View from My Door: Evening Clouds

I love clouds, and at this elevation, they are quick little buggers.  Tonight it was gorgeous out.  The weather was wonderful, there were clouds, and as the sun went down it just lit them up.  I grabbed a hard cider and my camera and just went out to the porch to hang out for a few.  I took a bunch of pictures.  It was just too pretty not to!  Just spectacular was the view from my door.

Lily Lake

I had such a hard time getting motivated for my day off.  I woke up early as always, but went back to sleep for at least another hour.  I had no idea what I wanted to do.  A part of me just wanted to be lazy and not leave the room, but I had to do something.  I went to breakfast and decided to go to lily lake.  It is about 7 miles south of Estes.  It is a short trail around the lake.  I took a book, my journal and the camera and that is how I spent my morning.

View from My Door: Afternoon Storms

I love the smell of rain.  I like to dance in it, and jump in puddles.  Sometimes I think I am still a kid in that regards.  I love thunderstorms, unless there is a tornado or I am trying to sleep, then they can go away.  But I love afternoon rainstorms.  Today is my day off, and I went for a walk this morning, (will get to that later) and then spent some time downtown.  Headed back to my room and noticed the clouds were rolling in.

View from My Door: Crazy Weather

 So I am sure I've mentioned a time or two, that Estes Park in the Rocky Mountains has some hellishly weird weather...  Thought so.  Well, today was not my first experience with it, it was quite off yesterday, but today was strange none the less.  I wish I'd been thinking and had taken a picture earlier.  I was supposed to work at 7:30 (at least that is when the vans were supposed to leave).  This didn't happen.  It was very windy and snowy and cold last night up on the mountain.  Thus the roads were unopened and needed some plowing.  Now 6ish hours later, still not open, so work has been officially called off.

View From My Door: Elk Edition

Elk, I've seen a lot of elk in my day.  Not as many as I have bison.  But that's a different post.  I've been pretty close to some elk, by accident usually.  Not a fan of things with antlers and the occasional desire to gore you.  But went out of my room today and there by the other building was a big 8-point bull elk.  There were 4 actually, 2 across the street in the neighbor's yard, and one near the EDR and of course the big bull across the way.  It is great, I have a balcony to watch from, that way I don't have to worry about getting to close to the old guy.  But needless to say it was a great view from my front door.

Wild Thing: Sea Horsies

Sea horsies!  I was lucky enough to see several sea horse exhibits over last few years.  The Monterrey Bay Aquarium, the Aquarium at the Mall of America, the Minnesota Zoo, the Oregon Cost Museum.  Lots of them, and they are an amazing creatures.  They are so tiny and so perfect. 

Alberta Falls... Alberta Falls...

That Thursday, the other hike I did was to Alberta Falls.  I left from the Glacier Gorge trailhead; not far from Bear Lake.  I was warned by the park service (volunteer??) that the whole trail was still covered in snow.  I wasn't too concerned as it a short hike only .6 miles in and .6 miles out... actually I think it was closer to .9 in and out.  Their signs were sending me mixed messages.  The first .3 miles was pretty dry, and as I came to a bridge over a raging stream I noticed it was snow covered.

Bear Lake

I had Thursday off and I got up early and did some easy hiking.  I first went to Bear Lake, and then to Alberta Falls.  So June in Rocky Mountain is still pretty snowy.  And in some places it hasn't melted yet, and both of my destinations were such places.  Bear Lake was mostly frozen still and the path still covered in snow.  It made for some unique hiking.

Bear Lake is an incredibly short nature walk, though due to the snow, I only walked around half of the lake and went back the way I had come.  I just wasn't feeling to secure in snow.  I am not always the graceful sort and the last thing I wanted on my day off was to tumble into freezing cold waters.  But it was such a pretty day that it was totally worth it.  I love the drive to the lake and the walk was so much fun, and it was gorgeous anyways.  Win-Win!

Boats

Still in San Francisco!  We went to the Maritime National Historic Site (or what ever it is called).  It was totes cool, I like boats.  And they had all kinds.  There were old timey boats, a submarine and other fun and exciting things!

View from My Door: Hanging Clouds

We had a storm the other night.  It was awesome, I love the rain, but the clouds do some silly things in the mountains.  The next morning, I had the day off, and I had planned on doing a spot of hiking.  (I did).  But since I couldn't sleep much, I got up for breakfast.  Was OK with this once I saw the clouds.  They were just hangiug there, like cotton candy around the mountains as I went to breakfast.  So naturally I snapped this pictures from my door when I got back.

Wild Thing: Jellies

Yeah, yeah, I know what you're gonna say, Jellyfish... again... Yeah, so what's your point exactly.  I love jellyfish, love them so much, it isn't even funny!  I have more than just the Monterrey Jellies anyways.  I've waxed poetic about them before, so I guess this is just one for simple enjoyments.  There was a Jellyfish exhibit in the aquarium at the Mall of America (MOA) and my sister and I naturally went. 

Across the Bay

Wow! I just realized that I haven't written about my time in San Francisco at all!  Fear not this will be remedied.  The only time that I went to San Francisco it was in March or April of 2008.  I had just finished my first winter at Snow Lodge and I went traveling with my parents to the southwest.  I haven't really blogged about this trip at all which is a shame cause it was great!  My younger bro was living in the San Francisco area at the time.  So we stopped by.

Wild Thing: Frogs

So I was going through my pictures, I've been doing that lately.  I was looking at my trip to the Mississippi River Aquarium in Dubuque Iowa, and while I love the albino alligator, the frogs where what called out to me.  So cute!  I am pretty sure I've got frogs from several different trips.  But hey I guess we'll find out together.  The only ones I could find were from Iowa and one lone frog from a butterfly garden in Malaysia... odd.

View from My Door: Sunset Edition

Well, yeah, here is another of the lazy photograph posts.  But hey I'm tired, I just dug in then snow for something like 4.5-5 hours.  The view from my door is amazing, almost all the time, so long as you can actually see out of it.  But I was watching some lame TV show the other night and luckily I looked out my window at the very right moment.  It was an incredibly vivid sunset.

Digout: Days 1&2

As I am sure I’ve mentioned, I am spending the summer working in a gift shop in Rocky Mountain National Park.  Well, it’s a pretty tall mountain, somewhere around 12 thousand feet.  And you’d better believe that there is a bunch of snow up there.  It like many places in the mountains is a seasonal spot, and in the winter, they just let it snow.  The road is closed for several months and they plow it out each spring.  And this year was no different.  And while the road is being plowed out we dig out the gift shop.