We stayed at this 100+ year old house in downtown Fort Collins because we love places where you get to meet people that also believe traveling is a necessity. Fernweh: "The urge to escape your everyday life by traveling; feeling homesick for a place you've never been before." This is more eloquent than me quoting The Animals song "we gotta get out of this place, if it's the last thing we ever do." So off we go wandering aimlessly in the Rocky Mountains.
We has breakfast at a downtown bakery with this quote on the wall. This made me laugh. You don't see Julia Child quotes too often.
We spent most of the day traveling along the Cache la Poudre Scenic Highway. We stopped often along the way. Sometimes at specific places, other times we just pulled over to stretch our legs or check out something interesting. We are hoping to get acclimated to elevations over 10,000 feet.
Everyone is all smiles in this beautiful place.
The Cache la Poudre River is very low due to a drought across Colorado this year.
We stopped to take pictures of the colorful aspens...
...and we stumbled across this reminder that we are in the wilderness.
It is a wonderful day for a scenic drive through the mountains.
This pass is between the Medicine Bow Mountains and the Never Summer Mountains.
There are so many different public lands out here. We are traveling through the Roosevelt National Forest, the Cache la Poudre Wilderness and the Colorado State Forest State Park.
These pictures are from stops along the way.
Kennedy was hoping to see a moose but this was the only one we saw today.
We did a short hike at the Ranger Lakes area of State Forest State Park. We manged to get lost on this short self guided hike. We might be in trouble on a real hike.
More evidence of the year long drought here.
Our next hike was a bit more of a challenge to us flatlanders. We hiked up the short but steep trail to Lake Agnes.
Chrissy hiking through the forest up to Lake Agnes.
The 12,485 foot high Nokhu Crags as seen from the trail.
Lake Agnes at 10,660 feet above sea level.
We relaxed on the rocks and downed trees along the shore.
I hiked along the shoreline to get a few different looks of the lake.
This island is covered with krummholz, trees shaped and stunted by wind.
This scree field was huge across the lake.
Chrissy and Kennedy relaxing on the Lake Agnes shoreline.
We are always searching for elk or moose in open fields late in the day. We did not see any here on our way back to the car at Lake Agnes.
The Poudre Falls along the Cache la Poudre Scenic Byway.
Not sure why Chrissy zoomed in so close.
The several strands of aspens were easily seen from the road here.
We spotted these big horn sheep along the scenic highway.
This group of locals showed us what they thought of us.
Chrissy got several good pictures from our car.
We had dinner in downtown Fort Collins at the Lost Cajun. It was a couple of blocks from the hostel. They brought out a sampler of their most popular dishes to help you decide which ones you like best. This was a great idea. I had the Crawfish etouffee with a Hurricane to help
We passed this place on our way back to the hostel. A goofy way to end a fun day.
What spectacular scenery all around you three. You definitely are high in the elevation. My smokers lungs wouldn't survive hiking to begin with but the thin air would be medivac time. Kennedy still may get to see that live moose yet. I'm enjoying these great photographs. That 100 yr old Inn/Hostel you stayed in at Fort Collins was cool. Did you have to share a bathroom with other guests?
ReplyDelete