Our second trip into Rocky Mountain National Park

To see much of the sights of the park it is necessary to do some hiking.  In 1964 ninety-five percent of the park was protected by the Wilderness Act.  In 2009 President Obama signed into law another wilderness act, protecting it even further.  No further roads or buildings may be constructed in the park.  On another note, the park is celebrating its centennial birthday, it was dedicated in September of 1915.

We did a full day of serious hiking Monday, despite a forecast predicting that the first of the monsoon  season was to start.  Pictured above is Bear Lake, with Hawlett Peak looming over it.  Mountaineer F.Chapin named it for his guide William Hallet in 1887.  From this lake we also had a good view of Longs Peak, the northernmost so-called fourteener" peak rising above 14,00  feet (according to park brochure).  We did not realize we were looking at the peak here until we bought a book on Bear Lake after the hike.

After we hiked Bear Lake the skies were overcast and rumbles of thunder could be heard.  We thought perhaps we could to a short hike to Nymph or Dream Lakes, but then on our way to them we saw signs pointing to Albert Falls, a further distance away.  By then the sun came out again and we decided to head for the falls.  Our path took us first to a steep rocky canyon with a mountain stream rushing down it.  We thought we were getting closer to the falls but we still had a distance to go.  It started sprinkling.

We made it to the falls and it started raining harder.  We pulled out our rain ponchos, but by the time we got them on we were just dealing with little sprinkles and the sky cleared up.  We headed back and, since the weather seemed to have improved, we decided to hike to Nymph Lake.  We knew that it would be a hard upward climb back to Bear Lake, and because of the uncertainty of the weather, we turned of the path and boarded a shuttle back to Bear Lake. From there we hiked to Nymph Lake.

The beauty of this lake are the many yellow water lilies floating on it.  By this time it was getting late in the day and time to head for home.  I still have more pictures to show of our day in the park, they will be in the next posting.