Rocky Mountain National Park

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Estes Park

We debated whether there were more monumental opportunities between Mount Saint Helens and Estes Park. Short answer, there were tons. But, like Glacier National Park, we knew that hitting any more would put a strain on the family just from a purely road-weary perspective.

I wanted badly to push past Salt Lake City and drive down into Arches National Park, but we had to choose between Estes Park or that. We chose Estes because it was much closer to Chimney Rock, which we knew we wanted to visit as the last destination on our trip.

We approached Colorado through Wyoming, and turned south on 287 at Laramie. Even before entering Colorado, it appeared like a storm was brewing. But it was a strange storm. The forecast didn’t predict rain, and the current weather didn’t mention any either. Then it hit me. We were staring into wildfire smoke. It blanketed the entire Northeastern corner of Colorado and into Wyoming.

The closer we got, the darker the skies appeared. We passed through Fort Collins and into Loveland, and I could smell the smoke in the air when we stopped for gas. We saw a massive helicopter with a bucket trailing underneath and we knew getting any shot of anything that afternoon was going to prove challenging. The aircraft disappeared out of view behind a ridge

But, again, we persisted. After all, we had booked a room in Estes. There wasn’t anything else to do, and we hoped we could at least hunt for an opportunity. The closer we got, the thicker the smoke became. It was like an odd-colored fog had settled. Yellow. The foothills loomed eery and close as we descended and then ascended from Loveland into the pass on Highway 34. We could only partially make out Devil’s Backbone, and any familiar sights or ridges. Only the closest ridge line appeared as shadows through the smoke.

We cut up Devils Gulch Road to pass through Glenn Haven, my youthful stomping grounds from another life. Some things were different, and it was hard to make out the landmarks that I’d grown to love and recognize; the frogs outcropping, and some of the turnoffs that I bouldered as a boy.

We zoomed through Glenn Haven and noticed the General Store was already closed for the day. No matter, we had to get to Estes anyway, and maybe even drive up into Rocky Mountain National Park (RMNP). We navigated the switchbacks carefully, having encountered a couple other oncoming vehicles during the ascent. And all at once we crested and poured into the Estes Park valley. It was a moment I had witnessed so many times with almost a sense of rapture in my youth. I wanted Aiden to experience that, too. But the smoke again obscured everything. It’s what I had anticipated.

We decided to head up through Fall River Road, and doubled back to the visitor center after hitting the RMNP gates. The park required reservations, and they were all sold out, for the next several days. So the park was only open to the general public after 5:30 PM. It was about 4:50, so we had some time to kill. We pulled up to the visitor center that we’d taken pictures at with Aiden 4 years prior, and took the same pictures… this time with Tori! It was a fun moment. We all but got kicked out of the visitor center as they closed up shop for the night.

Following a long line of traffic into the park, we started angling for a good shot of… well… anything that we could see; which wasn’t much. The road was closed on 36, so we were forced to take a right and continue on 34 and up Trail Ridge Road. I was driven to get some shot, any shot at this point, so we continued up past the Many Parks Curve and could barely make out Longs Peak in the distance. The place was packed, so I pushed on. Katrina pleaded with me to pull over, and that the curve was the best that we could do. She was right, but I didn’t know it yet.

“We’re doing this!“

We kept on, and we kept getting higher and higher. Katrina kept getting sicker and sicker. We stopped at Rainbow Curve Overlook, just briefly enough to realize that there wasn’t much to see. It was getting cold, too! We repeated that pattern all the way up to Alpine Ridge Trail. Stopping, straining to find a photo-op, freezing, seeing ash, smelling smoke. Katrina feeling sick. It wasn’t a lot of fun, and I knew it.

We passed a wedding party trying to make the most of a bad situation. And they weren’t doing badly. Looking at the backdrop out in the boulder field that they were standing in, I found it breathtaking. The smoke was forming in columns and joining with the clouds, and the sunset was casting a reddish glow through the haze. The wind was fierce. It sounds hellish, but it was beautiful. But I couldn’t dwell on it for too long, else I was going to ram right into the jeep in front of me. I almost did, too, as they swung into parking off the side of the road.

I parked at Forest Canyon Overwatch, twice. Once up to Alpine Ridge, and then again on the way down. It was brutal. Cold, windy. I knew I couldn’t get the whole family out and do our picture routine with the family. It just wasn’t going to work. Katrina had her head down between her knees and was trying her best not to puke by this point, so I pulled out of our parking slot and headed back down the mountain.

It was the right move. Katrina had been right. We had passed our best chance at securing our photo. As we drove past that original turnoff, it was now abandoned. The light was almost gone, but I stopped anyway. It was a good thing that I did. I hopped out and immediately smelled the front wheels, even above the smell of the wildfire smoke. It didn’t smell good, like a burnt clutch. Some will know immediately what I’m talking about. I hauled out my phone and took some pictures and video of the wheels. The passenger-side front wheel was burning hot to the touch. I checked for seized calipers, and the wheel checked out. I had simply driven us too hard. The car, and the family.

I was about to jump into the car after waiting for the wheels and pads to cool down, when everything turned crimson. The sunset was piercing through and created a pink reddish glow against the smoke and clouds. Holy shit, we gotta move! “Are we doing this?,” Katrina asked. “We’re doing this!”

We scrambled because I knew, once again, that our window of opportunity was closing fast. We set up for exactly two bursts of 10 before the red had disappeared entirely. The first shot you can see above, where my elbow obscured Tori’s face. Apropos of the smoke obscuring Longs Peak in the background, I suppose…

The second shot, we posted. Katrina was recovering, and so was her appetite. We visited Peppers Fresh & Fast Mexican grill, in downtown Estes, which was just a treat. Despite social distancing measures, we were able to get a table for the whole family with hardly any wait. We needed a break, and we got it. We checked into our room and collapsed for the night.

Kinda.

I stayed up past midnight searching for good views of Longs Peak. I wanted to see if the wind would play nice the next morning.

Early Bird Gets the Worm

We woke up early and packed quickly. We were outta the room and on our way before 9:30 AM. And… the smoke had cleared! Sometime during the night, the wind shifted direction. It was a beautiful and mostly clear morning, and we had work to do.

Without the Boston Tea Party… none of this would have happened.

We started up Highway 7 to Lily Lake. And when we arrived, I saw the same signs that we saw at RMNP entrance. We were only allowed to park and use the amenities around the lake if we had a digital reservation. It invited me to check the website, but they were booked. “To hell with that,” I thought. We were once again up against a tight schedule. We swung into high gear and snapped some amazing photos just feet away from the parking lot. In and out in less than 15 minutes. One of the locals was hiking down from the trail and saw us staging for a shot. She applauded our efforts and message. We chatted briefly and I told her I wanted to live there in Estes Park someday. And, I do.

Next I wanted to hit the Estes Park Welcome sign off Highway 36. We’d taken a picture there 4 years prior, and I wanted to get another. This time, with Tori. I had no agenda, not until we arrived that is. We pulled up to ample parking, and I scared Katrina with how close to the edge of the turnout I got. I think the exact same thing happened 4 years ago, too.

The welcome sign is a busy spot, so I knew we couldn’t linger. But our timing was perfect, several cars were just wrapping up and leaving. Looking over at the outcropping, and I immediately knew I couldn’t pass up the moment to snap our flag & sign together with the family. I apologized to Katrina and told her we just had to. And we did. It was a perfect shot with perfect lighting, and there wasn’t a ton of traffic. We couldn’t have asked for better conditions.

A man playing bluegrass music on an acoustic guitar near where we parked said “now that’s a nice thing to see” as I snapped the flag together. I wondered if he’d feel the same when we took out our Black Lives Matter sign. We’d soon find out. I couldn’t worry about that, though. I had to set up the tripod and stage the shot.

As I planted the tripod, several cars pulled up. Families got out, and one of them asked me to take their picture. I turned and didn’t see Katrina or Aiden, so I accepted. We snapped some shots, and I asked what they’d like… portrait, landscape, body shots, head shots. I took an assortment. They returned the favor for another family and left. I looked over and shouted for Katrina.

It turned out to be perfect timing, because she was just dropping the mic defending the notion that Black Lives Matter. It turned out that Mr. Bluegrass didn’t exactly agree, choosing instead to conflate the movement with violence and destruction. Katrina quipped that “while we don’t condone violence in any way, without the Boston Tea Party… none of this would have happened.” She gestured with a curt swirl of her finger to indicate everything, which was, of course, her reference to America in general.

So Katrina was riding high having defended herself and our protest, and my holler gave her the opportunity to leave after successfully delivering her point. As if to punctuate the message, we got honks of support as we snapped the shot that would ultimately land on Instagram. She was proud, and so was I.

Gone but Not Forgotten

We left the way we came, through Devils Gulch Road, back down through Glenn Haven. The General Store was still closed. Maybe for the season. We made a couple of stops, one to snap the view of Longs Peak that still amazes me 30 years later, and another to see the cabin of my boyhood stomping grounds. I told my family tales of the deer in the snow, striding up to the window of the camper that we stayed in as the cabin was built… and Lindsey… the manliest man to ever share my sister’s name. And Good & Plenty boxes that my dad bought for us for our hikes, the ones that started at Dunraven Trailhead just up the road. And we stopped to pay homage to Mountain Lion Rock, and Katrina snapped a picture.

As we passed the lake in Loveland, I saw that it was almost dried up. I compared that to the wildfire smoke in our rear view mirror, and remembered the DC-10 tanker jet that we saw on our way into Estes Park. I looked to the right to find the lakeside cafe where I enjoyed a cinnamon roll with my grandma and sisters all those decades ago. I think it’s now a dentist’s practice.

The mountains already out of view behind us, we headed North on I-25 toward Cheyenne. And that’s where I saw it. “Hey look, another fake buffalo!”

Instagram

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#thisamericantrip #unitedstates #blacklivesmatter

A post shared by Aron Filbert (@afilbert) on Oct 2, 2020 at 11:34am PDT

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#thisamericantrip #unitedstates #blacklivesmatter #cameronpeakfire made #rmnp pic challenging, so we woke up early and got a second chance at #lilylake

A post shared by Aron Filbert (@afilbert) on Oct 3, 2020 at 3:29pm PDT