Post Vacation Blues

I’m back from the trip to Estes and having those usual “vacation is over blues”.

I won’t bore readers with any details of my attempted hike to Sky Pond that resulted in a difficult trip back to the trailhead from 4 miles up, and a night in the hospital in Estes Park, other than to make the points that giving blood a week prior to heading to elevation is not good idea, and they are really serious about altitude and hydration. I’ll find out more this week if there are any problems beyond the single event.

Estes Park stays at the top of our list of mountain destinations. We went to Jackson WY last year. The Tetons are very beautiful from the valley, but they are “up there”, and you are “down here” … in order to get up into the mountains it is more of a hike, and harder to get to the really great scenery. From the shorter hikes, a lot of the viewing is looking back out at the flat valley. There is a lot of taste in scenery, but my real problem is that Jackson seems to be becoming an ACTUAL example of what liberals claim America is, a place that is good for only the very wealthy.

Jackson has an airport that can handle all the private jets, and the land prices and the kinds of galleries and restaurants that are there show it. The place keeps moving up the dollar scale, and moving to the political left as well as more of the Hollywood types come in to act like their view of a cowboy and move the real cowboys out. Estes has everything from the KOA / YMCA / Super-8 that is actually cheap, to the Stanley Hotel where the Presidential Suite goes for $1,500 a night. Estes is like what America ACTUALLY is … a place where there is a bottom, a big middle, and a good sized top, and they can all get along and enjoy the scenery together because they know they are all generally where they are at because of the blessings and trials they have received in life, and what they have done with them.

Aside from the hike to Sky Pond that ended at Timberline Falls, we did get in a short hike up to Calypso Cascades which caused me now ill effects, and traveled over the Trail Ridge Road to search for Moose on the Grand Lake side. Two Moose were spotted, it appeared to be a cow and a calf, but they were not very cooperative relative to viewing. I have to give Jackson the nod for viewing of the Moose … we had a cow munching away outside our condo one night up there, and saw 3 large bulls on hikes up in the park last year.

So vacation is officially over and one day of work is under the belt