Hikin' and chillin'

Monday (it was last Monday—yikes! how fast this idyllic vacation is drawing to a close!) Henry suggested we take a "moderate" hike starting near Old Monarch Pass on the Divide and heading down at Waterdog Lakes.

Of course, we should have realized that his idea of "moderate" might not exactly jive with ours, and it was a very strenous hike, in spite of the fact that the path doesn't involve much climbing. But we saw spectacular scenery and had a good time in spite of all the huffing and puffing.

The first part of the excursion took us along the top of the ski area, a path that coincides with some of our favorite ski runs. Above on the right you can see Hal and his father-in-law checking the GPS at an observation point on the trail.

We had a little fun, too, at the top of the Panorama ski lift, which we usually see under slightly different conditions.

Then it was off along the Continental Divide for a couple of miles. Spit off one side and your DNA will end up in the Pacific, off the other and it will slide into the Gulf of Mexico. Pretty neat place for a globe-trotting travel writer to take a rest stop, here on what could be called the top of the world.

Our destination was the lovely Waterdog Lakes I showed you in the last post. But getting down to them isn't as easy as it looks. On the left you can get a slight idea of the scary and ankle-breaking way down and on the right there's a look back at the way we came, from the comfort of the lakeside.

Speaking of the lakeside, here's the way Upper Waterdog looks from a place where we haved camped on a couple of different occasions:

And here's a closeup of the sunlight sparkling on the clear (and cold, but refreshing for tired feet!) water of the lake:
The trail down from the lake is a little longer than might be comfortable, considering how tired we were from our 11,000+' elevation stroll and the tricky descent to the lakes. But we were rewarded by the sight and sound of this lovely stream just before hitting US 50 and returning to civilization. Very tired, but happy to be reminded once again how wonderful the high Rockies are. And our New England visitors were suitably impressed and are ready to come back and ski!

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We took it easy Tuesday after our big hike, partly to let our bodies recover, but partly because the weather wasn't too welcoming toward outdoor activities. Although I'm sure that a cool rainy day sounds pretty good to friends back in Texas these days.

After lunch things warmed up a bit, though, and we took a short trip to our favorite little waterfall, just uphill a ways from the Angel of Shavano campground. We've visited it many times before, but never tire of it. Here's as good a look at the whole fall that you can get, since it bends around a bit.
Here's another shot, of just the top this time, showing some climbers up there.


The water's awfully cold, coming directly from melted snow, so Henry was the only one of us brave enough to let water meet flesh.

But the combination of water and rocks here is really spectacular, for looking at only, both in longshot scenic views, and more intimate closeups, like this one on the left of the swirling waters and lichen covered rocks just below my favorite viewing seat.

On the right is one of the big rocks providing not only a backrest for me but a viewpoint for another photographer. It looks like Beth's camera; is it her using it, or Carey?

Wednesday was a bittersweet lovely day, as we had to bid farewell to Sally, our Maine visitors, and also, eventually, to Hal and Carey. We were with the latter group for a few more hours, though, as we took them up to Breckenridge for a friend's wedding. [Congratulations, Peter and Brooke! and thanks for bringing the travelers home, at least for a week!]

Our way back to Garfield from Breck was incredibly scenic and interesting. I'll try to get the details of this journey posted tomorrow, but if I don't have time then you'll have to wait a few days. When can we get internet access in the car, Dad?

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Henry has an extensive review of this week's activities here.