front range
-
Colorado Hikes: Deer Creek Canyon Park
Located on the southwest edge of the Denver Metro area, Deer Creek Canyon Park is open to hikers, bikers, and equestrians. The park isn’t huge, but there are 14 miles (22.5 km) of trails, including routes to the park’s two highest points: Plymouth Mountain and Bill Couch Mountain. There’s also a lengthy trail connecting this… Continue reading
-
Colorado Hikes: Geneva Creek Iron Fens
Fall in Colorado has become a nightmare. From mid-September through early October, the Colorado mountains are painted with large swathes of yellow, interspersed with the occasional bursts of red and orange, as our many aspen groves and a handful of other trees and bushes begin to change color. It’s no New England autumn, but it’s… Continue reading
-
Colorado Hikes: Pawnee Pass
As you know if you’ve followed me for a while, my to-do list of Colorado hikes seems to constantly get longer rather than shorter. Some of these hikes in particular have been on my list for years and we’ve just never gotten around to them. So at the beginning of last summer, I made a… Continue reading
-
Colorado 14ers #15-16: Grays and Torreys Peaks
When we moved to Colorado, I made a rule that I was never waking up earlier than 4:00am to go hiking. Unfortunately, these two 14ers are so popular that if I was ever going to climb them, I might be forced to break that rule. It was one of those moments where I was forced… Continue reading
-
Colorado Summits: Chief Mountain
This happens to everyone, right: you do something wrong and you get corrected and then you can never remember which version is wrong and which one is correct? As a kid I briefly attended a school named for a Native American chief and, in one of the more embarrassing moments of my time there, I… Continue reading
-
Colorado Hikes: Lost Lake
There are many Lost Lakes in Colorado. Apparently. I didn’t realize this until I just googled “Lost Lake” in an attempt to verify the mileage of this hike and a whole bunch of options came up. Turns out there are at least 7 or 8 of them. Back in the day, people must not have… Continue reading
-
Day Hikes in: Evergreen, Colorado
I have a terrible tendency to discount shorter or easier or lower elevation hikes because I’d much rather be above tree line on a summit or way in the backcountry at an alpine lake. I’m certain this bias has caused me to overlook many hiking opportunities over the years. But Colorado continues to remind me… Continue reading
-
Colorado Hikes: Chihuahua Lake
As you know if you’ve followed me for any length of time, alpine lakes are one of my favorite things. I hike to a lot of them. So when I say that Chihuahua Lake is one of the prettiest lakes I’ve seen in Colorado, I have a pretty good basis for comparison. Now that I’ve… Continue reading
-
Colorado 13ers: Cupid Peak and Grizzly Peak D
My goal for this summer is to summit more mountains. So far, my progress has been subpar. I always go into the summer with so many plans and an endless list of hikes to accomplish, and inevitably time gets away from me and suddenly it’s almost time to go back to work and I’ve crossed… Continue reading
-
Colorado Summits: Mestaa’ėhehe Mountain
Let’s begin by answering the obvious question: it’s pronounced mess-tah-HAY. Mestaa’ėhehe Mountain is named for a Cheyenne woman who was also known as Owl Woman. Owl Woman was married to William Bent, a white settler, trader, and co-founder of Bents Old Fort trading post on the plains of Colorado in the 1800s. Their marriage was… Continue reading
-
Colorado Hikes: Lower Coney Lake
Lower Coney Lake, located in the Indian Peaks Wilderness of Colorado, is beautiful. Getting there was awful. This was partly due to weather and partly due to the fact that, all in all, this was not my best day on the trail. My friend, her husband, and I arrived at Beaver Reservoir around 7:30am, and… Continue reading
-
Colorado Hikes: Harmonica Arch
I debated with myself about whether to share this hike with all of you, because this wasn’t exactly a typical excursion. Reaching Harmonica Arch required quite a lot of navigation. We climbed very steep hills… and then had to hike back down them, which was extremely slippery. We walked across large rock slabs that were… Continue reading
-
Colorado 13ers: Mount Bancroft, Parry Peak, and Mount Eva
Sometimes, a hike ends up being more laid back than you thought it would be and goes more quickly than you expected. And sometimes, a hike is far more intense than you anticipated and it takes 8 hours to hike 7 miles (11.3 km). This hike was one of the latter. Chelsea and I set… Continue reading
-
Colorado Hikes: High Lonesome Loop
In general, my day hikes average 8-10 miles (12.8-16 km) in length. Too much more than that and the exhaustion begins to outweigh the enjoyment. But every once in a while, I stumble across a longer hike that sounds like it’s worth the extra distance. With a name like High Lonesome, I was hopeful this… Continue reading
-
Colorado Hikes: Isabelle Glacier
Do you ever have one of those hikes where the scenery just blows you away? There’s so much beauty in Colorado that the bar for that kind of awe has been set pretty damn high. But Isabelle Glacier exceeded that bar. Lake Isabelle is one of the most popular hikes near the Front Range, and… Continue reading
-
Colorado Hikes: Herman Gulch
I first hiked Herman Gulch a few years back, a challenging but beautiful outing in the midst of peak fall color season. More recently, my fiancé, my mom, and I completed this hike in the summer and instead of yellow leaves we found ourselves surrounded by wildflowers. So I decided now would be a good… Continue reading
-
Colorado Hikes: Silver Dollar and Murray Lakes
My mom and I left home just before sunrise and headed up to Guanella Pass and the Silver Dollar Trailhead, looking forward to a lovely hike to multiple lakes. There are two starting points for this hike… the lower trailhead and the upper trailhead. Had we planned ahead better and driven the Subaru we could’ve… Continue reading
-
Colorado 14ers #2: Mount Bierstadt
I’ve been hiking since I was too young to remember, and in that time I’ve accumulated quite a few hiking accomplishments. But one thing I’d never done in all 30+ years of my life was go hiking alone. In general, I don’t consider myself an anxious person. Sure, I have my moments of anxiety when… Continue reading
-
Colorado Hikes: St. Mary’s Glacier
Most lists of “best hikes near Denver” include St. Mary’s Glacier. And with good reason. For a relatively short drive and 1.8 miles (2.9 km) of hiking, you can see a pretty subalpine lake, bristlecone pines, and stand on a glacier. Well… sort of. As it turns out, St. Mary’s Glacier isn’t actually a glacier.… Continue reading
-
Colorado Hikes: Burning Bear Trail
The Guanella Pass area is moose territory. So when we headed up Burning Bear Trail one January morning, adjacent to an expanse of willows, I was on the lookout. Just a few minutes up the trail we encountered a fellow hiker who informed us there were four of them just ahead in the willows. Despite… Continue reading
You must be logged in to post a comment.