Chris and I planned to hike in RMNP again today. Though we had reservations for Bear Lake, we opted to find a new hike.
I had some things ready to go Friday night and then was up early on Saturday morning making our lunch so we could leave early. We were out of the house by 7:30 am.
Passing the lake as we arrived in Estes Park, Chris and I were both surprised to see how calm the water was! No wind. So unusual.
Chris chose the Colorado River Trail on the west side of RMNP. We decided to drive up the Old Fall River Road. The skies were just a little smoky from the wildfires, but not too bad. We could still see blue sky!
Old Fall River Road winds up the side of Mount Chapin's south face for 9.4 miles on a one-way gravel road until it tops out at the Alpine Visitor Center. We passed by Chasm Falls, Fall River Pass, and Chapin Trailhead.
We stopped at a new spot along Fall River Road to check out the Willow Park Patrol Cabin (also known as Willow Park Ranger Station or Willow Park Cook and Mess Hall). It was built in 1923 and was originally built to house maintenance crews on the Fall River Road.
Today there is a cabin, a vault toilet, covered barn, picnic benches and a lovely meadow.
We opted not to hike the Chapin Trail (maybe another time) or the Marmot Point Trail and continued on past the Alpine Visitor Center and down to the west side of RMNP.
We had to follow some slow (very cautious) drivers and were happy when our turn off for the Colorado River Trailhead appeared. We quickly found a spot to park, loaded up our gear, stopped at the pit toilets, talked to the volunteer ranger, and got started on our hike. This hike is the location of the headwaters of the Colorado River that begin from snowmelt.
The Colorado River runs through seven states: Wyoming, Colorado, Utah, New Mexico, Nevada, Arizona and California.
The original plan was to hike about 4 miles and then return.
Somehow we ended up hiking 13 miles instead!
We passed by the deteriorating cabin at Crater Creek. This was 2.18 miles in (I took note of it).
Another trail marker was a little past the ruins.
We planned to go to Lulu City. There wasn't much remaining there but it was a beautiful meadow with a stream running through it.
The side trip to Lulu City added an extra mile or so. Fortunately, Chris took a picture of the map at the trailhead. AllTrails wasn't working great for us.
I think it was the idea that Little Yellowstone might be awesome. So, we continued on to check it out. We had to skirt around mountains, follow narrow trails, and cross streams running the gulches. I did find some cool mushrooms.
We met up with three guys from France. They passed us by as we sat on the side of the trail somewhat close to Little Yellowstone and were eating our lunch. One of the men said, "Bon appetit" as he passed by.
We caught up to the men a bit after we finished our lunch and they had stopped to take a breather. We found out that they were attending a chemistry conference in Fort Collins. Two of the men were from Marseilles and the other from Toulouse. They spoke pretty good english.
There was no sign announcing that we had arrived at Little Yellowstone, so we actually hiked right past it as we had expected something a lot more spectacular. Just note that Chris and I don't recommend hiking to it unless you are trying to get in some mountain hiking!
Our hike took us to a road that would have eventually led to LaPoudre Pass. We stopped at the road and approximately 7 miles in.
As we turned around to hike allllllll the way back down to the trailhead, we passed the french guys again. They had thought to follow the road back down instead of the trail. That would have been 11 miles down instead of the 6 or so. I tried to get a picture of them without being too obvious about it.
I think I have mentioned before that 7 or 8 miles total is my sweet spot for hiking. After that, the aches start to set in. My feet were most sore.
The treat of the day was that we got to see another moose shortly after we stopped at the Crater Creek house and stretched our legs. From the cabin, I knew we had 2.18 miles to go. Ugh.