1998 Northern Rockies Trip

Rocky Mountain NP, CO
28 and 29 May 1998

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From Mark's "Book of Doom"
Day 13: Thursday, May 28th
Relatively short drive to Rocky Mountain NP camped at Longs Peak, 9500 ft. elevation. Took a short hike to Alberta Falls, a nice little waterfall. Pancakes and Mashed taters for dinner - yum! We seem to be leaving bits of the Badlands wherever we go, including on a newly-washed section of highway drove over on the way up
Yes, indeed! When we got the Jeep all muddy on Sheep Mountain Table on Wednesday we apparently packed the wheel wells to the gunnels and beyond. It caked on pretty thoroughly. Now, every bump and even some prolonged vibrations cause a little more to break off. Maybe some will make it all the way home!

Text on back of postcard:
Rocky Mountain National Park
Columbine Falls makes its way down to Peaccock Pool, cascading over
boulders along the way. the 1600' sheer face of The Diamond, the east face of
Longs Peak, provides the dramatic backdrop.

My note to recipient:
We camped at the Longs Peak C'ground last night. At 9500', it's below
the tree line. Longs Peak is 14,225'. I've spotted some flowers the
like of which I've not seen before. I'll have to figure out what they
are. They're pretty spiffy. The flower is like a small tulip or a large
crocus, but the leaves appear to be compound. The flower is a pale purple.
Woohoo! I've also encountered a number of new-to-me bird species. Too
bad the guys are mostly interested in getting to the end of the trail
quickly. No time to smell the "roses".

Text on back of postcard:
ROCKY MOUNTAIN NATIONAL PARK,
Colorado. A summer view of Fan Lake with
Mount Chapin and Mount Chiquita in the background.

My note to recipient:
Today we drove out of RMNP via the Trail Ridge Road -- the highest
continuous hiway in North America. Saw much tundra. Much of the road
is above the tree line. A trifle brisk in shorts. We're camping in
Dinosaur National Monument tonight. Off to look at bones, etc. tomorrow.


A small waterfall cutting across and through solid rock


This is the flower mentioned in a postcard above


Some views of the park about at treeline

From Mark's "Book of Doom"
Day 14: Friday, May 29th
Nice leisurely drive out RMNP, followed by the mad dash across Colorado to Dinosaur NM. The party had various experiences with sleeping nearly two miles up. Steph and Subrata slept quite well, Scott had some trouble, I slept somewhat lighter than usual, and had quite a bit of sinus fluid drainage (probably a good thing, overall).

We drove above the tree line for a while, topping out at 12,000 ft. Some really nice views, and some really stupid parents...

Dinosaur NM is literally 100 miles from nowhere. We've started cutting things from the list of places to visit. Colorado NM was the first to go - we're planning to hit it on the "next" trip, whenever that is.


Views of the park above treeline

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1998 Rockies Start
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This page was last updated on 22 February 2004.