Steamboat Springs, CO (7/22/2018)

I moved my base camp to Steamboat Springs, enjoying a lovely ride over two mountain passes with little traffic to bother me.  Last visit here was 2003, so I was interested in seeing what changes had been made in the past fifteen years.  The short answer is, not much.  Oh, there has been some new construction, new soccer fields developed, maybe more stop lights.  On the whole, for a popular ski resort, Steamboat still has that laid-back, casual charm that makes visitors feel at home right away.  I'll show a few of the downtown buildings, just to give you a feel for the place.

F.M. Light & Sons has been selling western wear since 1905.  They have small, colorful signs along every road into town, kind of like the old "See Rock City" campaign.

Of course, Steamboat Springs got its name from the hot springs around the area.  Supposedly, French trappers discovered a spring and thought it sounded like a steamboat.  While several springs are now confined to spas where people pay to soak in the "healing" waters, others are scattered about town, still chugging away.  I noticed that some are not very hot at all, with temps of 66F and 78F.  The spas must have cornered all the hot ones.  If not hot, they are at the least very smelly...rotten eggs.

The original---Steamboat Spring

On my first afternoon, I headed to Rabbit Ears Pass, where the nice lady at the Visitor Center suggested wildflowers were reported to be blooming well.  The main location, she said, was Dumont Lake, but I tried several side roads into the national forest and found some nice patches of flowers. 

I could also see the rock formation called Rabbit Ears (a stretch, if you ask me), for which the pass is named.

I've seen moose not far from here, so I kept my eyes open for some of the big fellows here.  While there was plenty of prime habitat for them, no moose did I see.  There were signs warning campers of moose active in the area, but they must have heard I was coming.

Turning in to the Dumont Lake area, it was like the lady had said...beautiful wildflowers all over the hillsides.  There was a great variety of colors, but the fireweed was especially abundant.  I haven't seen so much of it since going to Alaska many years ago.

Fishing Buddies

In my travels, I encountered lots of birds.  This House Sparrow stumped me for a while, because I rarely see them.