came to visit. Her son Fred accompanied her. She had known Julia Holzworth in Denver and had met Mama. She had never been to the ranch before but was thrilled to be there and we were thrilled to have her. She reminisced with us about what she knew about the Holzwarths and we gave her a special tour of the Mama cabin. She hadn’t planned on coming back to the ranch but as her son was driving her through the park, she noticed the sign and asked her son to pull in. How serendipitous.

Fun Things:
Learned from our southern friends here at Rocky:
- Y’all is used when addressing one person and ALL Y’all is used when addressing more than one.
- WAD UP!! Means gather round.
Elk jams or moose jams are when cars and people are congested around a sighting, often with cars blocking the road, sometimes with doors hung open into the road. The park tries to clear these out when they get too bad.
Not only were two young women standing way too close to Adams Falls on a slippery wet rock, then they decided to lean way over like they were about to take the plunge. Yikes! That’s when I yelled at them.
After explaining how moose sightings happen sporadically in the park and you never know when you might see them, a young woman asked me if she would see a moose if she walked up the trail we were standing by. Maybe I didn’t do a good job explaining the subject. So then I told her and her guy that the moose don’t let the park in on their schedules, he got it and laughed, she remained way too serious.
OK, will pick on a guy now. His name probably wasn’t Billy Bob because he was driving a car from New York. He was seen waving a gun around, maybe before driving into the park, anyways they were looking for him. Not sure what the outcome was but they had a good description of his vehicle and determined it was a rental from New Jersey. I only hope they gave him what was coming to him. These yokels may think that now that guns are allowed into national parks (what a dumb law!) they can do whatever they want with their guns. But they can’t fire them, or wave them around, or threaten anyone with them.


Interesting facts about Rocky Mountain N.P.
About 1/3 of the park is above tree line, which occurs around 11,400 feet. Much of it is tundra, which is rare in the lower 48.

The source of the Colorado River is found here, about ten miles from where we live at Holzwarth ranch.

Trail Ridge Road, which crosses the park east-west, is the highest continuous paved road in the U.S. It gets above 12,000 feet.

Completed Training, Telluride and Black Canyon

We have just completed our training at RMNP, concluding with First Aid and CPR/AEd today. We start our work tomorrow, giving tours of the Holzwarth Historic Site. There is a lot to know about the place and the intriguing story of the Holzwarth family, wish us well. Their story is one of hardship, opportunity, dreams, conflict and perseverance. It should be a lot of fun to tell this story to the vistors who take the time to stop and learn the story.

Prior to this we had just traveled to Telluride for the annual Bluegrass Festival, hooking up with Katherine, Ben and Andy, Ben's friend who also had his son and parents there. It was a great weekend, wonderful weather and music, and they push the boundaries there with the music, much of it is newgrass and beyond. Performers like Sam Bush, Yonder Mountain, Bela Fleck, Mumford & Sons and Edward Sharpe were some of the ones who delighted us.

Since our coordinator Liz gave us some extra time off, we were also able to fit in a visit to the Black Canyon of the Gunnison. This is an amazing canyon, about two thousand feet down on average, carved by the Gunnison River. To experience the canyon best, we hiked down to the bottom on the Gunnison trail, a trail that drops 1800 feet in one mile. I should describe it more of a climb than a hike. It was comparable to the Lava Falls trail that almost killed us at the Grand Canyon last year, but without the scree which made it that much better. It was wonderful down by the river, we were able to hang out there for a while, hoping to see some kayakers who sometimes get that far in, but didn't see any. We met a young student ranger on the way back up, who told us that sometimes people will haul their kayaks down that trail to the river, amazing. We were able to get to Sunset Point the night before just in time for a great sunset, which is shown in the picture.

We already feel like so much a part of the park and the people who work here, although we have barely scratched the surface of all that the park has to offer. we did get up to the high country one night last week with Katherine, this time getting some great views. But at 12,000 feet, I coluld tell the air was thin! A flat topped mountain stood out, and it turned out to be Long's Peak, looking very different from the west. We have booked two backcountry trips, one next week on the west side here and one at the end of August to Long's Peak, which should be the ideal time to be there. Some good advice from our backcountry office has us doing these trips in optimal ways, but we shall see how they go.

The First Week in Rocky Mountain N.P.

Rocky Mountain National Park – we made it! Coming down from the ‘back side, from the west, we saw the magnificent snow-covered Rockies plus some other mountain ranges to the west and the south, I guess they must all be the Rockies. After getting supplies in Granby, we contacted our volunteer coordinator Liz, who met us at the Kawuneeche Visitor Center and gave us a warm welcome and then took us up to the Holzwarth historic site where we settled in to our new home, the Tivoli cabin, a 4 room cabin with full bath, partial kitchen, and heated by either space heaters or wood stove. There is plenty of wood left for us, but so far we have been getting by with the space heaters. We learned that last year was much colder at this time, and we were rather glad that although our cabin is at almost 9000 feet of elevation, it has been free of snow and warm enough. The temperatures can dip down into the thirties at night in the summer.

Our first full day here was spent exploring our immediate surroundings. A service road goes through the historic site, hereby referred to as the ranch, so we took it up to where it met the Grand Ditch, which is a water supply for the Ft. Collins area. We were at over 10,000 feet when we met the ditch, and had stunning views of the Neversummer Mountains. Many of them reach heights greater than 12,000 feet. We were following ‘cat tracks’ up the road, and after following the ditch for a while we came upon the ‘cat’ itself, a front loader Deere so not a cat at all. It was used in clearing the ditch from snow. Apparently back in 2003, the Grand Ditch Co. failed to clear the snow properly and it caused major breach that almost wiped out the historic Holzwarth site. Yikes! They were able to save it with some quick diversion work. I also had 3 bars on my cell phone up there, but get only 2 around the ‘ranch’, and reception here is spotty. But you can’t expect all the luxuries you want in paradise.

We are taking training with about 25 other new volunteers and interns. There are a little over one hundred volunteers who will work in the west side of RMNP, also known as the Colorado River District of the park. Over the next two weeks we will be joined by many other returning volunteers who will participate in more training with us, including First Aid and CPR/AED, which we had taken before but need to get refreshed on. Our first day was a general tour of the west side and Grand Lake, the community that serves as the gateway to this side of the park. Estes Park serves as the gateway to the east side of the park, or referred to as the ‘other side’ by the west siders.

We didn’t complete the tour however, as before we could get up to the ‘real high country’ and the Alpine Visitor Center, we learned that our access to the ranch (and our home) was being threatened by the surging Colorado River. So we were ushered down to the Resource Protection unit (also Law Enforcement), and had a discussion with Head Ranger Mark, who informed us that the bridge leading into the ranch could be wiped out if debris got caught at the bridge, and he thought it was safest if we evacuated and stayed somewhere else until it was clear whether the bridge had survived or not! This was happening on our second day in the park! We were told that this is very unusual, the Colorado had never threatened this newer bridge, although previous bridges had been lost, including a few of the Holzwarth’s bridges. But there was another way out in case the bridge got wiped out, a couple miles to the south another bridge crosses the river which was built higher and would not likely be wiped out by the raging waters of the river, and if we could access that, we had an escape route. Kathy and I told Mark that we could hike out at through this bridge if need be, and I suggested that by leaving our car on the other side of the river, we could at least have use of the car in case the bridge went. So instead of evacuating, we have stayed the last week in our cabin, leaving our car on the other side of the river.

The bridge has held, thankfully. We have now spent the last week keeping our car on the other side of the river and walking in to our cabin.

Friday June 11 had been a long day, we had gotten up especially early (for us) and went on a tour of the east side under cloudy skies, taking Trail Ridge Road. Normally there would be fantastic views, the road goes up to over 12,000 feet in elevation. But the only good view we got was on the way back at the Many Parks Overlook, which was down further on the east side. We did enjoy our time at the backcountry office there, hearing Ranger Barry give us a motivational speech about the renewing qualities of our national parks. He reminded us of the dual mission on the parks, how we have to protect our parks and provide for the interests of the visitors, which can be a fine balance sometime. Thankfully Trail Ridge Road was still open for our trip back to the west side, but it closed the next day due to snow.

Considering how worse it could be if the bridge went out, it hasn’t been too bad except for Friday night when we got back from doing our laundry and shopping at 9:00 PM, expecting to walk the half mile into our cabin under the fading twilight. As we were preparing to head in, flash! Boom! Lightning struck, and nearby, this is not good. So we waited the better part of an hour for the storm to abate. It seems that whenever we thought it was clearing up, lightning struck again. We finally walked in under pitch black skies and no light, until after crossing the bridge when I remembered I had a small light on my keychain which helped for the rest of the way in. Lessons learned: the weather is unpredictable in the mountains so be ready for anything and always make sure you have a good light. As of Monday, June 14 the access to the ranch is open again, yippee! No more waiting for storms to abate just to get to our car!

I had to take a trip in to the Denver airport on Saturday to pick up my daughter Katherine and son Ben. It takes about two and a half hours from the west side to get there, and requires going through Berthoud Pass on US 40, which can be dicey in bad weather. There was mixed precipitation on my trip into Denver, and the many twists and curves made it slow going. But I got to the airport in plenty of time, we delivered Ben to Boulder where he met up with some of his buddies and stayed with some of them for dinner. Then I had another disagreement with my gps as it told me it would only takes two hours to get back to Grand Lake, and not until we were heading out of Boulder did I realize that she expected us to go up to Estes Park and through the park on Trail Ridge Road, which was closed. So it ended taking more like three hours to get back, again going through Berthoud Pass. This time it wasn’t precipitating, but it was foggy, and only because I could follow the lights of a vehicle ahead of me did I feel safe enough driving it. So traveling to the Denver area is always going to involve potentially treacherous driving, any time of year and I’m trying to get my head around the fact that road closings will be a way of life out here.

We have just scratched the surface on the hiking available here. We have also gone up the Colorado River Trail a few times, once with one of our rangers who showed us some historic sites of old miner cabins and an old mine. We also went to the lookout on Shadow Mountain with a group of fellow volunteers and had great views of the surrounding scenery with the lakes, the town of Grand Lake and surrounding mountains. We have talked with a few of the backcountry rangers and are planning on doing some backpacking soon, stay tuned!

Grand Teton

Poor Jackson, Wyoming. They have been getting lots of rain all spring, and so has the Grand Tetons, which are near by. But the guy in the outdoor store said they really need the rain because they didn’t get the moisture in the snow this past winter. So let it rain, and we decided not to camp, as we had in Yellowstone, staying at the Jackson Lake Lodge the first night and The Hostel in Tepee Village the second night. We were able to pull off one amazing hike, despite the dire weather forecast. We stopped in the ranger station at Jenny Lake and told the ranger we wanted a hike that would get us up close to the peaks in the Tetons. He suggested two hikes, Cascade Canyon and Death Canyon, we didn’t like the sound of the latter so we went with Cascade Canyon.

We walked around Jenny Lake and then started up the canyon on the other side. There were several other hikers because a boat ride could get one across the lake. There was a short but steep hike up to Inspiration Point which gave a sweeping view of Jenny Lake and mountains to the east. We eventually got up to just below the Grand Teton itself, walking on a soft snow pack as we got up higher. A cute ranger coming down the trail warned us to watch for pools of water below the snow pack as we got up higher near the junction. We reached the junction with no mishaps, then thanks to a suggestion from some other hikers we went a little further on the right fork and got another wonderful view of the Grand Teton from a bridge. We got back down just in time for the last boat shuttle across the lake at 6:00, saving us only 2 miles of hiking but after hiking on so much soft snow my legs (but not Kathy’s) were ready for a rest. It started raining soon after we got to the car, phew dodged the bad weather that day.

We drove down the park road to Tepee Village, seeing a lone moose on the way and checked into the hostel. The only reasonably priced restaurant in town according to our host was the Mangy Moose which gave us an excellent meal, especially the artichoke dip, which we took for leftovers. The next morning we went up to the Laurence Rockefeller Preserve and walked a trail in the rain. Along the way we met a nice guy from NY who had been doing almost the same trip we had, but spending more time at each place and camping, He was getting tired of the gray skies and rain and was heading to sunnier skies. I give him credit though for toughing it out as long as he did. We also saw a mother moose with a calf, not far off the trail. A ranger told Kathy later that the mother positioned her and the baby so their backs were to the creek and they wouldn’t be surprised from behind, but she could keep on eye on us hikers on the trail. These animals are smart.

We spent the rest of the rainy day in the city of Jackson, also called Jackson Hole. The hole means a valley, as it is surrounded by mountains on both sides. We spent a good bit of time in the Teton Outdoor store and each bought a new lightweight Big Agnes sleeping pad to replace our heavier Thermarests, and Kathy bought a new backpack, I hope she likes it, it’s the third one she’s bought in the last three years! I’m using one of her old packs.

I had a disagreement with our auto GPS (named Octavia) on which way to go to Granby, Co, where we would prepare for our arrival at Rocky Mountain National Park (hereafter referred to as RMNP). Octavia had us traveling back up north for 30 miles before heading east, which seemed wrong but I let her have her way. It was a nice drive through the Absaroca Mountains though and we spent our last night in a cheap motel in Wyoming before reaching Colorado on schedule, Saturday June 5.