From the Depths of Hell

12 Sunday Jun 2016

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Longs Peak, Mount Meeker, RMNP, Twin Sisters

girl on the mountaintop Ran ten miles in 86° Saturday. I think the humidity is up because it felt like 100°. Carried a camelbak for the first time this year. My pace slowed down to a crawl the final four miles. I was happy to see the irrigation ditch flowing strong again, allowing me to dip my hat in the cold mountain snowmelt. A refreshing respite after running through Hell’s kitchen.

snow From the depths of hell Saturday, Ellie and I climbed 11,400 foot Twin Sisters on Sunday. As the photo shows above, the trail is still covered with snow at higher elevations. Glad we took trekking poles. This is Ellie’s first real mountain peak hike, if you don’t count the Flat Irons overlooking Boulder. This is a seven mile roundtrip hike and a real accomplishment. Our plans this summer are to work ourselves up to a 14er, likely Grays and Torreys.

Mudsilde This photo shows where the trail crosses the massive mudslide from the Great Flood of 2013. Karen and I hiked up to this point two years ago, and turned around. Ellie and Brit went further, but the trail was in disrepair and they didn’t make it to the summit. The trail is still an extremely steep alternate route, but safe and manageable.

charlies angels 2 Ellie’s friend, Esme hiked up with us today. The cool mountain air made for a perfect hike. You can see the Diamond Face east cliff wall of Longs Peak over Ellie’s head in this photo. The views were awesome of Mount Meeker and the Mummy Range. We could see Estes Park and Longmont as well.

yoga If anyone wants their kids to get in some hiking this summer, let me know. I’m scouting 12,000 and 13,000 peaks next. A 14er by end of summer.

Indian Peaks Wilderness

23 Sunday Aug 2015

Posted by Ed Mahoney in Colorado Trail, Running

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Brainard Lake, forest fires, Indian Peaks, Longs Peak, Mount Audubon, RMNP

Wow! What a difference dropping my mileage down to normal makes. After dropping from 100 to 50 miles, I’m running fast again. It doesn’t hurt though that the temperature has also dropped – down to what I consider football weather. Call me foolish but I even ran without my hat and sunscreen. And the kids returned to school this week. It just keeps getting better. I ended the week by hiking in the Indian Peaks Wilderness with Ellie today. A bit blustery up there.

In fact, the intense wind kept us from climbing to the top of Mount Audubon. Couldn’t complain though because the wind also swept out the smoke from the Washington State forest fires. You can see the smoke in several of the photos if you click to enlarge them. The high altitude smoke was thickest north of us over Rocky Mountain National Park. Ellie has some asthma related issues so I checked the Colorado air quality index before committing to the hike. We saw a bull moose here next to Brainard Lake during our first few minutes starting out.
Ellie and I found ourselves constantly adding and removing gear. The temperature was fairly cool starting out, although the trees shielded us from the wind. The climb quickly warmed us up so we stowed away our coats and hats in our backpacks, only to put them back on along with gloves once we rose above tree line. Same routine in reverse on our descent. The flat topped peak above and to the right of Ellie’s head in this photo is Longs Peak. I’ll be hiking up there next weekend with some buddies.

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This is Mount Audubon directly over Ellie’s head in the photo to the right. We climbed nearly up to the snow field before turning back. On the way down we turned north onto the Beaver Creek trail for a short ways and bushwhacked over to a rock cropping to catch the views. The entire hike was about seven miles because we started from a parking lot one mile before the Mitchell Lake Trailhead. Looks like a brand new parking lot with restrooms on the east end of Brainard Lake. They’ve done a great job improving the parking in the Brainard Lake Recreational Area. I didn’t see any cars parked on the road like in days past.
This is Beaver Lake behind Ellie in this photo. Karen and I have snowshoed near there on the Sourdough Trail before. Ellie and I also hiked around Brainard Lake a bit on the return. Ellie couldn’t get over how blue the water was. Mountain lakes are absolutely gorgeous. I can’t wait to get back up here next weekend to hike Longs Peak.

Twin Sisters

07 Saturday Jun 2014

Posted by Ed Mahoney in Colorado Trail, Ellie Rose

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Estes Park Resort, Grags, hiking, Longs Peak, Oscar Blues, RMNP, Rocky Mountain National Park, summer camp

After the snow pack we encountered on last weekend’s trail, our objective today was to find a trail with southwestern exposure. The Twin Sisters trail in Rocky Mountain National Park fit the bill. Plus it starts out 1000 feet lower around 9000 feet. This trailhead sits east of Lilly Lake just off Hwy 7, a few miles north of Long’s Peak Trailhead. We spent the night nearby at the Estes Park Resort. A very nice lodge and spa on Lake Estes. We drove there Friday evening after picking up Ellie from the last day of her computer programming summer camp at CSU in Ft. Collins. The drive to Estes Park from Ft. Collins is similar to the drive from Longmont. You take Hwy 34 via Loveland instead of Hwy 36.

The Weather Channel had us set for 50° and rain. Instead it was gorgeous. Clear skies and 60°. Parking at the trailhead was nearly full. Mostly for a wedding across the road at Lilly Lake. This is clearly a very popular trail, but we got there early enough with our short drive from Estes Park. The trail begins for a few hundred yards on a dirt road that’s closed to traffic. It then veers off to the left with a large sign. The first mile is a bit of a workout up to these cliffs. The slope flattens out once it completes some switchbacks and turns south. I think these cliffs are part of the Grags formation, which are more popular for climbers than hiking.

Karen I turned around when we encountered this landslide that obliterated a hundred yard swath of trail. Brit and Ellie were undaunted. They maintained course for the saddle that sits between the Crags and the Twin Sisters Peaks. This avalanche was pretty impressive. Apparently caused from flooding, it knocked out trees clear down to Hwy 7 leaving quite an ugly scar on the mountain. We reached our turn-around point at just over an hour of hiking which gave us a two hour hike total. We waited for the girls on a bench over-looking Lilly Lake.

Brit and Ellie took another hour or so to climb up the steep switchbacks that lead to the saddle. They said they had to scramble a bit using their hands – the trail was so steep. Doubtful Karen would have liked that. I wouldn’t say this trail was crowded but we encountered quite a number of other hikers – including a couple of shirtless boys that Ellie said were eying Brit. Brit told Ellie she thought the boys must go to CU – because they were “buff”.
I highly recommend this trail for family hikes. The views of Long’s Peak to the west are awesome. It’s definitely a workout but very doable by all skill levels. And if you want to let the kids hike, you can choose to hang out at Lilly Lake. There’s a short mile trail around the lake that I wouldn’t mind visiting for a run. The trailhead has a restroom, and the scenery is stunning. We drove back home along Hwy 7 and stopped for lunch at Oscar Blues in Lyons. Looks like it might rain now but we had a beautiful Saturday morning.