View from Trail Ridge Road

Every summer we head over to Grand Lake and play. We start out at the Fat Cat Cafe, which has the best breakfast in the world. Try it for yourself. The owner, Sally, is a fantastic hostess. I thought she told me that she has about 200 people per day for her weekend buffet. Pastries, scotch eggs, tons of bacon, cinnamon rolls and desserts of all kinds, I could go on and on…

Best Breakfast Around

My kids aren’t really into hiking these days so we planned a short hike on the Green Mountain trail. Our main goal was to see MOOSE, which we were very successful.

Moose in Big Meadow

Moose Cow and Calf

We saw bulls, a cow and calf and many wild flowers on our way to Big Meadow. It rained all day and the mosquitoes were horrible so it was pretty difficult to keep the kids motivated. All in all I would highly recommend a early summer hike on the West side of Rocky Mountain National Park. The Calypso Orchids were just amazing.

Calypso Orchids

We also spent about an hour at Grand Lake watching the sailboats race. The best way to finish off the day is at Grand Lake Chocolates for some of their world famous ice cream.

Sailboats on Grand Lake

Here are some photos of a recent hike to Calypso Cascades in Wild Basin, Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado. This is a beautiful hike along the Saint Vrain river. Not a lot of vistas but a beautiful setting and this time of year abundant water. The warm pine smell was just amazing and my favorite memory of this hike. I looked the entire way for orchids and was rewarded right before the falls with many clusters of these delicate flowers. We were also rewarded by meeting a huge family of Ptarmigan. This hike is 3.6 miles round trip with slight elevation gain. The parking lot is small so arrive early. Enjoy! See you on the trail!

Pair of Calypso Orchids

North Saint Vrain River Wild Basin

Estes Park has pedestrian trails that connect downtown to Lake Estes and then continue West to Fall River Rd and also South to Carriage Hills.  This includes the Riverwalk trail along the downtown river corridor and also the trail around Lake Estes.  Locals and visitors alike take to our town trails to enjoy our outdoors, exercise or simply get from point A to point B. With shopping and dining so close together it is great for visitors to park their cars and breath in some crisp mountain air along these paths.  As a local, my kids use it to ride their bikes to schools, I use it to walk my dog and run safely away from traffic.   In April, the Parks and Recreation Department received a grant to assist with an addition of a new section of trail.  The grant is slated to fund an 2.43 mile section beginning at the Fish Creek Trail and ending at the Lily Lake Trail head.  This new section will be an eight foot wide soft trail estimated to cost about $875,000.  The grant from Great Outdoors Colorado is covering $450,000 and the town is contributing $50,000.  The remainder of the funds come from the mill levy increase approved by voters in 2008 for trail maintenance.  Upon its completion we will have a continuous 9 miles pedestrian trail from downtown Estes Park to the Lily Lake trail head.  Construction will be in early 2011 and be complete by the end of the summer.  I am excited, what a huge benefit to us.  I love the outdoors and Haley (my Golden Retriever) and I are going to enjoy using this new trail.  Thanks Estes Park!

Cloud City Cottage

Spent the 3rd weekend  of June at Leadville just hanging out soaking up the high altitude rays. No, this was not a training run or LT100  race prep for my husband. We just celebrated our 20th wedding anniversary and thought Leadville would be great getaway. Perched in between the high mountains of Mt. Sherman, Mt. Massive and Mt. Elbert this old mining town will not disappoint.  We stayed at the Cloud City cottages and it was a delightful turn of the century cabin that has been renovated.  We planned to climb some mountains while we were there, but it didn’t pan out.

Mt. Massive

Old General Store

We drove around and did a little off-roading looking for places to explore. Leadville is rich in history like Estes Park and there are old buildings and mining treasures all over. One day we rented bikes and rode the Mineral Belt trail 12 miles around the perimeter of Leadville. We saw the old general store and awesome views of surrounding mountains. We took it counter clockwise and it was pretty steep on the Western side so allow plenty of time for breaks. Along the path there are plaques detailing Leadville historical facts or notable figures. If you stop and read them all it paints a picture of this wild west mining town during the boom time.

Mineral Belt

While we were trying to find the Mt. Sherman trail head we encountered this sign and road block. We tried to reach the trail head twice, the first time we there and didn’t see the signs.

It is not like RMNP where trail heads have huge green signs and paved parking lots. After some searching on the internet we realized that we were in fact at the right location. The next day we tried again and ran into two guys who had a stroke of bad luck and two dead vehicles. We ended up taking them back to town. After wards, it was simply too late in the day to start climbing a Fourteener. We decided it wasn’t our time to climb Sherman. We are ready for the next time.

Road Closed Ahead

Obstacles in the Road

Spending time in the RMNP back country is one of life’s simple pleasures. I try to plan a couple trips per summer with my family. It allows you to enjoy places further into the park because you can spend the night and venture out on day hikes. A place we have wanted to go is Lawn Lake and Crystal Lake. The only draw back is all the tons of gear you have to haul in, especially when camping with children.  Three days of food for 5 people is hard to pack for,  it took two bear canisters to hold it all. My husband and I try to load our packs the heaviest and then let each of the kids carry their own clothing and snacks. We have a rule: The person with the heaviest pack gets to whine~and that’s usually my husband and he doesn’t whine.

The Big Pack

There are three individual campsites and one group site located right East of the lake in the trees. The sites are private and the trees protect you from the wind. We choose the second site so we could set up two tents and there was a large tree stump to cook on.

Filtering water at Lawn Lake

It was cold and rainy the entire weekend. We passed a lot of time in our tents waiting for the rain to stop. Some of the wildflowers were still blooming, but many were already done. We did a little exploring between rain storms and I spent the first night mostly awake after something large walked right between our tents.

New friend we met on the way to Crystal Lake

The second day my two youngest daughters and I headed up to Crystal Lake and my husband and my oldest daughter started scrambling up Mummy Mtn right behind our campsite. All of us were caught in the nasty thunderstorm that hit in the afternoon. My group turned back, but the other group was able to summit successfully. These two photos were taken 10 minutes apart, the first one we were just minutes from Crystal Lake hoping the weather would hold.  Unfortunately, a nasty boomer came over the saddle of Mummy and gave us a scare.

Sweeping Views above Lawn lake

Taking Cover coming down from Crystal Lakes

Stormy Summit

This is my second time being in this area, the most attractive feature to me is the diversity of the wildflowers. We saw Indian Paintbrush in all colors of the rainbow, yellow, light green, red, orange, pink, coral, and lavender.

Pink Indian Paintbrush

We made a slideshow of our photos and our favorite part of camping-Jiffy Pop over the stove.

This is a beautiful area, I hope you can make there someday. See you on the trail!

Devils Gulch Estate

Top of the world views. You won’t a find a better view in Estes Park! Longs Peak and the Continental Divide showcased from this home. Tucked into the Lumpy Ridge this rare offering backs to RMNP on 3+ acres. Simply walk out your back door into Rocky Mountain National Park. Aspens and large boulders line the drive to this private setting. Decks on every side of the home allow breathtaking views. Huge Master Suite with Fireplace, Jack and Jill Bath, skylights, built-ins and two decks. Elegant Dining Room with huge windows that allow the gorgeous setting to be enjoyed indoors as well. Featuring Five Bedrooms and Four Baths, Formal Living and Dining Rooms, Great room with wood burning fireplace, lower level Recreation room has a wood burning stove and full kitchen. The fifth bedroom doubles as a media room, Game Room, Exercise Room, Commercial Elevator, Secure Storage area, Central Vac, AC, Skylights & more. This is a must see property!?

More information HERE…

We are reaping the rewards of a very wet Rocky Mountain Spring in Estes Park. I recently hiked to the Big Pool on the North Inlet trail leaving from Grand Lake. It was 10 miles or so round trip and the wild flowers were the best I have ever seen.  The first mile or so of the trail is a jeep road because there is a private cabin along the trail. Once the trail narrows we saw fields of columbine in varying colors of rich periwinkle and light blues.  On the East side I have seen clumps of columbine, but these fields were amazing.  I also saw my first Calypso Orchid in a top secret location.  Along the trail further in we saw red columbine.  The vegetation was lush and we had to keep moving to ward off the mosquitoes. We stopped at Cascade Falls on our way to The Pool and took a break on the huge boulders and listened to the roar of the water.

Blue Columbine

Calypso Orchid

Red Columbine

Lush vegetation along the trails

Cascade Falls

I know many visitors to our area in Estes Park choose to remain on the East side of the park, but I would highly recommend exploring the trails in the West section of Rocky Mountain National Park.

Here is an older trip report that I forgot to post. For a big hiking payoff with a short time commitment Emerald Mountain is the hike for you. This mountain located West of Ramshorn Mtn off of hwy 66 has fantastic views of the entire Rocky Mountain National Park.   You can park in the cul-de-sac at the end of the hwy and start at the trailhead.  We hiked this the first week of March on a sunny day.

sign post on the trail-go left

It’s maybe a mile and a half hike to the summit, but very steep.  I was huffing and puffing the entire way.  I just can’t stand hiking slow so I was pretty miserable trying to catch my breath, but the reward at the summit is spectacular.

Continental Divide

Mummy Range

You pretty much have wrap around views from Twin Sisters West to the Longs Peak around to the Continental Divide and finishing with the Mummy Range.  Absolutely gorgeous.  It was pretty windy that day on the summit, but the high altitude sun warms you.  I still had several layers on, but my husband just wore a t-shirt.  Snowshoes were not needed as it was windswept except for one drift near the summit.  See you on the trails!

My husband and I on the summit

I have said this once and I will say it again, one of the best advantages of living in Estes Park is access to Rocky Mountain National Park. The second weekend in March my family headed out with our snowshoes to RMNP. We hiked up a back country winter trail to Lake Haiyaha to stomp, sled and play on the ice. Watch the video our our silly antics and the amazing igloo we warmed up in between sled runs (Many thanks to our forum friends who built it the weekend before). We brought our heavy duty Thermos with hot herbal tea. We bought a light weight roll up sled at the hardware store, but ended up sliding on our snowpants instead.

If you are wondering what those shiny rolls are in my husband’s backpack are they are reflective windshield shades. They work fantastic to keep your seat warm while sitting on the ice or snow and the best part is they are cheap. I picked them up at a garage sale. The snow has all melted from the April storm and it looks like Spring here. The golf course is greening up and we are starting to see some Spring flowers. Bye for now!

I am really behind on my trip reports and even more behind on getting out into the park. I am embarrassed to say how long it’s been since I hiked. That should tell you a lot right there because now snowshoes are required for most of RMNP. Well, here are some photos of a hike last fall in the Lumpy Ridge. I have a couple more to post today from last week.

Lumpy Ridge trailhead

For a great hike deep into the Lumpy Ridge try the Lumpy Loop Hike starting at the Twin Owls trailhead off of Devils Gulch Road. It is an 11 mile loop connecting several trails and at the end taking you by Gem Lake and back down to the TH. There is elevation gain to work those legs and a lot of runnable trail if you like to trail run. The views are spectacular as you descend from Gem Lake, well at the start too.

Longs Peak and Divide Views

Unique Rock Formations

This odd rock formation greets you right at the start.  We call it the Man Riding Dolphin.  I would love to hear what it looks like to you.  The day my husband and I went there was some snow through the trees on the Northern slopes of the Lumpy Ridge but mostly it was clear.

Snowy Trails

It is kind of a long hike and is perfect if you want some solitude.  I hardly ever see more than a handful of people on the trail (aside from Gem Lake-sometimes its busy).  See you on the trails.