Wednesday, August 18, 2010
Sunday, August 15, 2010
Day 3 - Arapaho National Forest - Cascade Falls
On our third full day in the park, we hiked in the Arapaho National Forest (Indian Peaks Wilderness). It's a very beautiful area, and pretty devoid of people. I actually didn't take very many photos that day, not because the hike was terribly difficult (although it definitely did have its moments), but because I was far too busy freaking out about all the bears that I knew were hiding in the forest, waiting to jump out at me.
This may come as a surprise, but I have a few phobias. (This is where you should politely feign surprise.) Bears tend to rank pretty high on that list of phobias when I'm in bear country. Aaron was so happy to be in the mountains he didn't even complain about my proactive bear warning system, which included singing "99 bottles of beer on the wall" all the way down to 30-something bottles of beer, and whistling a little tune over and over on the emergency whistle (not terribly loudly, lest you think I'm a complete nature jerk).
The morning before we headed out to Arapaho, I was reading an outdoor magazine that had been lying around the condo. There was an article that discussed how important it is to not wear a lot of strong smelling personal products before heading for a wilderness hike, because it would surely warn the animals (which have keen senses of smell, of course) that you're headed their way, causing them to avoid you-- the wilderness seeker. The article went on to recommend abstaining from showers to that same end. This seemed like perfect common sense for someone who might want to actually encounter, say, a bear. Therefore, I took a shower with triple soap, layered on multiple smelly shampoos and conditioners, and even made sure to wear some hair spray.
Just to be clear, I completely attribute my lack of bear incidents on this trip to daily showering, extraordinarily high levels of personal hygiene, and lots of annoying whistling.
(I would also like to note that the evening after this invisible bear-infested hike, I downloaded a peer-reviewed journal article concerning the effectiveness of various bear repellents, including annoying whistles. They were not found to be very effective. However, I think my scientific study of this phenomenon entirely disproves their finding.)
It also turns out that yellow-bellied marmots are extremely attracted to strong hair spray and meticulous personal hygiene, because we saw three. They were pretty nifty... they looked like a cross between a woodchuck and a badger. In fact, at first, I was convinced they were badgers (having never actually seen a badger, this seemed very reasonable). I had to do some impromptu googling that evening before we figured out what the heck they really were. Here are a couple of pictures:
Here are a few more photos from the day's hike. ...If you look carefully, I'm sure you can see the small army of bears that stalked us through the woods.
This may come as a surprise, but I have a few phobias. (This is where you should politely feign surprise.) Bears tend to rank pretty high on that list of phobias when I'm in bear country. Aaron was so happy to be in the mountains he didn't even complain about my proactive bear warning system, which included singing "99 bottles of beer on the wall" all the way down to 30-something bottles of beer, and whistling a little tune over and over on the emergency whistle (not terribly loudly, lest you think I'm a complete nature jerk).
The morning before we headed out to Arapaho, I was reading an outdoor magazine that had been lying around the condo. There was an article that discussed how important it is to not wear a lot of strong smelling personal products before heading for a wilderness hike, because it would surely warn the animals (which have keen senses of smell, of course) that you're headed their way, causing them to avoid you-- the wilderness seeker. The article went on to recommend abstaining from showers to that same end. This seemed like perfect common sense for someone who might want to actually encounter, say, a bear. Therefore, I took a shower with triple soap, layered on multiple smelly shampoos and conditioners, and even made sure to wear some hair spray.
Just to be clear, I completely attribute my lack of bear incidents on this trip to daily showering, extraordinarily high levels of personal hygiene, and lots of annoying whistling.
(I would also like to note that the evening after this invisible bear-infested hike, I downloaded a peer-reviewed journal article concerning the effectiveness of various bear repellents, including annoying whistles. They were not found to be very effective. However, I think my scientific study of this phenomenon entirely disproves their finding.)
It also turns out that yellow-bellied marmots are extremely attracted to strong hair spray and meticulous personal hygiene, because we saw three. They were pretty nifty... they looked like a cross between a woodchuck and a badger. In fact, at first, I was convinced they were badgers (having never actually seen a badger, this seemed very reasonable). I had to do some impromptu googling that evening before we figured out what the heck they really were. Here are a couple of pictures:
Here are a few more photos from the day's hike. ...If you look carefully, I'm sure you can see the small army of bears that stalked us through the woods.
RMNP Day 1 & 2 - Cub Lake and East Inlet trails
We've made it back to Lawrence safely, so now it's time to post some pictures from the mountains. What a great vacation!!!
We got into the park last Sunday, after staying the night in Denver on Saturday. We came in through the Loveland Pass, which we hadn't seen before (quite the sight for two civil engineers!). What an unbelievable cut through the mountains. We prefer staying on the far west side of the park because the crowds tend to congregate on the east side, in Estes Park. So, we drove through the park on Trail Ridge Rd (which, by the way, is the highest highway in the US - pretty cool, unless you're completely freaked out by heights, as I am) to get to Grand Lake, CO Sunday afternoon. We made a few stops to do some short hikes... here's our stop at the Cub Lake trail. Ceci was pretty excited about (1) being let out of the car and (2) being let out of the car to play by a river.
The first full day that we were in CO, we did a portion of the East Inlet trail, which is still my favorite trail in RMNP to date. I'm pretty sure the trail crosses the continental divide to go all the way across to the east side of the park, however, I in no way lay claim to being able to accomplish that at any point, and our hiking expectations were considerably lower this year with a 25-lb Ceci strapped to Aaron's back. Aaron and I hiked a decent stretch of it a few years ago in the rain, and I thought that it was one of the prettiest trails I've ever been on. It follows the East Inlet river of Grand Lake all the way up through Mt. Craig.
We were actually doing pretty well on the hike... Aaron got some trout fishing in, Ceci was being mostly cooperative, and then I noticed that half of Aaron's fly rod had fallen out the back of his pack where it had been jammed. So, all hiking ceased, and it became a "search for the stupid fly rod" mission. We didn't find it after combing a good portion of the trail twice, and finally gave up as Ceci's patience deteriorated. I figured Aaron would be getting a new fly rod that evening. But then he went back and did the hike again that afternoon while Ceci was napping and found it! Yay!!! So all was not lost. There definitely would have been a new rod purchase had he not... I can't even imagine the trauma had he not been able to fish while we there. ;-)
We were pretty happy about the view from the condo we rented for the week, too:
Some pics from goofing around in Grand Lake on the second evening we were in town:
We got into the park last Sunday, after staying the night in Denver on Saturday. We came in through the Loveland Pass, which we hadn't seen before (quite the sight for two civil engineers!). What an unbelievable cut through the mountains. We prefer staying on the far west side of the park because the crowds tend to congregate on the east side, in Estes Park. So, we drove through the park on Trail Ridge Rd (which, by the way, is the highest highway in the US - pretty cool, unless you're completely freaked out by heights, as I am) to get to Grand Lake, CO Sunday afternoon. We made a few stops to do some short hikes... here's our stop at the Cub Lake trail. Ceci was pretty excited about (1) being let out of the car and (2) being let out of the car to play by a river.
The first full day that we were in CO, we did a portion of the East Inlet trail, which is still my favorite trail in RMNP to date. I'm pretty sure the trail crosses the continental divide to go all the way across to the east side of the park, however, I in no way lay claim to being able to accomplish that at any point, and our hiking expectations were considerably lower this year with a 25-lb Ceci strapped to Aaron's back. Aaron and I hiked a decent stretch of it a few years ago in the rain, and I thought that it was one of the prettiest trails I've ever been on. It follows the East Inlet river of Grand Lake all the way up through Mt. Craig.
We were actually doing pretty well on the hike... Aaron got some trout fishing in, Ceci was being mostly cooperative, and then I noticed that half of Aaron's fly rod had fallen out the back of his pack where it had been jammed. So, all hiking ceased, and it became a "search for the stupid fly rod" mission. We didn't find it after combing a good portion of the trail twice, and finally gave up as Ceci's patience deteriorated. I figured Aaron would be getting a new fly rod that evening. But then he went back and did the hike again that afternoon while Ceci was napping and found it! Yay!!! So all was not lost. There definitely would have been a new rod purchase had he not... I can't even imagine the trauma had he not been able to fish while we there. ;-)
We were pretty happy about the view from the condo we rented for the week, too:
Some pics from goofing around in Grand Lake on the second evening we were in town:
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Western Kansas / Eastern Colorado
Ahh, vacation is here. Here are some pics from the road to RMNP... the wind turbines are from a huge wind farm in western Kansas - quite a sight to see. We drove through an absolutely terrible storm in eastern CO on Saturday afternoon, but there were some pretty awesome rainbows after the storm... Ceci was enthralled with both the wind turbines and rainbows.
Wednesday, August 04, 2010
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