There’s A Bear In There!
Well it was another absolutely glorious day today in the Colorado Rockies with bright blue, cloudless skies and warm summer weather. After breakfast by the pool, we drove to the Aspen Highlands, ready to board the ‘Roaring Fork Transit’ shuttle bus up to the iconic Maroon Bells.
Boarding the bus hadn’t been a piece of cake. We’d pre-purchased our tickets with a gondola package (just love those gondolas!) so we had some tickets allowing us free transit on the bus up the mountain. With a big crowd waiting for the bus (and a few “pusher-inner-ers” in the queue) we finally made it to the doors of the bus when the driver announced he had only room for 3 more passengers. I eagerly stepped forward, waving my tickets excitedly in the air, only to be frowned at and told these were not the right tickets. These white tickets had to be taken inside the souvenir shop and exchanged for orange tickets. Both said the same thing and it was just a case of silly red tape but…it meant we missed the bus! Bummer. Luckily the next bus was only 20 minutes away.
We had a lively bus driver who was keen for us to spot some local wildlife as we ventured up the mountain. Apparently the group before us had been lucky enough to spot a moose. The pressure was on! He wanted us to “holler” if we set eyes upon anything living and breathing out there in the wilderness. We had to look out for marmots, moose, woodchucks, bears, elk or deer. With eyes peeled, we listened to his informative commentary about the history of the beautiful White River National Forest. The valley is a perfect U-shape since it was formed from a glacier and back in the 1800s, there was silver in ‘them thar’ hills. In fact, silver mining in Aspen was so prolific in the late 1800s and early 1900s, the whole of Aspen mountain has tunnels through it resembling Swiss cheese! Every now and then the tunnels collapse. Skiers beware!
We also heard that if you are intending to camp in the forest, it is possible to hire a llama as your pack animal, capable of carrying up to 5 backpacks for you. Poor things! Just as the bus driver was spilling forth more information on the fragile alpine ecosystem we were entering, someone behind us yelled out “THERE’S A BEAR!!” There was great excitement amongst the passengers (the driver no exception) and sure enough, there right before us, on the edge of the meandering creek, was a bear! It was actually a gorgeous little bear cub and as we backed up the bus for a better view, we saw he was not alone but had two other brothers with him! They were adorable, jumping all over each other and playing amongst the trees. Everyone was speculating that Mother Bear must be close by and then Sam, with his keen eye, spotted her, exclaiming excitedly to our fellow-bear-seeking-passengers: “there’s the mum!” She was HUGE! Definitely not someone you’d like to meet on a stroll through the woods. The campers were just upstream! We were so thrilled to be seeing real life bears! The mother bear was a cinnamon colour and her cubs were a darker brown but the driver assured us they were all technically black bears (we weren’t colour blind). It was so awesome to see the babies playing together and tumbling all over one another! We were stoked! We did also see marmots sunning themselves on the rocks and I’m sure we’d never seen a marmot before!
It seems it’s quite rare to spot bears from the bus and the park rangers that greeted us at the top of the mountain were jubilant to hear our news! I guess we were meant to be on that bus after all. They equipped us with a map of the area and sent us on our merry way with an abundance of trails to choose from. They also warned us that the safe recommended distance between us and a moose, if we did see one, is the length of two football fields. Don’t mess with the moose! They ‘aint the friendliest critters around.
The Maroon Valley and White River National Forest, surrounded by 14,000 foot peaks and vast fields of wildflowers, was spectacular! We were able to get up close and personal with God’s handiwork and the Maroon Bells themselves – massive grey and red rocky peaks, tipped with snow – stand as a backdrop to the incredibly pretty valley, towering over everything below. Apparently these are the most photographed mountains in all of North America. I can see why! The bell-shaped mountains were mirrored faultlessly in the pristine Maroon Lake and it felt like we were in a Richard Attenborough documentary. It was almost too good to be true! As we wandered around the lake and through meadows of flowers, past rushing creeks and towards the falls, we were astounded at the beauty before us and just kept saying “WOW!” with every bend we rounded. There were cute little wooden bridges crossing the creeks and SO many great photo opportunities! At an elevation of 2880m, we were again feeling the effects of the altitude and huffing and puffing a little more that usual!
Once we’d soaked up all we could of this amazing place, we jumped back on the bus and again kept an eye out for random wildlife along the journey. I saw something big and brown in the river and even though it had its head right down, some of the others on the bus confirmed that it was actually a moose! Cool! I saw a moose! (well I saw a moose’s bum anyway!).
Returning to the Aspen Highlands area (home of the steepest downhill ski slope in America) we lunched at the Ale House at the foot of the Exhibition Chair Lift and Sam had ONE piece of pizza that was easily bigger than his head! Sam was also excited to hear music from 3 Aussie artists while we were there (Flume, Cut Copy and Hermitude)! Made him feel patriotic!
This afternoon I walked into Aspen village to check out the much talked about thrift shops. They were fantastic, living up to their hype, and I did bag a couple of bargains (couldn’t resist!). With our flight to Canada looming tomorrow we were very conscious of how much our bags were going to weigh and whether or not we’d pass the weigh in. With that in mind, I decided to visit the post office and send a few of my heavier purchases home ahead of me to lighten the load. That was not as easy as it sounds. Firstly I lined up for about 10 minutes only to be told I’d have to go away and package everything up before I got to the counter. He sent me on a mission to find a box. There were literally hundreds of boxes to choose from so I chose one I thought would be the right size and went about packing it all up. Out of all those potential boxes to choose, it seemed I’d chosen the wrong one, so after queuing for a further 10 minutes I was told that I’d chosen Express Post and that would cost a couple of hundred dollars to send to Australia! Suddenly that $25 ski jacket wasn’t such a bargain after all! He just told me to get a box. He didn’t say which box! A young couple took pity on me and took it upon themselves to find me the right box and get me sorted. They were so nice! The post office was supposed to close at 5 but I only made it out of there, in a hot and flustered mess, half an hour after closing time!
During my harried time at the post office, one of the postal workers told me that Australia was famous for its poetry in Colorado. I was intrigued that he’d heard Australian poetry and asked him if he’d heard of Banjo Patterson or Henry Lawson. No. He’d never heard of them. He told me there was a group of Australians that recite poetry each week at a secret location in Aspen. Well there you go! Who would have thought?
Sam and I had a very relaxed afternoon by the hotel pool, participating in happy hour and mingling with all our new friends. It has been such a great place to stay and we’ve met some really lovely people. Roger and Jan from Tulsa have taken Sam’s address and email and have invited him to come and stay with them! They were just so nice! We’ll be rather sad to leave Colorado. We’ve had such an amazing time here and have seen more beauty in one place than we’ve seen in a lifetime. I hope one day we can return!
