Back at the Rocky Mountain Arsenal National Wildlife Refuge

October 24, 2021

Yesterday, we went for a two and a half hour hike beside the RMANWR. We hiked in a Denver Open Space.

We started from the parking lot on the corner of E 56th and Peña Blvd. We went east along E 56th to get there. The parking lot is just before you get Peña Blvd. The parking lot is gravel and very rough. The name is First Creek at DEN Open Space.

We walked along Buckley Road looking at the remains of the controlled burn from last week.

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There was a trail that went along the a creek to the west. We decided to take the trail beside the creek. The trail was a bit sandy with tall grass and thistle plants along the sides. We had to pick Nox up and pull grass seeds from her paws a couple of times on the walk.

At one point, I looked over to the west and saw bison!

We walked all the way up to the First Creek Overlook. It was full of tumbleweeds! On top, we had a stunning view of the mountains.

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Bruce noticed a bison wallowing to the northwest of the lookout.

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Since storm clouds were gathering, we decided we needed to head back a fast pace along Buckley Road. At some point, the road had turned to gravel instead of blacktop. Since we were on the trail, we didn’t realize the road had turned to gravel.

We saw more deer on the way out.

The milkweed pods had opened and looked like tall cotton plants. If you zoom in on the picture, you can see the black seeds in the white fluff.

We made it back to the truck before it rained and before sunset.