Rocky Mountain National Park Trip 2025

At the end of June, less than a week after Allison and I returned from Niagara Falls and the boys returned from Young Men's Camp, we took a trip up to Rocky Mountain National Park. It's the National Park closest to us, yet we'd been to every other Colorado National park except Rocky Mountain. I wasn't going to let another summer pass by without going!

We stayed in Silverthorne, CO the first night so Oscar could run the Slacker 1/2 Marathon in Georgetown. We left after Oscar finished up a few hours of work on Friday June 27th, stopped for Vietnamese food in Lakeside, then continued west until we reached Copper Mountain. It was still mud season when we were in the area during our Breckenridge trip, and with Silverthorne being only 10 minutes away, I figured we should go experience their summer activity pass.  

We arrived just after 3:00pm, the kids and I did the bunjee trampoline, then we all went up the scenic chairlift. Most of the activities didn't close until 7:00pm, but the last ride up the chairlift was 4:00pm, so we needed to hop on it right away. The only reason we did the bunjee trampoline first is that Oscar forgot his hat and walked back to the parking lot to get it while the rest of us jumped.

There's a pretty lookout at the top of the lift where we got some cute photos. There was a family reunion group who'd just taken a big family photo, and they offered to take our photo for us. 

We were hoping to ride down in the open chairs, which they offered for the way up, but on the way down they required you take the enclosed gondolas. They were pretty hot and stuffy in the summer, but I'm sure they're great for skiers in the winter. I would have preferred the open gondola since you see the view better on the way down.

Then it was time for the main attraction - the copper mountain coaster. It's the 2nd longest mountain coaster in the US. It was super fun, but I wish they had a way to let you do it more than once without paying full price. Most other places with mountain coasters and alpine slides offer multi-use or unlimited passes. Copper's is $30 for a single ride or 1 single ride is part of the summer day pass. 

The kids then did the Ninja course while we talked to Oscar's mom who'd given us a call. I wanted to do the course with them when they were finished, but they were too exhausted to do it again.

We wanted to go on the bumper boats next, but we couldn't find them and ended up going on the Go Karts. Unfortunately a lot of their cars were down, there was a line in front of us and they let you drive for about 10 minutes, so the line moved slowly out in the hot sun. It was also pretty far from where everything else was. 

We did eventually find the bumper boats. They were close to where most of the other activities were, but the route there from the main square was definitely a bit hidden. We'd done bumper boats before, but it was fun to be out in a natural body of water rather than in a man made pool. I just wish we'd found them sooner so we could have cooled off before waiting in line for the go karts. 

Oscar did his race the next morning, the kids and I sat in the hot tub at the Silverthorne Inn, and we enjoyed beautiful scenery on the way up to Rocky Mountain National Park. Thankfully they let us check out a little late so Oscar could get a shower in before our big drive.

Here's lovely lake Granby

We got some tasty Mexican food for lunch, then we entered the park through the Grand Lake entrance. I'd had Adam's Falls on my list to see, but I hadn't realized it was actually in the city of Grand Lake, not in Rocky Mountain National Park. We realized it after looking at the map once we were well inside the park, and we didn't want to go back out. We'll have to see Adam's Falls some other time and explore more of Grand Lake. 

After about 20 minutes we saw several people on the side of the road and stopped to see what was going on. They were looking at a moose down in the valley. Another tourist let us borrow her binoculars so we could get a close look.

We kept driving to see more beautiful views. We also saw a mother moose with her baby, but by the time we got out of the car they were in the trees. We could still see them in and out as they walked through it, but I didn't even try to take a picture since it was so obscure.

But we hit the jackpot after stopping to take a hike at Lake Irene. There was a bull moose in the meadow not far from the trail! It was about as close as I've ever been to a moose. 

I thought this lake was just okay, but it'd been listed as an easy hike for kids, so I put it on our list. The close up view of the bull moose definitely made the hike!

After our hike we stopped off to see this beautiful view. The family stayed in the car and Oscar got back in after taking this photo of me, but then I noticed that there were a lot of people pulled off and no one was looking at the beautiful view. I turned to see what they were looking at...

And to my delight they were looking at elk! I'd never seen elk outside of a zoo before, and here were several majestic bull elk relaxing and grazing on the hill! I made the family get out of the car and admire them.

A large part of the reason for this trip was that I was really hoping to see elk in the wild. Check and mate! I didn't want to leave.

But eventually we had to get back on the road. Our next stop was at the Alpine Visitor Center where the kids got their Jr Ranger badges. At RMNP they give the badges out before the kids complete the books so the rangers know to talk to them.

While we were there we took a hike up Huffers Hill to the park's highest point. The trailhead is right in the Alpine Visitor's Center parking lot.

It was much harder than it looked. Hiking at that steep a grade while at over 12,000ft in altitude will really work your lungs! 

Oscar took these photos of me on our way back down the stairs.

We continued our drive to Estes Park enjoying many beautiful lookouts along the way.

As we pulled into town, we saw a female moose just walking along the road. I didn't get a picture of her since the view was too brief as we drove, but Oscar saw a female elk cross the road on his way to pick up pizza. 

We stayed at the Expedition Estes lodge for the next two nights, which was a decent resort. There was an arcade, board games, a swimming pool, and they had a big breakfast each morning. One of the options was Green Chili with elk jerky!

The next day was our Bear Lake Corridor day. We parked at the park and ride lot and took the shuttle to the Alberta Falls Trailhead. The kids enjoyed spying ground squirrels on the trail.

And here we are at beautiful Alberta Falls. It was definitely worth the hike!

We stayed there for awhile just admiring the view. Oscar ventured out closer to the river to get photos from a few different lookouts.

I took a photo for a girl hiking on her own, and she got these cute family pictures for us. I think we got more family pictures here at Rocky Mountain National Park than the vast majority of our other vacations.

We could have hiked back out and taken the shuttle to Bear Lake, but we could also hike to Bear Lake from where we were. We stayed on the trails since it wasn't much further than hiking back to the shuttle. And bear lake was beautiful! Admittedly Rocky Mountain Alpine lakes are not as beautiful as those in the Pacific northwest, but the mountain views surrounding them are quite lovely. 

We also walked around bear lake. As we were walking we saw a couple on this rock who insisted it was a much better view from there. They were right, and they took some more family pictures for us.

These are some of my favorite family photos on this big rock close to the lake. Another family had been they're taking pictures, and they kindly got one for us. We also ran into them randomly at our next stop - Sprague Look.

We looped around then took the shuttle back to the park and ride. We were going to Sprague Lake next, but the shuttle to it only runs once an hour. We got back in our car instead, and thankfully there were some parking spots left in the Sprague Lake lot.

Once at Sprague Lake we almost got on the wrong, much longer trail along with the family who'd taken photos for us at Bear Lake. Thankfully Oscar read the map and informed everyone that we'd inadvertently turned the wrong direction away from the lake instead of towards it.

Sprague Lake didn't seem all that impressive at first, but then you walk across to the other side of the lake, turn around, and see this gorgeous mountain view.

After our hike at Sprague Lake, we walked back to the car and left the bear lake corridor. We'd missed one area of the park the day before (the curvy portion going towards the Fall River Visitor's Center). There was one waterfall we hadn't seen on the Alluvial Fan trail, so we took the short hike up to it. The kids stopped here where the trail ends, so they only saw it from the photo on the left. Oscar and I scrambled up a bit further to get an unobstructed view. It really wasn't much further from where the kids got to (maybe 10% more of a short hike), and we could see them easily from where we were, but they were completely spent. 

Technically this waterfall is called Horseshoe Falls, but you could only see its horseshoe shape if you were looking at it with an aerial view. I called it Alluvial Fan Falls, which is also what I saw it referred to online when I was looking up RMNP waterfalls. 

We'd hoped to see Rocky Mountain bighorn sheep and drove through the Sheep Lakes area. The guidebook says the sheep often come off the mountain to drink water from the lakes, but we didn't see any. We then stopped at the Visitor's Center so the kids could finish their books and get sworn in, and the ranger told me the sheep don't come out much. She said there'd only been two sightings that day so far. 

We were pretty exhausted from all that hiking, so we went back to the hotel and chilled the rest of the day. The kids just wanted to watch a show and eat leftover pizza and pasta, so we left them there while Oscar and I got yummy Indian food and picked up ice cream at the store.

It rained quite a bit after we got back to the room. We'd considered going to the Mustang Mountain Coaster for their evening deal ($12 a ride after 5:00pm), but the rain was intense and didn't clear up until 5:00pm, so we went in the morning instead. During the evening I took Allison to the hotel pool while Oscar and Tyler played chess in the game room.

The next morning I woke up before everyone else and went down to breakfast. Out the window I saw several female elk and their babies. My photos are really zoomed in here since I was 3 tables away from the window, but I'm pretty sure that's 4 females and 3 babies. That was definitely worth waking up early for! We also saw a couple more later in the day as we were driving out of Estes Park.

Here we are at the Mustang Mountain coaster.Allison had been able to ride her own coaster at Copper Mountain, but here the requirement is 56 inches, so she had to be a passenger. The vehicle definitely gets going much faster with a passenger and having that extra weight.

The benefit for her being the passenger is that she got to go on the coaster 3 times while the rest of us could only do it twice with their two for one deal. Oscar went once by himself and once with Allison while I went both times with Allison.

From there we drove down to Lily Lake. It's part of Rocky Mountain National Park, but you don't have to go in one of the entrances that requires a timed permit. 

We saw a marmot (?) swimming towards the end of our loop around the lake.

Without those clouds there would be a mountain peak view, but they didn't clear for a couple more hours.

Then we drove to the Ouzel Falls trailhead. The ranger told us the parking lot 2 miles ahead was full and that we'd need to find another legal parking spot, but luckily a few spots had opened up at the trailhead by the time we arrived. I'm glad since it was a long enough hike as it was and we didn't want to add any more on top of it, especially with the kids. 

Ouzel Falls has several beautiful cascades along the way. This is the lower cascade of Copeland Falls

And a bit further is what I'm calling Upper Copeland falls. The picture on the right puts them both together.

We knew Calypso Cascades was the next named falls along the trail, but we kept guessing at which it was since there were so many other beautiful cascades along our way.

I feel like this large drop deserves a name. It impressed us enough that both Oscar and I took videos of it. For now I'm calling it Upper Upper Copeland Falls.

Allison was powering through this hike with as much gusto as she could. She basically did sprint walks until it just got too steep to sprint anymore. 

At that point we thought we'd already passed Calypso Cascades, but then a man passed by us and told us it was just after you cross the bridge. 

When we made it to the actual Calypso Cascades there is a sign there marking it, though I have to say the other river cascades we passed were pretty impressive too and deserve their own names and signs.

The last part is pretty steep, but we finally made it to Ouzel Falls. If you see the sign for Ouzel Falls and just follow the bridge where the trail continues on to several lakes, this is your view. Thankfully I'd seen photos online and knew there must be a better view of the main drop, so we bushwhacked up the side of the hill.

And we found it! It was just a short scramble away, and there was a couple there who took our picture for us after we took theirs. 

We got a few more photos of Ouzel Falls before we turned back around.

And Oscar got a few more shots of Calypso Cascades on the way back. It was a long hike for the kids and there was definitely some whining, but ultimately they powered through. I think the hardest part was that we'd brought jackets and long pants since it was cold in the morning, but the sun came out when we were at the steepest parts with the least shade. At least the way back was all downhill. The kids definitely earned their tablet time on the drive home. We stopped at a Little Caesar's in Boulder, filled out bellies, then made it home to our sweet kitty cat.