Green Mountain Reservoir

After a day of recuperation, we moved on to Green Mountain Reservoir, about 16 miles north of Silverthorne, CO.  The reservoir has six campgrounds, four of which are $5 a night and, for some mysterious reason, two are $10.  We stayed in South Cow Creek, which used to be free, but with Ron's Golden Age pass is still a bargain at $2.50.  We stayed four nights at this lovely spot.

The only thing wrong with the place is the abundance of these critters.  Although admittedly cute, they are an overpopulation problem in parts of Colorado and sometimes carry fleas infected with the Bubonic Plague.  Yikes!

One day we took a hike around Lower Cataract Lake.  It's only about two miles around this pretty mountain lake.  (BTW, we had quite a bit of haze during our stay there.  We heard it was from the fires in Idaho.)

We were excited to see this beaver swimming around.

I know what you're thinking - why do I love beavers and hate prairie dogs.  Well, because the beavers have the good sense to stay away from humans!

We're guessing the only reason he was out during the day was because a rude human (not us) had came too close to his den.   He was sounding the alarm by slapping his tail quite dramatically.  I caught a very blurry shot of him lifting his tail.

And the huge splash it made.  It sounded like a rifle shot.

At the trail head, there was a sign saying that the bridge was out and halfway around the lake we came across this warning sign.

But we think somebody forgot to remove the sign, because just look at the fancy new bridge!

Although if you look closely, you can see the giant tree that must have taken out the old bridge.

However, if we hadn't continued on, we would have missed the view from the far end of the lake.

(Did I mention it was hazy?)

And also missed this sign of recent beaver activity.

At the top of this slide was a grove of aspen trees, some of which the beavers had cut and somehow dragged at least 60 feet down  to the water.  Talk about your 'busy beavers.'

One more cute thing.  We saw this deer enjoying the plants on a plant nursery roof in Silverthorne.