Day Thirteen: Elk Refuge!

Monday, July 04, 2011

Today we went to Rocky Mountain National Park. I was excited, because I had a feeling that there were going to be bighorn sheep, which there were. Jasmine and I ran outside with binoculars to see them. I soon found out that they were baby ones, with tiny horns. They had very wooly wool. Their horns weren’t curly yet. Jasmine went back and I decided to stay and listen to the program about them. Some of the facts I found out were:

• The number of rings on their horns could show you how old they were

• When they head butt each other, the force is sixty times the force needed to break the human skull

• They come down from the mountain to eat mud in the valley so they can get the vitamins

• They have four stomachs

• Three to four day old babies can take leaps over cliffs

• Their head weighs thirty pounds

• The sheep’s heart rate almost doubles just when they hear the sound of a car, but when they take death defying leaps, their heart rate doesn’t change

I thought most of these facts were really neat, and I sure learned a lot!

After that, we went to a trail in the tundra. I was looking out for bighorn sheep, but I didn’t see any. But I did see lots of wildflowers. We climbed some rocks, which were easy since I was used to getting dragged along to climbing with my dad. But the real surprise came on the way back. There were lots and lots of elk!

There was a mama elk making weird noises. She was probably calling her children. One baby, two babies, three babies, that should be it. But no, there were lots more. Eight or nine of them. I was really surprised because I didn’t think that mama had all of them, but I didn’t know where the other mamas were. The mother kept calling until all of them came. Then they crossed the trail, which was when I noticed the other mamas coming over. One of the babies drank her mama’s milk, which was so cute! I was wondering where the fathers, or the males were. Soon, that would not be a mystery.

We were driving when we saw a bunch of cars parked along the side of the road. When we stopped, we saw elk! Not females, but males with antlers. They were just grazing by the side of the road. My mom said they were young college elk hanging out. It was funny, and one of them actually used their antler to scratch their bum! I was happy seeing all the elk, they were so majestic!

I saw a fat yellow-bellied marmot! He was so fat! That’s about the only thing to describe about him.

Jasmine and I had a bit of a snow ball fight. I only got hit once, which was lucky. But Jasmine? Well, let’s just say not lucky at all. There was also a snowman that my grandma built, which was nice!

I was ready to go back and sleep. My mom and I took a walk around the RV camp, and we were heading back. The confusing part was that there was another RV exactly like ours. Unfortunately, my mom started walking towards it, with me dragging her saying that the other one was ours (truthfully, it really was). She didn’t believe me, and I started laughing because I never knew my mom could be my stubborn. My mom was dragging me to the door, yelling, “Daddy! Your daughter is trying to kidnap me!” By then, my stomach was hurting and I was laughing so hard. When we got to the door, I thought my mom was going to open it, but she stopped when she saw a man standing at the stove, whom she didn’t recognize. Then she dragged me away from the door. I was laughing so hard by then, and my mom was saying oops, uh oh, why do you have to be smarter than me? And when we got into our RV, my dad stared at me, like, what was so funny? And it was the funniest of the whole day.