Having hiked in the Rocky Mountain National Park many, many times over the years one sad aspect to my trips has been watching areas slowly turning brown as the ongoing outbreak of mountain pine beetles takes its toll.

Most of our camping was done in the Kawuneeche Valley area of the Never Summer Mountains North of Granby. Sights included areas known as Little Yellowstone, Sawmill Creek, and Skeleton Gulch - plus several populations of Elk.

Most people know the valley as the headwaters of the Colorado River, which begins in a marshy area just below La Poudre Pass.

Of course like everything else in the Colorado River's journey to the sea people have made things complicated. A structure called the Grand Ditch was dug by hand in the 1890s before the National Park was created. The structure collects water from snow melt on the west side of the continental divide and carries it across the divide to people and farms in the east.

One of our stops while hiking in this area was at the abandoned remains of Lulu City, which for a few years in the late 1800s was a bustling town of 200 people that had a hotel, lumber mill, and post office. The humans abandoned the settlement as soon as it became clear that silver mining wouldn't be profitable, but the area continues to have plenty of wildlife including Yellow Bellied Marmots, Least Chipmunks, trout, and the usual complement of squirrels and song birds.

We spent the our remaining time exploring the area around the Cow Creek Trailhead North of Estes Park. Sights included the Lost Meadow camp sites and views of the Mummy Range.

As always I took a few pictures of Warren as he hiked, rested, and attempted to navigate. And he took one of me at the airport as I was collecting my bags.

Panoramic images were created using the Pandora plugin for GIMP.

Last Updated: 12/6/2015 - Anthony Anderberg - ant@anderbergfamily.net