Kid, candy store
Estes Park is a beach town. No, I haven’t lost all sense of geography. It just has the same kind of feel. It has the many crafty stores, and, most importantly, the t-shirt shops. It’s a touristy town, but also a really fun place to walk around. It has a mini river walk which parallels the main drag (Elkhorn Avenue). Many shops and restaurants open on both the street and the walk by the river.
Our campground is a half mile from Rocky Mountain National Park and a little less than a mile from town. We took a quick trip to the Beaver Meadows visitor center in order to figure out what to do for the next two days. It won’t be complicated: look around; enjoy beauty.
We drove into town, parked, and raced over to the Scandanavian festival. We watched some folk dancing and heard folk tunes played on an accordian. (One of the greatest instruments ever, right Emma?) The arts and crafts booths were filled with jewelry, wooden statuettes, walking sticks, dolls, and gnomes. Gnomes are to Scandanavia what kokopelli is to the Southwest: ubiquitous. They are the go-to cultural emblems for gifts and souvenirs.
I prefer edible souvenirs. The food booth was out of sauerkraut, but I still got a Swedish sausage on a bun. It was great — Danine liked it to. According to the food booth guy, the meat is ground with potato, making a sweet and mild sausage with a distinctive flavor. It is possible that it contains gnomes, but I could not confirm this.
River walk
We walked from shop to shop. Danine bought a lovely dress. Elise bought a bag of candy. I almost bought a hat, but didn’t. Then we walked a mile to church. Last week we went to Our Lady of the Woods. This week it was Our Lady of the Mountains. I can only assume next week will be Our Lady of the Plains. After Mass we strolled along the river walk and found ourselves at Poppy’s where we consumed vast amounts of good food. Poppy’s has a really long and elaborate beer list. This is good, but can be a bit of a stumbling block unless you’re decisive. We did pretty well. Danine had a stout and I had an English style bitter.
A little more walking helped our digestion after dinner and then we went home. The best part of our campground is also the best part of Estes Park: from most places you can see snowy mountains rising up before you. Boy, I wish they’d put a few of those just west of Washington, DC — or maybe on top of Washington, DC.
