Another Bullwinkle Sighting

At Sunset Point Campground, Lake Granby, CO

Headed up to the Kawuneeche Visitor Center near the Rocky Mountain National Park’s southwest entrance.  Most people who visit the park come in through Estes Park, a town on the eastern boarder of the National Park.  Tomorrow or Friday we will enter the park, if the weather cooperates, and we wanted to visit the Visitor’s Center ahead of time, since it is only 12 miles from our camp.  Just before the visitor’s center, we see a line of cars pulled over from both sides…I figured it was a bear…but it was a pair of moose.  This one above is our best shot of the day, captured by Marcia.

Marcia took this shot too of the same moose through a crowd of people who had gotten out of their cars…I moved a little forward, as did the moose, and that is how she got the good shot of it (first picture).

The other moose is more shy…darting into the brush away from the crowd.  And that was our moose sightings for the day…it had been since Alaska since we had seen moose…and here we see two without even trying.

On our way back to Sunset Point Campground, we saw a sign to the Grand Lake Lodge, and decided to swing into the parking lot for a quick look.  Not bad, but I think I like the cars more than the lodge. 

Grand Lake Lodge opened in 1920, the same year the Trail Ridge Road into Rocky Mountain National Park opened.  The lodge, once on Park land, consists of around 100 various structures (cabins, lodges, etc.)  And one can get a pretty good view of Grand Lake, Colorado’s largest and deepest natural lake. (picture below)

We found our way between Grand Lake and Shadow Mountain Reservoir through the city of Grand Lake, and got this picture on the far northeastern side of Shadow Mountain Reservoir looking to the southwest.  It is a large lake, very blue water and we even saw…

…a few geese in the water, along with a sailboat or two….

Next we passed our entrance to the campground, and continued out along the southern shore of Lake Granby to Arapaho Bay.  We didn’t drive all the way to the Arapaho Campground at the tip of the bay.  It is a slightly bumpy at time dirt road, which takes you over the dam (which was the bumpiest part of it), and it really shows the enormity of how large Lake Granby is.  The shot above is looking to the northeast, below it is a view of the northwest.

So far we are loving our time here at Sunset Point Campground…the camp hosts are very friendly, and stay right on top of everything.  Now, if we can get these afternoon thunderstorms to go away….