Salt Lake City to Rocky Mountain National

We are now entering our last leg of our trip, and I must say, I'm looking forward to putting down some roots and having my clothes in a cupboard instead of a suitcase.

We left Salt Lake City and headed towards Rawlins in Wyoming, which would be our pit stop for the night, before we continue onto the famous Rocky Mountain National Park.

The landscape is very pretty and you have wonderful green mountain ranges leaving Utah, before entering Wyoming.

Wyoming is typical cowboy country, and you have miles and miles of vast landscape, dotted with cattle farms here and there. You can actually picture the modern day cowboy movies.

Rawlins was, well, how do I describe it, small, with one horse, no actually, he got shot, so nothing actually. At least the hotel, Comfort Inn, was very comfortable and probably the newest addition to this small place. I had to laugh, we went out to the local Pizza spot for dinner, and Chris asked for Ice Tea. The lady said that they did not have any, and when we looked at her funny, beacuse we could see that they did, she asked again, and then realised he wanted Ice Tea and not Arse Tea.

I must say, some places (San Francisco) battle to understand our accents more than others (Denver). Like the word Diet, they just could not understand what we were asking for and I had to spell it out more than once in San Diego and San Francisco. But every now and again I get the comment that they just love our accents, so it keeps us entertained.

The trip to the Rocky Mtn National Park was lovely. Again, rolling green hills, vast landscapes and we even spotted some game, Prong Horned Deer. There were also hundreds of Prairie Dogs (dassie like creatures) continuously running across the roads. We did well in missing all but one, which was standing in the middle of the road and literally ran under the car, which Chris could not miss.

The Arapaho National Park which you drive through just before you get to the Rocky Mounatin National P, is stunning, lots of streams and rivers flowing due to all the snow melt.

Grand lake just before the Park

I was really excited about seeing the Rocky Mountain Nat Park, imagining the Park teaming with Deer and Moose, and the odd Bear, I suppose similar to what you would do ito game viewing in the Kruger.

Well, even though the Park is stunning, you REALLY have to look for the game, and the speed limit is 45 M/Ph (approx 72 Km/Ph). Needless to say, I am not sure what game you're supposed to see while speeding through the park at that rate. If you try and drive slower, you have 10 impatient cars up your rear, really painful.

However, having said that, the Park is stunning and worth seeing. The main activity is hiking, so it's well worth it to put those hiking boots on and see the Park on foot. We did see a pair of Elk, and a Moose. Not all bad.

As you reach the peak of the Rocky Mountain Range, where you are just over 11,000 feet, there was still thick snow about. I could not believe how high some of the ice ridges along the road was, and it's also pretty chilly up there.

A frozen lake towards the peak of the Rocky Mountains

A wall of ice next to the road, the car is half the size of this.

Chris and I stayed in a sweet little Inn in the town, Estes, just outside the Park, called Alpine Trail Ridge Inn. Everyone is so friendly here and the homely restaurant next door serves the most amazing Apple Pie.

View from the Alpine Ridge Inn

What's great is the Park is only approx 2.5 hours from Denver, so it's perfect for a weekend getaway, to go hiking or camping, which is what I think we will be doing allot of.

From here we head back to Denver where our trip ends and life as we all know it starts.