CLOSE TO PARADISE: ESTES PARK & ROCKY MOUNTAIN NATIONAL PARK MORNING One of the most popular parks in the country, Rocky Mountain wel-comes 4 million visitors a year and still manages to offer quiet solitude. Take a drive on Trail Ridge Road (4) , the highest paved through-road in North America. This roller coaster route crosses the Continental Divide and offers breathtaking photo ops as you climb past subalpine forests and windswept tundra to 12,183 feet above sea level. Or enjoy a family wildflower hike to Gem Lake or Bridal Veil Falls . For a little more challenge, try the 2.8-mile Mills Lake trek. You’ll be rewarded with grand views of 14,259-foot-tall Longs Peak and the Keyboard of the Winds, a whimsical rock formation named for its shape. Pull over at Moraine Park for prime wildlife watch-ing. More than 3,000 elk and 800 bighorn sheep live in the park, which is a regular gathering spot for bugling. Inside the park, the Rocky Mountain Conservancy offers year-round seminars, guided fly-fishing, naturalist tours, hiking and photography classes. Kent Mountain Adventure Center , the first outfitter in the U.S. to offer breathtaking (literally) cliff-camping excursions, has new activities: a kids mountaineering camp, a New Year’s Eve Longs Peak trek, backcountry ski classes/guiding and a year-round “snow-climbing school.” Or get above it all a different way at the Open Air Adventure Park , where rope bridges, aerial tight-ropes and swinging logs challenge folks 5 years old and up. There’s also a new 12-mile mountain-biking and hiking trail in Hermit Park Open Space , a new pumptrack at Stanley Park and many dog-friendly hikes around town. COLORADO FROM TOP: ROCKY MOUNTAIN NATIONAL PARK, JAMES FRANK; KENT MOUNTAIN ADVENTURE CENTER. QUICK TIP Dip into Mrs. Walsh’s Garden (the gate is to keep nibbling elk out, not curious passersby), a beautiful respite along West Elkhorn Avenue with plenty of benches for pondering the alpine landscape. COLORADO.COM / 109
Colorado Official State Vacation Guide 2018: Page 109
