Imagine leaving the Black Hills and travelling 387 miles SW to Estes Park, CO. Sounds like a nice road trip, right? Except, you’re pulling a 45′ 5th wheel with a Ram 3500 Mega Cab that only has a 28 gallon fuel tank! Keep in mind my truck is getting about 6 mpg because of the mountains and the headwind! Yes, we nearly ran out of fuel in the middle of nowhere Wyoming! The truck literally died as soon as I pulled up to the pumps! Poor Aiden had developed permanent paranoia until we bought the F350; it has a 45 gallon tank!
So, yeah, that was a fun start to the Colorado trip. We picked Estes Park for 2 reasons; A. We really like Estes Park because of its proximity to the Rocky Mtn National Park and B. Aiden wanted to visit The Stanley for his birthday. Lindsay and I visited Estes Park a few years back after a group trip to Moab, UT to ride the iconic trails.
If you don’t know where Estes Park is, it’s about an hour and a half northwest of Denver. It’s a very picturesque town with some good local shopping, Elk roaming around town, an awesome rock/mineral store and its the gateway to Rocky Mountain National Park. This is also where the Stanley Hotel is located, and is said to be one of the most haunted hotels in the United States.
We stayed a week at Yogi Bear’s Jellystone Park Camp-Resort in Estes Park. It’s a little tight in a few spots if you’re a considered a “big rig” like us however, we were there during their off-season, so it wasn’t busy at all. Aiden had pretty much free run at the mini golf course. The nights were nice and cool for campfires and the location was only 5.5 miles from Estes Park.
If you go in to town you are likely going to see Elk, we saw several of them just wandering around town and luckily it wasn’t rut; rut was the week after we left. When Elk are in rut, they are very unpredictable! Unfortunately, there are people that will get out of their vehicles to see if they can get closer to the animals! Please don’t do that! Though beautiful creatures, Elk are still wild animals and should be treated with respect at a distance.
We stopped at Lindsay’s favorite rock shop, Red Rose Rock Shop. They have a large selection of raw minerals and polished minerals both small and very large. If you’re in Estes Park and like this sorta thing, stop by and check it out. After that, we went to Rocky Mountain National Park. There are so many trails to hike, overlooks to stop at, meadows to gaze over and the scenery is beautiful no matter when you go. We’ve been there in April when snow is still piled up and in October before the snow begins and its beauty never ceases to amaze us. Please be aware that you do need to get passes to enter the park and you’ll need passes to drive certain roads. These passes must be purchased ahead of time. You can go to the Rocky Mountain National Park website to book all of the pass times and see all of the available time slots. We drove up Bear Lake Rd but we didn’t get to hike up to Bear Lake because we couldn’t find anywhere to park; this is always a challenge when your primary vehicle is a dually. We wanted to hike up to Bear Lake then over to Lake Haiyaha. Again, we were there in off-season and parking was still a problem! Just be aware and plan accordingly; we certainly didn’t expect it.
Since we could not participate in our planned hike, we decided to hike a portion of the Mill Creek Trail, entering at the Hollowell Park location. This was a pretty easy walk/hike across the meadow and along Mill Creek through the valley. As you got further back into the valley, we started to notice the trees were black. Upon further inspection, we realized that this was a spot that a wild fire had ravaged thru at some point in time. Being as we were in the western US, we were aware of the wildfire risks however, seeing the charred remnants of the forest amongst the new growth, showed us the resilience of mother nature in an up close and more personal way.
Aiden had been wanting to visit The Stanley Hotel for quite some time as he had started watching some of the paranormal folks on YouTube a year or so before. Since it was getting closer to his 13th birthday, we decided to purchase tickets for the night time haunted tour. Although we didn’t experience anything paranormal, we did learn some interesting facts about the hotel, got to go the basement where some of the original tunnels still exist, behind the scenes of the auditorium and our tour guide told us about some of the not-so-alive permanent residents. The Stanley Hotel’s architecture is stunning! Haunted or not, it has some amazing history and strikes aww upon entering.
There are 3 stories that stand out:
- Lucy, believed to be 13-16 years old, was possibly an orphan runaway. She secretly slept in the Concert Hall basement until she was found and kicked out. Sadly, she froze to death on the property. Lucy’s ghost is often seen in the basement but dislikes photos. Some have claimed to capture glimpses of her. During tours, guides hand out suckers, and some believe Lucy interacts by moving them. We didn’t experience this.
- While on the tour, we ended in the main hotel basement. This is where a tall black male figure is said to be watching over the tunnels that used to connect the hotel to various building on the property. He sometimes will appear to be rushing toward you while in the basement. We didn’t experience that either, but the basement is definitely a creepy place!
- The 3rd one is probably the creepiest to me. Supposedly there is a 7′ to 8′ shadow figure with green eyes in the basement hallway of the Concert Hall. There are reports of it physically touching people and leaving scratches. This one definitely had my goosebumps on high alert!
Whether you believe in the paranormal entities or not; The Stanley Hotel is one of the creepiest places I’ve visited. Although we didn’t personally experience any activity or have any interactions doesn’t mean we don’t believe. I definitely believe there are spirits or entities there, they just didn’t wanna come say hi that night! I cant say I blame them, as the constant flow of tourists ensured a wide array of energies constantly flowing throughout the property. While you’re at the Stanley, make sure you grab a bite at The Post which is one of the restaurants on the property. It definitely did not disappoint!
We want to say thank you for taking the time to explore our website and for reading our blogs. These first few blogs are just the beginning our our journey and there are many more to come!
Discover more from Getaway Gosses
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
