Estes Park

My wife and I flew to Colorado to attend a wedding but we gave ourselves several extra days to spend some time in the mountains. We liked Estes Park a lot, it has beautiful views and a river walk. We also saw a whole herd of elk. We found a great Costa Rican restaurant there called Pura Vida, which we highly recommend.

Go to the YMCA of the Rockies, if you have large family rent a place off property. If you have a small/average-sized family stay at one of the YMCA Lodges. Get American Plan Meals and plan hikes and trips for most of the week. (i.e. Drive up to the Alpine Visitor Center, Hiking up to Fern Falls with the kids)

I didn’t stay the night but went there for the day. The place is beautiful. It’s a lot of tourist stuff so if your looking for something different this is not the place. Would have loved to go back to horseback ride but we just walked around.

Beautiful place on the face of earth!!! Very relaxing and quiet yet lots of adventure. If you like mountains. rivers. lakes and nature this is the place you want to go to. There are about 47 hiking trails ranging from 2 mile round trails to 12 miles trails. We go there at least once a year if not twice. Bear creek park at the entrance of the park on left hand side is a must see. Also if you are a hiking lover, try Timber lake lodge, a 12 mile hike with several streams crossing. Make sure to take plenty of water along with other snacks, small combat knife is not a bad idea either.
If you are planning on making a trip to this palace and looking for more info, shoot me an email and i will give you all need to know

A buddy and I hopped in the car last July and drove…not knowing exactly where we were headed. We followed the Continental Divide up from Salida and ended up in this little town before we headed into RMNP. The scenery is amazing however the town is very touristy. We also got a tour of the Estes Park Emergency room as my friend dislocated his knee climbing through the downed timbers of Forest Canyon off of Rock Cut. The scenery was beautiful there too as a gorgeous dark haired nurse helped ice my buddy’s mangled limb. We can’t wait to go back!

living on top of the world, in god’s country

Only Problems: Cell phone service is questionable and its cold even in summer.

LOVE this place. There is SO MUCH to do for it being such a small town. It rained the whole time I was there and I still had a blast. Camping, Horseback Riding, The Stanley Hotel. This is probably the best vacation I’ve ever had despite the rain.

used to live here. Unless you have a lot of money to blow and you REALLY want to go visit Rocky Mountain National Park it’s a real tourist trap.

We went horseback riding up in the mountains. It was so beautiful. It was June but you could see snow covered peaks. It was so gorgeous and the guides were so nice!

We just went up into the mountains to Estes Park… It was roughly 30ish miles or so out of Boulder. It will take you roughly an hour to get there depending on traffic.

With that said…. you will enjoy every minute of your drive. You might see deer along the roadside, possibly elk. The snow hadn’t come down as much yet this year.

Enjoy the cozy little town. If you want to take your dog to walk in the mountians, you might want to call ahead and see if the trails that allow dogs are open.

There is a video at the visitors center – I think it was free.