Day 2 Rocky Mountain National Park

We drove up to Bear Lake on Sunday morning and did a hike to "The Loch". On our way, we stopped to talk about the Colorado River. Tait showed us a map of the Colorado River and its basin and explained the origin. I was surprised to learn that California takes more than their allotment of water, and they also waste a lot of water. They pump it through the desert and then they flood irrigate their crops. I was shocked to learn this because it simply doesn't make any sense. I hope that they start to use more sustainable farming techniques in the near future before the water issue becomes more serious. Another big issue we talked about was how much snow pack we get and how temperatures have changed. The area tends to get spring rain when they have snow pack that is not very compact. This melts the snow quickly instead of it melting slowly and feeding the river throughout the summer. Snow pack has changed by 20%, which will have a large impact on the amount of water that runs through the Colorado river.

During our hike, we noticed trees with bent trunks from the weight of a rock slide:

We also talked about the quaking aspen trees and how they grow from one root system as a colony:

While we were hiking, we met a nice local couple. The gentleman, Don Hoff, was quite knowledgeable on a number of topics. He spoke to us about problems with the Arkansas River shortage from Colorado and how Nebraska things Colorado is "taking" their water. He explained that there have been many lawsuits between Kansas because Colorado was "taking" their water as well. Arizona also sued three times over water rights. Mr. Hoff also spoke to us about fracking and the local controversies surrounding it. He was very realistic in his approach, as he said it isn't always safe, but we use a lot of gas and we have to get it from somewhere. Fracking has been happening here for over 70 years, and nothing is perfect. There's a lot of fracking taking place in Colorado, with new ones popping up more recently. This is controversial because of pollution and the risk it poses to water in the area. Many local people and activists are upset, but Mr. Hoff expressed his thoughts that we have to get it from somewhere and we just have to be more careful.


I really enjoyed our hike to The Loch. The weather was beautiful. It was really nice of Mr. Hoff to stop and talk to us when we had just met him on the trail earlier. I agree with Mr. Hoff's position to some extent. As an environmentalist, it's easy to say, "No fracking!" because of the environmental risks as well as public health risks. However, he is right about how much gas we use regardless, and it has to come from somewhere. He is correct that no energy technology is perfect, and we are going to pollute to some extent no matter what. It's all about keeping things in moderation and being as cautious as possible. I do not think that we are doing that, though. It seems like there are a lot of loopholes going on about safety and things could be better. We don't understand the geology of some of these areas well enough, either. Hopefully we will gain more knowledge about this technology which will allow us to perform fracking in the safest way possible.
After speaking with Mr. Hoff, we saw a "Scrubjay" as he called it- it was a blue bird with a tuft on his head. I took some great pictures of him and The Loch. The hike back was also very enjoyable. Then we hiked around Bear Lake and took our time, which was nice. Afterwards, we stopped at Estes Park to check out the shops and grab dinner. We went into a few nice stores and I bought a pair of earrings. Jess and I shared a BLT from a local food spot. On our walk back to meet the vans, there was a small acoustic concert going on. The man was playing guitar and singing "Country Roads", which is one of my favorite songs. We stopped to listen for a while and watched the sunset. It was a really great first day.