Our Time in Rocky Mountain National Park

We stayed at the Riverside RV Campground in Loveland, CO for our time in the near Rocky Mountain National Park.  It was about a 20 minute drive from there up to Estes Park and then a little ways beyond that to see the RMNP River Entrance Station.

We started there and then made our way over to the Alpine Visitor Center.  What a great drive!

The right corner of the map shows the Fall River Entrance Station which is where we started.  From there we picked up a map that showed the major roads and scenic observation points throughout the park.

We took our time and drove over the Trail Ridge Road to the Alpine Visitors Center.

Inside there were some artifacts and small displays of animals that frequent the area

There were some nice views of the valley below

 There was a restaurant at the Alpine Visitor Center but since we had a picnic lunch we just looked around some more and headed back down the mountain.

Here's another map showing some of the stops we made along the way

The overlooks and scenic stops were beautiful.

And we saw some wildlife down the mountainside

With my telephoto lense, I was able to get some close shots of these magnificent beasts.  They didn't seem too interested in us which was fine with me...

We found a spot to have a picnic and enjoyed our lunch along the way.

We also drove up another day for a drive over to the Bear Lake.  It was still before 10:30 but they put up signs advising to take the Shuttle because the parking lot was full.  We took our chances but sure enough it was full!  We were hoping either there might be a spot or someone would be pulling out.

So we have something to see next time.  We didn't take advantage of any of the hikes this time but there are plenty of those in the park.

We enjoyed our time at Rocky Mountain National Park and will have to come back another time.
Thanks for joining us today on the Roadrunner Chronicles!