Blogs from Fort Collins, Colorado, United States, North America

Saturday began by meeting Drew downtown for brunch at Snooze. It was one of several restaurants in the historic district where people were having breakfast. After breakfast, Drew had a number of errands to attend to before the evening concert. Susan and I struck out on our sightseeing. First stop was the Colorado State University campus. The land grant university was founded in 1870 as the Colorado Agricultural school. The main campus centers around The Oval, laid out in 1909, and its several academic buildings in the Italian Renaissance style. We parked and walked over to the Lory Plaza, the core of the modern campus. The Natural Resources building has a display of Colorado rocks, which make for a good introduction to Colorado geography. In the Lory Student Center is the bookstore, the place to find ... read more

June 21 thru June 25 Ft Collins I stayed in a rv park that was a kid resort. They had swimming pools, splash pads, miniature golf, huge playground, bouncy castle, bumper boats and several different styles of bikes to rent. My niece Jess brought her 2 kids, Abby almost 3 and Shea almost 1 to play and the kids had a ball in the pool. We had hikes, and lots of play time over the couple of days that I was there including a softball game that their dad Rob and uncle Joey played in. Fun to see Abby so excited about her loved ones playing on the field. She cheered, jumped up and down and gave her dad a thumbs up for a great catch. I was a little overwhelmed with all the activity and ... read more

This morning we awoke to a cloudy almost stormy morning. My usual morning coffee on the porch was anything but usual. The squirrel and the chipmunks were very subdued, but the birds took over for the entertainment. The starlings were all over and joined by three robins scurrying around the ground looking for worms I think. Our usual hummingbird was joined by a second and a woodpecker showed up checking out all the trees in our front yard. Great entertainment with morning coffee. Today our goal was to seek out the moose that are said to be abundant in this area of Colorado. When I worked here in the late 60’s a moose sighting was very rare since the numbers had dramatically dropped. In the 70’s and 80’s a private donor funded the reintroduction of moose ... read more

So we are now at the Stub Creek Ranger Cabin. A shorter day of driving in miles. We drove on I 70 for about 60 miles and then turned north towards Walden. The scenery was beautiful, but it was all 2 lane roads winding through the mountains. Much slower driving. We made a stop in Walden for some more groceries, gas, and lunch at the Moose Creek Cafe. Walden is about 50 miles and a hour drive to Stub Creek. The last 20 miles are dirt road just the way I remember it. The first time I drove to Stub Creek was when I was hired by the forest service for a summer job. I drove from Boulder in my 53 ford and at the time much of the road from Fort Collins was gravel. I ... read more

With no way through Rocky Mountain National Park available, we found a northern alternative via Loveland and Fort Collins, then west on Route 14 through Rustic, Kinikinik and a lot of places that included the name Poudre. It was a really scenic road which edged a river apparently very popular for white river rafting. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cache_La_Poudre_River On exiting the national forest, we saw many moose before reaching Walden, the self-proclaimed moose viewing capital of Colorado. Route 14 eventually ended with highway 40, which we then took over the Continental Divide at Rabbit Ears Pass and into Steamboat Springs.... read more