Two Pitches and Buena Vista

We drove south into Boulder and up into Boulder Canyon looking to do our first Multi-Pitch climb of the trip, 'The Young and The Rackless'.  Usually when doing anything new climbing-wise, its wise to keep the climbing easy to minimise the time and risk in learning new things.  Unfortunately, the only multi pitch sport route in the area was a 5.9 that was originally rated a 10b since it was more difficult for shorter folks.

Beta Photo from Mountain Project.  The climb is on the Upper East Face. 

Welcome to Colorado!

Wyoming treated us well, even through the final BLM campsite where we stayed.  It was a beautiful park nestled in the cottonwood trees.  The nearby river was cool and we spent a good bit of time with our feet in the water trying to stay cool.

Our campsite in Wyoming.  It was the first camp we visited managed by the Bureau of Land Management and not the National Park service or Forest Service. 

That put us in a good position to drive into Colorado.  Driving through some rain showers, we made our way to the western side of Rocky Mountain National Park near Granby, CO.  We met an unusually friendly and well-dressed ranger, who approached us at a picnic area to ask if we had any questions, and invited the nearby kids to be junior rangers.  We thought it was a bit out of the ordinary, and the shock red mutton chops and NPS issue tie might have contributed a bit to the weirdness.

On the way up the road, we saw a bit of a moose hiding in the plants.  After our sighting in Canada, we were unimpressed with only partial moose sightings, so we moved on in a hurry.  The famous Trail Ridge Road wound up the mountain and landed us at the mountaintop visitor center.  We found a cool short walk nearby out to a "Mountain Index" which helped us to see prominent features by lining up our eyes with the compass marks.

Adrianne overlooking the Colorado river at RMN Park

 

Joey checking out the Mountain Index that pointed out all of the nearby mountain peaks.