Mt. Evans is about 2.5 hrs from Ft. Carson. Funny story, I was getting my hair done last july at this cute little salon. My hairdresser & I were discussing Colorado wildlife and i was telling her we haven't seen rocky mtn goats yet! She suggested we drive up Mt. Evans and we would see some. So I went home and googled Mt. Evans and have been wanting to go since last summer.
This is Summit Lake. Despite it being a bit of a hazy, rainy day; the views were glorious!
And then I spotted these guys! We had stopped in a little visitor lodge for bathrooms and Michael picked out a rocky mtn goat ornament. He made a deal with me that we'd come back and buy the ornament if we spotted some goats. Well to my great pleasure we saw two different herds! The first herd i spotted because they were moving down the side of the mountain. They're pretty ragged right now, working on losing their heavy winter coats.
There were even babies!
Love
Climbing rocks at the top
Alpine flowers. Mike says these flower pics are for TP ;)
Evie, Gabe & Mike did the final hike to the top. Prego (me) waited in the truck. I was having a little trouble with the altitude
Cuties were troopers. It was 45 degrees and high winds up there. I made a rookie mistake and didn't bring them warmer clothes.
View at the top
The black things are crows
That's the "we just spotted another herd of mtn goats" smile
They blend in extremely well
We loved the little babies hopping around
This is a massive herd of Elk down in the valley. They were wayyyy down the mtn in their own private spot.
My new favorite wildflower: The Rosy Paintbrush
Can you spot the animal in this picture?
Pica!
View of Echo Lake
Yellow-bellied Marmot
Bottle brush pine trees
If you're in Colorado, go do the drive up Mt. Evans. It's phenomenal! Now the last big colorado animals I need to see are mountain lions and bears. Not sure where we'll see those ;) Oh and we didn't get the ornament, it was sold out when we stopped by the lodge again. But we did get baby Nulk a little stuffed mtn goat for his cradle.
