Estes Park, Colorado Part 2

Ok - I got some sleep and can post about the rest of our trip now...we had a great time seeing the Rocky Mountain National Park - it was only 5 minutes from our house so we got to explore that park and see TONS of elk. They told us that this time of year the male elks are basically recruiting thier "harem" (elk term for band 'o ladies). You could see groups of elk with one large male and tons of females. They would buggle to call thier lady friends and me and mom joked that we would run if we were them! :) Here are some elk pics...
We had so much fun watching these huge animals - they were everywhere including our yard and the grocery store! Makes publix back home look a little lame with no elk lying in the parking lot!Em and Jonas came out and joined us on Thursday and we had a few great days with them, they are so fun! We spent Friday in Colorado Springs going up the cog railway to Pikes Peak and then hiking around Garden of the Gods. Here are a few pics from our trip up to Pikes Peak...This was a beautiful lake we saw on the way up to the peak - I never think of lakes being tucked away in the mountain peaks but we saw several. It was surrounded by evergreens - isn't God just beautiful?View from the top with my new super duper zoom lens! These mountains were miles away.

Em, me, and mom on the top - it was VERY cold - but not as windy as it could have been so we got lucky. Don't worry - we all filled up with hot chocolate and donuts for the trip back down the mountain!

Here are some pictures from Garden of the GodsMatt, me, Em and J in front of balancing rockJonas getting adventurous in a no tresspassing zone!

Em made us do this trying to get cheesy prego pics, I actually thought this was cute.

We also had a couple of hikes in the Rocky Mountain park that were much more snowy than we thought they would be. The first day we went everything was COVERED in snow and ice - we were at about 10,000 feet elevation so the snow had really come into the mountain already. Once Em and J got there a lot of it had melted but we did find one lake that was already 1/2 way frozen!

Em and Jonas pondering the half frozen lake.Winter wonderland!

Thanks mom and dad for getting an incredible house for us to vacation in this fall. It was a great trip and I'm so thankful I got to visit Colroado with Matt before little girl gets here!