Rocky Mountain National Park – Grand Lake, Big Meadows

Following  our 98.1% conquest of Mt. Bierstadt (% conquest = 13,800 ft reached / 14,060 ft total elevation), we bolted for Grand Lake, a small touristy village nestled right next to the only Rocky Mountain National Park (RMNP) west side entrance.  Approximately 2 hours from Mt. Bierstadt, as we approached Grand Lake we passed the larger Granby and Shadow Mountain lakes.  We had booked our temporary residence via AirBnB and it turned out to be a nice little 5 room inn above a renovated bar in the village called The World’s End.  Sadly, Mt. Bierstadt had gotten the best of Brad and he was overcome with neckburn and dehydration our evening in Grand Lake.  With Brad incapacitated for the night, Erin used her super gal powers to revive him and purchased 3 flatbread pizzas for approximately $21 from the bar downstairs.  For staying upstairs we got a nice 15% discount…which we guess saved us about $2.50.  Success? Success!

We woke up the next morning rejuvenated from our much needed evening of sloth and walked around Grand Lake.  It’s a quaint, though slightly touristy mountain village with a main street full of little trinket stores, tourist bars, and ice cream shops.

Next we made our way to the RMNP west entrance just a short drive away.  We stopped momentarily at the Kawuneeche visitor center to see if they had any free maps,  however woe and behold they were not free.  That’s ok, because it turns out when we bought our $35 entrance fee for the week-long pass to RMNP (we knew we would be back in the park the next day) we were given a brochure with a handy map of the Trail Ridge Road and surrounding trails, which would come in handy in case our cell phones lost connection of course.

Our goal for day 4 was another hike and then to drive the Trail Ridge Road to our next destination, Estes Park.   After the Goliath of a hike on Mt. Bierstadt the day prior, we needed a more gentle jaunt.

Erin chose the Green Mountain Trail leading to Big Meadows as our journey and destination in hopes of seeing some wildlife.  It was only a 1.8 mile hike each way with no more than 600 ft in elevation gain.  Interestingly that elevation seemed to come all at once near the beginning of the hike! Thankfully the trail to the meadow was moderately well covered with trees and provided spurts of much needed shade.

We arrived at the meadow and personally (this is Brad speaking) it was more impressive than expected.  Not in a ‘wow’ kind of way but an ‘ah’ kind of way, just a relaxed, good nature feel to it.  A nice babbling stream running through the middle added some character.

We hiked across the meadow and started circling around the other side after a fellow hiker had revealed a moose sighting!  We like moose!   We continued our hike around the meadow for nearly a half mile.  We were losing hope of seeing the moose ourselves when out of the blue Brad spotted a male moose through the trees with his male and female friend behind him.  We didn’t expect the moose to come close to us because the stream was right in front of  us.  But it turns out moose fear nothing and they confidently strode right past us through the water.  Erin thought they might attack us.  But we are writing this blog post now so we guess that didn’t happen.

Our moose sighting complete, we felt as though we conquered the Big Meadow and retraced our steps to our car.  However, to our great surprise, right at the entrance, another moose appeared out of nowhere, jumped onto the trail, and began walking down the path towards us. At first it seemed that the moose was going to walk right up to us, but as we stood frozen, we noticed a photographer had joined us as well as a family with two little boys. The commotion was enough to send the moose veering off the path back into the woods. After all of that excitement, we walked out into the parking lot, thankful that our wildlife sightings were moose and not the bear that signs warned us had recently entered the area. At this point, we were ready to let our feet rest as we drove the Trail Ridge Road.

Overall, the Big Meadows hike was very satisfying.  Easy enough for all ages!