This year’s big road trip was to Rocky Mountain National Park!
We decided to split the drive over a couple of days to make it a bit easier. The first stop was about 8 hours in – Lincoln, Nebraska. The second (and final) stop about 7.5 hours away, Estes Park, Colorado, where we stayed for a few days!
Lincoln, Nebraska
Nothing too exciting here since when we started driving, it was pretty late in the day since I had only taken half a day off from work. One of the cool things we did do was stop at the world biggest truck stop in Iowa, which was pretty cool.
An hour before arriving to our hotel for the night, we stopped in Omaha for a late night drink and bite at Kathmandy Momo Station, which was fantastic!
Spoiler alert, we ended up coming here again on our way back from the rockies!
We ended up staying at Americinn by Wyndham Lincoln South, which was a pretty great choice. Solid breakfast options (included), comfortable room and bed, and friendly staff. For a single night where we really only stayed to sleep, it was more than what we could have asked for.
Estes Park, Colorado
Along the way here, we stopped at Rowe Sanctuary, which was a great little spot packed with information, wildlife, and hiking! We had a good time here and in fact, are thinking of coming back to see tens of thousands of cranes migrating in the spring.
Towards the late afternoon, we made it to Estes Park, our stay for the next 3-4 days. We stayed at the Appenzelle Inn, which was fantastic! Beautiful views right outside our windows, hot tub, pool, and best of all, very close to one of the entrances to Rocky Mountain National Park!
We ended up using the pool every single day, which was great! It was during the week, so it wasn’t as packed (maybe 1 other party at times).
Food at Estes Park
Pretty much everything we had in Estes was great! The first thing we had when we arrived was pizza at Antonio’s Real New York Pizza.
Kind Coffee was also pretty great! My partner really enjoyed her chai latte! The views of course are also pretty great at your local coffee shop in Estes!
Estes Thai was also really great! But also very spicy…I may have overestimated how tolerant of spicy food I actually am…and this place doesn’t mess around. But it was delicious nonetheless!
Cinnamon’s Bakery had delicious cinnamon rolls, perfect to start our day of hiking at the park!
The final dinner we had at Estes was at Park Tavern, which was probably my favorite of the bunch! It was also on a weekend by this point, so there was live music which probably helped influence my great liking of the place.
The final coffee shop I went to was Coffee on the Rocks, which was fine. The coffee wasn’t anything special but the pond they had there was great!
The final brunch we had here was at the infamous, Stanley Hotel! We came here mostly because I knew my partner would enjoy the place for its historical value, but the food was also better than expected! We ate at their Brunch and Co, which had spectacular views of the city and mountains!
RMNP
Onto why we actually came here, Rocky Mountains! Overall, it’s a National Park, so it’s going to be beautiful…and tiring…and dangerous. One thing we had to make sure (and you should to) is to make sure you have reservations to actually enter the park. Unless you plan on entering before 9 am or after 2 pm, you need a time reservation entry pass (a special one to access the road to Bear Lake), which is strictly enforced (this does not include the price to enter the national park either).
Something to note here is the weather is pretty crazy and can go from being bright, sunny, and hot…to windy and cold…to pouring….back to being sunny and humid. Dressing in layers and having things like a rain jacket, windbreaker, hat and warm clothes is all pretty essential gear to being comfortable in the ever changing weather of the rockies.
There was also a ton of wildlife! Marmots, pikas, elk, moose, birds, and a few other things I’m forgetting.
Throughout the park, there are a ton of different kinds of ecosystems. swamps, forest, mountains, and even tundras!
Of course, lots and lots of beautiful lakes as well!
We made it a point to also visit all 5 visitor centers as a way for us to be able to visit a lot of the park (its about 1.5 hours from one end of the park (Estes end) to the other end of the Park (Grand Lake).
There was definitely a lot of driving! Good thing one of the visitor centers, only open during the summer season (since it would be impossible to drive up 12,000 ft because of the snow), had a restaurant!
Omaha, Nebraska
After a super fun and tiring visit to the Rocky Mountains, it was time to start driving home. But first, we stopped at Omaha for a couple of days!
The big thing we did here was visit the super fun Omaha Zoo & Aquarium! This was a pretty great and fun zoo! Really interactive and lots to explore!
Each little section of the zoo was VERY isolated from other sections in the sense that it really transported you INTO that specific section. Super immersive.
Another cool thing about this was that there was also an aqurium located within the zoo, at no additional cost! It was one of those cool ones where there are sharks swimming above you!
When we were walking out, the elephants decided to come out and have some fun in the water!
Food and Coffee
Honestly, we had a lot of things and everything was great! Like mentioned earlier in the blog, we stopped at the same place we stopped at while on our way to Lincoln, for some more drinks!
For coffee, I could not be happier with both Bad Seed Coffee and Archetype Coffee. Truly great places that know how to make some darn good espresso.
We also had Meddys, which was a Middle Eastern/Greek place with GREAT food.
Our FAVORITE experience though was at Everett’s! Those wings were truly something special and one of the things we will forever think about and wish we had back home. In fact, we are now looking for excuses to go back to Omaha just for these wings.
Final Thoughts
Overall, great trip, great food, great experiences! A ton of driving (probably close to 40 hours included the drive to and back, driving around RMNP, the cities, etc).