Estes Park, Colorado

     We left the national park campground to stay in a commercial campground in Estes Park, which was only an 8 mile drive.  The town backs right up onto national park land.  When we got to our new campground home - Spruce Lake RV park, we were too early to check in - the previous tenants had not checked out yet.  So we parked the RV and had coffee and donuts while we read the paper and caught back up on what was happening in the world.  Sometimes no news is good news, but now we are current.  After we had waited about and hour and a half I was getting pretty impatient since there were a number of open sites - apparently we had been somewhat forgotten as other folks checked in.  At last however, we got to our site with a nice view of the mountains on one side and a huge motorcycle trailer on the other.  As we were setting up two elk walked into the campground and decided to eat some grass.  Wildlife really up close and personal.
   After many days of picnic lunches we decided to go into town for lunch.  Yikes!  Sunday traffic in Estes Park is pretty overwhelming.  The main street in Estes Park is also the one of the main roads to the entrance to the park.  Most of the RV's, trucks, campers and cars going to Rocky Mountain drive through Estes.  On top of this are the thousands of folks staying in motels and condos in and around town.  There was no place to park.  We drove around a bit and found ourselves up on the hills above town in the Stanley Historic District.  F.O. Stanley, inventor of the Stanley Steamer car came to Estes Park and built the Stanley hotel.  It is a beautiful white resort hotel overlooking downtown Estes Park.  He developed the resort area as a destination for the tourists who were now arriving by car.  He built the Fall River Hydro plant in 1909 to power the hotel and resort buildings.
    We always like to have a meal at the historic hotels in or near the national parks that we visit so we stopped for a delicious lunch at the Cascade Restaurant in the Stanley Hotel.  Rick had a great clam chowder and I tried an elk burger - mmmm.  The view from the veranda was wonderful so we sat and relaxed for a while after lunch.  Then back downtown where we found parking.  The Fall River goes through town.  A river walk has been developed along it with benches, playgrounds, gardens, and cafes.  A beautiful addition to the town and a place that was less hectic where we could enjoy the beauty of the setting.
   We relaxed at the camper the rest of the afternoon as a sudden shower sent everyone indoors.  I am frustrated that there is almost no phone service still at this campground.  We had to drive a couple miles higher into the hills around town to answer a phone message.  Now my computer has mostly died.  I guess I will resort to the written word.