Hey everyone,
Just wanted to give my roadtrip report. This trip was supposed to take me to Washington and Oregon, but at the last minute my dad and I decided to do Colorado.
Last Friday he left Lodi, CA and I left from San Diego to meet up at my sister's place in Vegas. Saturday mornin we hit the road with our destination Glenwood Springs, CO. Pulled in during the evening. Nice little town. Found some good steaks and used the hot springs (which were crowded and overpriced, but rejuvinating). We stayed here three nights since we'd be fishing the Fryingpan and Roaring Fork Rivers.
One day we took a ride down 82 to Aspen then drove to the summitt (12,000 feet) of Independence Pass. Beautiful drive, good fishin up here too. The Independence ghost town was a pretty neat stop too, can't believe these people lived up there. Also hiked up the hill to visit Doc Holliday's grave.
On Tuesday mornin we woke and started towards Rocky Mountain National Park. Mapquest gave me a what seemed to be weird directions, taking us on a lonely road from Eagle (CO-131), up over Gore Pass (CO-134), and on to Kremmling. This was however a beautiful drive full of wildlife, bighorn sheep, deer, coyotes..etc..
Finally made it to Grand Lake around noon and started up over the Trail Ridge Road. Let me say, I was expecting this place to be very beautiful, but in actuallity, my expectations were nowhere near the beauty this park actually possesses. Robert Duvall said it best in Open Range."It's beautiful country, a man could get lost out here."
This drive is not to be missed. Saw lots of elk, deer, a couple of moose, a pack of coyotes, and bighorns. this place was so awesome, that we actually changed our trip on the fly. Instead of pulling into Denver this night and heading down towards Gunnison the next day, we decided to stay in Estes Park and work our way back over the Trail Ridge the next day. Did the hike to Alberta Falls. The second ride over was just as awesome. This time we came back to I-70 via CO-9 along the Blue River. I was shocked at how high the elevation was along this major interstate at Vail Pass.
We had planned to stay in Grand Junction but the hotel we needed was out of rooms, so they booked us one 100 miles down the road in Green River, UT.
This put us a bit ahead of the game for the next day. We planned to stay at Bryce Canyon this night since my dad had never seen it. So we followed 70 all the way to UT-89 and headed up to Bryce. Beautiful place, pretty crowded for a week day. Saw lots of antelope, which was kind of shocking since I didn't realize they lived there. The funniest thing was watching three fawn antelopes playing in meadow, they were running in circles and chasing all over, man can those guys fly!!
Friday mornin we woke up and took UT-14 up to Cedar Breaks National Monument, which is a pretty neat place, and very cold for a summer day. The landscape on this highway was pretty exceptional. Never did I imagine seeing lava rock in this area, spread through meadows, and aspens, very beautiful setting.
We made a quick detour to Kolob Canyon along the I-15, which turned out to be a great decision. That is an awesome 5-miles. I'd like to do some hiking in this area.
We finally pulled back into Vegas mid-day Friday.
On Saturday, with my mom (who flew into town to meet us) we drove up to Red Rock Canyon and then out to Valley Of Fire.
I gotta say, Valley Of Fire was pretty sweet. I had a lot of fun here and with its proximity to Vegas (and the fact that my girlfriend and sister live there) I'll be frequenting this place often.
All in all, this was a great trip, pretty good fishing, beautiful country, and a lot of time with my dad, which makes for a great week. Not to mention I hit a baseball parlay on the way out of Sin City which gave me $400 back!
I'll let everyone know as soon as I get the pictures posted.
Later,
Brett
