After you pay the landlord’s fee to get into the park your first view is what started it all, the bridge. And it is quite a bridge, and it sits about 1200 feet over the Arkansas River, and it spans an incredible Canyon.
An attraction that wasn’t here in 1958 is the tram, a fancy little box that holds a bunch of people and carries them from one side of the canyon to the other. We saw it coming from afar and did the zoom thing. Plans are to ride this guy later.
We started walking across the bridge when lo and behold the tram was making another trip across space, so we decided to take yet another snapshot.
1200 feet below the bridge, following the river, is a set of train tracks, and, as might be expected, there is a Royal Gorge train that runs for a few miles along the river. The train had stopped at the base of the Aerial Tramway (more later), so I was able to zoom in and check out the crowd on the open car. Nobody waved.
The whistle blew and the train took off, heading west. We all raced to the other side of the bridge to take pictures of the entire train as it wound its way around and along the rapids of the Arkansas. I suspect the view was pretty good from down there as well.
After we crossed the bridge we visited a few shops and then took the local trolley up to an area known as Point Sublime, a covered porch so to speak that had an excellent view of the bridge from some distance. Obviously it was a very sunny day.
Yikes. Some mentally deranged person constructed this tower that sits on the edge of the canyon, One or two people are strapped into it, pulled way back and up by a cable, and released. The girls scream like crazy on the first couple of passes. It’s like the swing sets all of us have been on as kids but this one has you out there 1200 feet from the bottom.
We caught the trolley back across the bridge and then descended to the bottom of the gorge on the Aerial Tramway. At the bottom it was absolutely necessary to show everyone what the bottom of a bridge looks like. Plus, for the next hour all you would see is the sun.
She was only a bird in a gilded cage…….
This is another picture I kinda like. The Arkansas is racing downstream, the train tracks are following closely, and I’m not at all sure what those steel beams are doing; maybe supporting the Tramway. My main thought here is what it took to get train tracks along this rushing riverbed probably more than a hundred years ago
Here’s a quick look at one of the Aerial Tramway cars, along with the view of the entire assembly as the cars climb the entire distance.
I used a little math on this one. If the angle of rise was around 45 degrees and the two tram cars were meeting in the middle, then they were about 850 feet from me when I snapped this picture. Sorry about the shaky but at this zoom length without a tripod, old Pops isn’t that steady.
PS. Jeff and Ali. Is my math correct?
We decided that it was time to ride the tram so we did just that. This is really the only place that you can get the whole bridge in the picture without a wide-angle lens.
This picture sort of gives you a full view of this fantastic area. The narrow gorge, the rushing river, the train tracks, the bridge, the surrounding mountains. Views like this make the whole trip worthwhile!
One of the added bonuses that accompany your visit to the Royal Gorge are several large areas where wild animals native to the area are kept. The trolley passes all these areas and you can walk this area as well. This bull elk, with the magnificent antlers was taking a snooze as we went by and didn’t notice us at all.
And here we have a real oddity; a white buffalo. Our trolley driver went into lots of detail but let’s just let it go for now as here's a white buffalo.
I think now that I can understand why some people will spend all sorts of money to go hunting for an elk when I see this marvelous set of antlers. I can just picture them hanging over the stone fireplace in my mountain lodge?????
OK, I was really impressed with the Royal Gorge and have included a lot of pictures. There are about twice this number that were looked over but not made a part of this post.
We leave after breakfast on Sunday for Creede, a small mining town about 100 miles from here.
We decided that it was time to ride the tram so we did just that. This is really the only place that you can get the whole bridge in the picture without a wide-angle lens.
This picture sort of gives you a full view of this fantastic area. The narrow gorge, the rushing river, the train tracks, the bridge, the surrounding mountains. Views like this make the whole trip worthwhile!
One of the added bonuses that accompany your visit to the Royal Gorge are several large areas where wild animals native to the area are kept. The trolley passes all these areas and you can walk this area as well. This bull elk, with the magnificent antlers was taking a snooze as we went by and didn’t notice us at all.
And here we have a real oddity; a white buffalo. Our trolley driver went into lots of detail but let’s just let it go for now as here's a white buffalo.
I think now that I can understand why some people will spend all sorts of money to go hunting for an elk when I see this marvelous set of antlers. I can just picture them hanging over the stone fireplace in my mountain lodge?????
OK, I was really impressed with the Royal Gorge and have included a lot of pictures. There are about twice this number that were looked over but not made a part of this post.
We leave after breakfast on Sunday for Creede, a small mining town about 100 miles from here.
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