This morning we stopped at a ranger station to buy an America The Beautiful pass (for $80 you get unlimited access to all National parks) and stumbled onto a fox den.  The mother was nowhere in sight, but four cubs were hanging around the opening, rough-housing.  That was a real treat.

The weather threatened to be bad today, so we planned a short hike in the Rocky Mountain National Park rather than a long one.  Unfortunately, the road to our planned hike was closed.  We chose a different road and opted for a 2 mile hike into a campground instead.

We had a different kind of wild animal encounter on this excursion.  Around the one mile mark, we spotted some elk way off in the distance.  One of the strange things about these mountains is that distances are really hard to gauge.  We kept walking along the trail and then turned a corner and encountered the herd of elk.  They were uncomfortably close, both for their taste and for ours.

The females took off up the hill, but the male stood his ground.  He took a couple tentative steps in our direction, obviously trying to decide if we represented a threat he needed to do something about.  We quickly made his decision easy by turning around and high-tailing it back the way we came.

“Dont step in the horse poop! Don’t step in the horse poop!”

The clouds breaking up, giving us a wonderful day after all.

On the way back into town, we stopped at a wine shop and Adam went in to get our Wine Time victuals.  There was a field next to the wine shop filled with little creatures.  Josie wanted to get out and see them.  She and I were standing there, looking at a critter infestation of some kind, when the wine shop guy came out.

“What kind of animals are those?  Are they prairie dogs?” I asked.

He said, “No, they’re ground squirrels.”

I said, “Oh, they’re really cute.”

And he said,  “I guess.  What they really are is a pain in my ass.”

Josie spun around at lightning speed and had a telepathic conversation with me:  That guy said a bad word!  I looked at her and sent back with my eyes, I know.  Just ignore it.  Be cool.

Then he kept saying it, over and over again.  “Those little jerks crawl through my heating system and run around in my store.  They’re such a pain in the ass.  Then they get trapped in the back room behind the boxes and chirp like little assholes.  I can’t tell you what a pain in my ass they are.”

Josie was staring at me and practically vibrating.  Telepathically, Bad word!  He keeps saying it!  OMG!  Are you gonna get him in trouble?!  BAD WORD!!!

To the guy, I said, “So, they’re a bit of a pest then?”

“Oh yeah.  Pain in my ass, they are.  There isn’t a good enough poison on the market for them.  Oh look!  Babies!  They are kinda cute, I guess … but they sure are a pain in my ass.”

Next up was shopping.  The town of Estes Park has some fantastic shopping, if you like Western art, turquoise jewelry and resort-style tourist traps.  We hit pretty much every store.  I overspent on jewelry and the kids overspent on other stuff.  In conjunction with the giant splurge on The Stanley, we’ve spent way more than we can afford here.  Our big plan is to mooch unapologetically off relatives in the coming weeks to make up the difference.

Cute little town.

The girls checking out their treasures after leaving the store.

A little more on The Stanley:

They don’t have rooms inside the original building that will accommodate 5, so we had to rent a condo on the same property.  It’s a fantastic condo (you could easily live in it permanently, as a primary residence) but last night all we had time to do was check out the more public areas of the main building.

The living room in our condo. Full kitchen, in-unit laundry facilities, two bedrooms and two really nice bathrooms, and private outdoor hot tub.

This afternoon we had a better chance to explore the rest of the hotel.  It has gorgeous, creepy old sweeping staircases leading to three floors.  Once you head into the halls where the rooms are, it becomes labyrinthine and easy to get turned around.

On the third floor, which has the vague feeling of an enormous attic, we ran into a group of middle-school kids taking the Ghost Tour.  They were all silently marching single-file, holding their hands out, palms up, with foil-wrapped pieces of gum on them like they were getting ready to feed horses.  That was far weirder and creepier than the building itself.  Most of the kids looked excited, but a few looked bored and a couple, downright terrified.  I have no idea what the foil-wrapped gum was all about.  I wanted to ask, but everyone was being so quiet I didn’t want to ruin their experience by opening my big mouth.  I guess I’ll never know.

The Stanley lobby and check-in desk.

Dinner at The Cascades restaurant. The famous bar in the background. I’m sorry we don’t have a better shot of it.

Holden on The Bear Chair — useful sculpture in the back garden.

Probably the most significant outcome of visiting Colorado is that I’ve now agreed to go to Machu Picchu.  We all survived higher altitudes than what Peru is offering, so I can stop worrying about our health.  Adam is already gleefully planning next summer’s excursion to Ecuador (including the Galapagos Islands) and Peru.  He has customers in both those places, so can combine family trip with business trip.  Now that my altitude sickness fears have been put to rest, I just need to conquer my boat phobia.  That one is going to be harder, but conquer it I shall.