On the morning of Day 3 we were watching the local Denver news. They kept talking about 6 to 12 inches of mountain snow starting Tuesday and ending on Wednesday. We always joked that maybe we would get snowed in but when we heard that on the news that morning we started to wonder if it might really happen! We drove into Estes Park again on Day 3 to explore some of their "famous" shops. We drove to town at about 9:30 a.m. and the first thing we noticed was how snowy it looked up in the mountains. Even the locals were starting to talk about the snow that was coming!
We just decided that the snow was going to fall whenever it wanted so we started to shop! The first store we hit that morning was the Rocky Mountain Chocolate Factory! We didn't care that it was only 9:30 a.m. We walked around in there taking in all the sweet stuff they had on display. At times like this you really wish they would have free samples :)! We bought a cedar box that said Estes Park on it with 4 chocolates in it. We thought that would be a good souvenir even though we knew the chocolate wouldn't last long :)! Well while we were paying for our little chocolate box we spotted some really awesome looking caramel apples. So of course we both had to have one! Boy oh Boy were those delicious! Nothing like a good caramel apple to wake you up in the morning!
After eating our apples we went into the Stanley museum. This was a museum all about the guy who invented the Stanley steamer or something like that. This Stanley guy also has a HUGE hotel that is pretty famous in Estes Park and I guess it's even been in a few movies. We didn't go tour the hotel but we took pictures of it. 
As we were walking back to the car we stopped to look at some deer that were just hanging out in the middle of the grass in the parking lot! There are creatures everywhere in Estes Park...it's unbelievable! I think these deer were even posing for us :)! We also hit this really good shake shoppe. Again nothing like a thick creamy shake to get your blood pumping in the morning (and your arteries clogged too)! They were excellent!!After stuffing our faces we decided to venture a little further into Estes Park. Boy are we glad we did! We came up over this hill and down below us was a street lined with little shops on both sides! Jeff thinks there was at least 100 of these shops! JACKPOT!! We found a parking spot and started walking! I think we darn near hit every shoppe along both sides of the street! We bought tons of cabin decor items so we could start re-decorating our house in a cabin theme. We also bought some salt water taffy (Heather and Linda told us it wouldn't be a trip to Estes Park without trying some of this taffy). They were right...it sure was yummy! We shopped until at least 1 p.m. and then went back to the cabin to grab a quick lunch (pizza) and head out to the National Park.
We weren't quite sure what would be going on in the National Park with the snow going on in the mountains. Down in the lower elevations it wasn't doing anything...in fact the sun was out. 
We stopped to take pictures of the Elk that were grazing in this one spot in the park. There were tons of people parked there 
with us taking pictures and video. It was quite the sight! We took a few different roads while we were in the National Park. Each one was just breathtaking. We just kept driving higher and higher and higher! The weather was changing too! It was snowing like crazy up in the higher elevations! Boy are we glad we took our winter coats! 
We finally got to a sign that said we were 2 miles above sea level and decided to turn around! It was snowing pretty good at this point! We didn't feel like sliding off a cliff on our vacation! 
It was nuts to look down and realize just how high we truly were! I freaked out a few times because I hate looking down and seeing how high we were! It was truly very beautiful though! We stopped at 
a stream that was so clear and the sound of it was awesome! It sounded like one of those nature CD's! 
We ended up driving on some other roads and finding a lake called Bear Lake that was pretty high up. It's nuts to see these lakes on the top of a mountain! We found all the hiking trails but at this point it was dusk and it was raining so we decided next time we will hit the trails!
We left the National Park at about 6 p.m. It is something neither one of us will forgot and we sure can't wait to go back! 
We went back to the cabin and had supper and hung out in the hot tub...we just kept thinking that we couldn't believe that we had to leave already in the morning! Why do vacations go so darn fast? I think we were secretly wishing the snow would strand us at our lovely cabin but we didn't get so lucky. We can't wait to go back to Estes Park and explore all the things we didn't get to see!More to come...I'll talk about our drive home in the next posting! God's blessings to you all!
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