Sunday, August 4, 2013

My first Moose in Colorado!

Last weekend Gary and I went on a camping trip while Brayden stayed home with Grammy and camped out in the backyard.

I had seen pictures, of a friend of mine on Facebook, of her camping trip and the area looked absolutely beautiful.   I told Gary about it and we were totally up for the adventure.  All we knew from what she told me was she camped on the west side of Chambers Lake.  No campground.  So we took off Friday morning looking for our spot to camp.  Unfortunately you can't have open fires so we packed no firewood! :(  It took us about 3 hours.  We first drove past Chambers lake a ways looking for a road that would even take us on the west side of Chambers Lake.  Couldn't find and just kept driving ...

On the drive a deer ran across the road in front of the car in front of us.  So of course we all stopped to watch the deer.  He was gone up the hill.  My husband in the meantime was looking out over the meadow on the opposite side and spotted a big Moose.  I was so EXCITED!  Everyone keeps telling me how many moose they see here in Colorado.  And in my whole life of living here I have never seen them.  I love this animal and just think they are so fascinating so I was pretty happy that we got to see one.  Not just one there were 2 standing together!  Pretty cool!

After watching them for awhile we took off back toward Chambers Lake looking for a camp spot.  The lake campground was completely booked so we drove down the road that goes north of chambers and ran into this beautiful little campground that is pretty tucked away.  It is first come first serve and we got there early enough that we were able to get a great spot!  There was a river and pretty little hiking trail that runs right through the campground.

Our first night we just set up camp and walked around the river and the trail a bit.  OH and since we were in a campground we could have fires!  YAY!!  SMORE'S!! (I won't be able to have these for awhile so I was pretty happy!)  Saturday we wanted to go fishing but because we had driven so far the day before we needed to get gas.  According to our GPS it was only 17 miles to the closest station.  We started that way and kept going and going and going.  We ended up on this dirt road and the GPS kept reconverting to an even further point.  The drive was absolutely beautiful!  We ended up in Walden.  Ya I have never heard of it either.  Filled up on gas and took the highway back that we should have taken.  On our way back we stopped at the Moose Visitor Center.  They have a big board in there that all the rangers write on saying the last place they saw moose and what time.  Kind of cool I thought.  Although you don't really need to look at it. We learned that the area we were in is known as Moose capital of Colorado.  On our way to the lake to fish we saw a bunch of cars stopping.  MOOSE, AGAIN!  There were 3 this time.  They were in this area that had a bunch of hiking trails.  All 3 were down in this meadow below the trails.  So Gary and I thought we would go up behind them on the trails so I could get some pictures.  We walked back in but couldn't get any good shots and didn't see any of them.  On our way back though at one point I looked to my left and not maybe 30 feet away is one of the moose.  I got a few shots and he looked up but then started charging at us!  AHHHH!  Gary took off on the trail back and I just ran for the closest trees behind me.  He went right past me and of course I'm trying to snap shots as he is doing so!  I felt safe where I was at.  The shots were a bit blurry due to my shaking hands, and I couldn't stop laughing(that's what I do when I'm nervous), and trying to hold my bladder!  I seriously almost pee'd my pants!  LOVED IT!  I would do this all over again!

Needless to say we didn't get much fishing in.  We stopped at a little lake and there were way to many flies for me so I wanted to just pack it up and go back to camp!  We enjoyed a nice steak dinner back at camp and then went on a little hike.  After the hike it started sprinkling a little bit.  So we put up a tarp between the trees and took cover next to the fire!  It was nice and warm and cozy!

Sunday - RAIN.  We woke up to it, we had to pack up in it, and we had to drive home in it.  BUT, I didn't care.  We just had such a nice weekend and it was so pretty up there.  The only thing  missing was Brayden.  So we are going back to the same place in a couple weekends and bringing our boy with us this time!!  I hope we have the same luck with seeing all the moose!









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