Time to go to Rocky Mountain National Park. We left Yampa River State Park around 9 AM, after breakfast and rather quick showers. They take quarters here, 25 cents a minute. You'd think that after charging $27 for a site overnight, that they might throw in a shower? Other than that the park was pleasant, with flat open sites and electric hookups, but not particularly a destination unless you were fishing on the Yampa.
It was back to Steamboat Springs for a stroll down the main street looking in the shops, finding an ATM and some good coffee on a quiet Sunday morning before the drive to the western entrance of Rocky Mountain National Park. We topped up Speedy and were on our way.
It was an interesting drive along US 40. We weren't in the flat desert any more. First it was a long climb over Rabbit Ears Pass, then we wound through hilly farmland and past the Wolford Mountain Reservoir, which looked about 20 feet below its normal level, and on into the town of Kremmling. From there we followed the upper reaches of the Colorado River through Middle Park, including a wonderfully twisty road at Byers Canyon, finally turning up US 34 at Granby, past Grand Lake, also down well below its normal level, and into the national park.
After a stop at the Kawuneeche Visitor Center, we passed through the entrance station on the way to our intended destination, Timber Creek Campground. When we got there, there wasn't any timber. Because of the Pine Beetle damage, all of the trees in the campground had been cut down. Instead of a nice wooded camping area, it was an open field in the middle of a clearcut ex-forest. We understand the reasoning, the dead trees were a danger to campers and if only a few live trees were left, they, being tall lodgepole pines, would be in danger of being blown down. So, everything was removed.
We had lunch while we considered our options, and decided to remove ourselves to the other side of the park. This meant an unplanned 35 mile drive over the Trail Ridge Road to the Aspenglen Campground near the northeast entrance to the park. It was an interesting drive, with many curves, lots of exposure and it went over the highest highway pass in the US, at over 12,000 feet. We stopped at the Alpine Visitor Center, just below the top of the pass. The views were spectacular, but there's not much air up there. They had a barometer in the visitor center reading about 20" of Mercury. It is closer to 30" at sea level. I had a bit of a headache, Ellen said she felt like she'd had a full bottle of wine.
There were more great views on the way down. The Tetons and Glacier mountains are bolder and seem more vertical, but these are just massive and look like they go on forever. The road down the east side was a bit more gentle than the climb up the west side with fewer tight switchbacks and soon we were at the entrance to the Aspenglen Campground...where the sign read "Campground Full". We hadn't realized that Aspenglen was a reservation campground.
We went in anyway, intending to ask if they knew what campgrounds might still be open, hoping that we wouldn't have to go back to Timber Creek. Ellen went up to the window and asked the ranger where we could go, since Aspenglen was full. His reply was "It's not full, where did you get that idea?"—from the sign, of course. Anyway, there were still a couple of open site that would fit Speedy, so we have a site for two nights and we'll look further tomorrow. We have arrived at Smoky Mountain National Park. What's next?
Photos of the day
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