Ok, so I didn’t see any ghost elk.  Or ghosts.  But I did see some elk!  That should count for something, right?  Good.  After an almost nausea inducing drive through the mountains (thank goodness for Dramamine!) we made it to Estes Park.  I had only heard good things about it before I went there.

This is also where the Stanley Hotel is.  I have to say I was pretty excited about this because I’ve never been to a movie filming location.  Just kidding, one.  That remains one today though as Stephen King was only staying at the hotel when he wrote The Shining.  I’ll count that as a half.

The weather was perfect for our walk around half of the lake, the hotel, the downtown area, and the tramway.  The only way it could have gone better was less traffic.  It was a weekend in summer though, so there’s that.

There were tours available for the Stanley, but they were a little expensive and I remember zero from tours, so I don’t do too many of them.  Instead we just wandered around the grounds for a bit, enjoying the view.  After this we went up the tramway cable car thing allowing for a spectacular view of Estes.

We stayed up there for a while doing a little wandering and some eating before heading back down to the town.  After trying to find a parking spot for about fifteen minutes, we were successful and wandered into every taffy shop around.  Ok, not every taffy shop, but at least six.  There is an abundance of taffy and candy shops here.  Of course I had to buy some taffy for the road home.

Our day came to an end with a tired drive home and a viewing of The Shining in spirit of our day and where the movie was not filmed.

Have you been to Estes?  Did you enjoy it?  Which picture is your favorite?