To Go or Not to Go. That is the Question!
Blue Sky Mornings on Old Fall River Road
I wasn’t going out that morning even though the days are all amazing in Rocky Mountain National Park. Especially blue sky mornings with a slight wind as the summer nears the fall. But, 5:00 AM comes early, so that night, as I went to bed, I begged my dogs to let me sleep until 6:30 AM. They looked at me with sweet faces and cocked heads.
At 4:45 AM, Aspen came up laying on my pillow, her body wrapped around my head like a warm stocking hat. Then little Maggie climbed onto my chest and laid there offering gentle licks to my chin that in dog language said, “Time to get up.” So…I shook myself awake, still dreaming of 6:30.
After five minutes of petting and rubbing my pups, I reached over picking up my phone. An unseen, late night text from a photographer friend. “I’ll be at the Fall River Visitor Center at 6:00 AM, if you want to cruise to the top.” Awake in the dark bedroom, I thought of the blue sky with the sunrise hitting 12,000 ft. peaks and elk on the tundra. I texted back, “See you at 6:00.”
An hour later, my camera gear was shifted to his car, and we headed excited into the park. Soon we were standing on the roadside, our cameras capturing a large bull moose feeding in the willows. He was a beautiful specimen of power, his full grown antlers covered in deep brown and white marbled velvet. “Nice start,” I said. “Amazing,” my friend answered.
As we drove Horseshoe Park, I scanned the chokecherry bushes for black bears entering hyperphagia, gorging themselves in preparation for hibernation. But the spring had been dry, the chokecherries thin, and the berries slow to ripen.
When we hit Old Fall River Road at 6:30 AM, the sun had just begun to touch the peaks of the tundra. Climbing upward on the one-way dirt trail, I commented my thanks to the park service for grading the dirt road’s curves.
It was a beautifully serene drive up the switchbacks to the meandering curves within the thick forest. Our eyes searching, my friend asked, “See any wildlife,” I smiled, “Unlike my dogs, most moose understand sleeping until sunrise.” He laughed. I knew Aspen and Maggie were back in bed sleeping comfortably. The thought made me yawn.
We stopped just past the four mile marker, scanning a distant willow field across the valley. A monster bull moose was feeding, his head and antlers tall above the willow bushes. “I took his picture in May when his antlers were stubs,” I commented. “Now look at him. Thirty-five pounds of bone with ten tine points on each huge paddle.”
Past five miles, we walked Willow Park, but the willows were all nubs from years of moose and elk enjoying their meals. Still, the serenity was welcome as we stood in the middle of the field listening to the quiet. That in itself was rewarding.
When we reached the eight mile curve on the tundra, we stood overlooking the massive bowl below the Alpine Visitor Center. “There,” I pointed, “three bull elk.” My friend motioned up on the mountainside. “Another with a harem.” Then we both broke into wide smiles hearing the first bull elk bugle of the season.
A friendly photographer behind a tripod told us, “There, not very far down.” Looking, I saw their heads poking from the dense greenery. A cow moose and healthy calf living comfortably at the edge of the tundra.
Then we heard the clattering to our right. Even closer, four medium sized 5x5 bull elk about 600 pounds each, two of them spared, proving their tenacity for the rut. They quickly grabbed our camera’s attention. We were quiet, the cameras were whirling, and the elk antlers were clattering.
I looked behind me, seeing two doe mule deer running up the hill. Focusing my camera on their eyes, I captured a couple of shots. Then I heard, “Brad, coyotes.” Looking across the bowl above the clattering elk, four coyotes ran down the mountainside. I watched, waiting until three stopped, two laying down, and I raised my camera. With the sunshine on my back, the browns of the tundra beautifully camouflaged the canines on the distant mountain.
From that one point on the tundra along the Old Fall River Road curve, We’d captured an elk harem, bull elk sparing, a mother moose and calf feeding, deer backlite in the morning sunlight, and coyotes resting on the mountain side.
My friend asked, “Was this worth getting up for?” My smile said it all as I quietly thanked Aspen and Maggie.
