September 11-13, Maroon Bells, Colorado

The weather is cooling.  Clouds and rain are returning

We went up to the Maroon Bells to see if the moose was out, but he was not. The trees seem to be changing very quickly now. Rain clouds over the bus.

Got some chores done around the house. John removed the window treatment so I could recover the valance. It went very smoothly except in the last step where John had to get the curtain back into the clips. It did not go smoothly. I didn’t know John knew that many swear words. We went for a hike in the late afternoon. It was raining.  Rain on the Bells.

We went to Stein meadow. A stream in the meadow. Clouds clearing.

The light was magical late afternoon light on the meadow and small pond. We got a lovely rainbow, landing on the golden aspens.

Rainbow over the pond. Notice the C of golden aspen. John says it is for Colorado. Pond outlet. There are monkey flowers in the foreground, but they don’t show up in the photo.

Red grass backlit. I couldn’t find John. He is in this second photo.

Right here in the tall grass and daisies.  Clear skies lured us to take off our rain coats.

We hike up the West Maroon Portal trail. Most of it was through changing aspens. It began to rain. We had not hiked that trail before and it was longer than we thought. The Bells under clouds again. When the clouds blew away there was snow on them.

We went back in the morning to catch the sunrise with the snow, but it was overcast so no rosey bells. It is a very popular spot for sunrise photos. The moose moved down to Stein meadow, it may have been in the trees when we were there yesterday.