Sad time for trees

The devastation wrought by the various conifer beetles around here has gotten really, really bad.

The view above was taken from the top of the Monarch Pass gondola. It looks like that entire hillside is going to be treeless before too long. (I've written about this scourge before; here's a collection of my blog posts containing the word "beetle.")

Here's another shot, in which you can see some of the ski runs at Monarch. They've had to thin out trees up there, for safety. It's made some of the runs more fun (easier tree-skiing) but I'm worried that eventually the scenery I love so much to take in while skiing will be very different in years to come.

I know some areas of the state are harder-hit than our valley. I was appalled at the views like this one, taken from my car on a short road trip further south...

I'm sure life will eventually adapt, and these hillsides will eventually have some sort of trees on them. But for the rest of my life, anyway, it's going to be dead trees wherever you go.

Wordless Wednesday: Christmas in August

On top of the world

Blogging about our time in Colorado, when here we're happy to see the high temperature at only 95, is almost a torture. But it's also a pleasant reminder of cooler days. 

And better scenery...

My last recreational activity before heading home was a very enjoyable hike along the Continental Divide near Monarch Pass.

I have blogged about these vantage points before, and have hiked this particular trail more times than I can count. But it's always a delight. 

And it's so easy! You just park at the Monarch Crest parking lot and take off walking south along the trail. You can walk as far as you feel like walking (or, rather, half as far as you feel like walking) then turn around and come back. With scenery like this, you certainly don't mind going over the same ground twice.

We walked as far as Mt. Peck, probably a couple of miles, and at one time thought we'd take a sidetrip and climb it, but decided to be a little lazy and just stop at this saddle, where I took a 360° video, to try and capture the heavenly view. I don't think it does the place justice, but you might get a small idea of what it feels like to be on the top of the world.

Strolling along the trail, I became rather taken with the flowers and tried taking some ground's-eye-views of them...

...as well as some more conventional shots...

It was great that there were still so many flowers blooming in spite of it being almost August. Which, in the high country, is really the end of summer. The unusual amount of rain we'd been having might have been the reason for the profusion.

But no matter how often you look down at the flowers, your gaze is always brought back up and out to the spectacular mountains. From this trail they seem to blanket the whole world!

These two peeping over a lower hill have an especially interesting story to go along with their rugged beauty. On the right is Mt. Ouray (climbed by some of our family members many years ago) and on the left Mt. Chipeta. They are named for a Ute Indian couple that are well-known figures in Colorado history. I think it's pretty nice to think of them being together, in spirit, anyway, forever. 

Or at least until these mountains erode to the sea. Which, I think, pretty much counts as forever in most frames of reference. At least I know they'll still be there when I go back next summer!

High climbing

Last week we did some high-altitude sight-seeing. Even higher than the 9500' where we're living.

A couple of trips to the 11,000' level showed us some fabulous scenery. And for one of the junkets we didn't even have to do any climbing!

We rode the Monarch Pass gondola (that I last rode in 2009), wisely in the morning before the clouds rolled in, and had spectacular vistas in all directions. In the shot above you can see not only the vintage cars but the nearby ski area in the background. The photo was taken on our walk down, since we thought that small amount of exercise would be a good way to help us acclimate to the thin air....

....so that a few days later we could self-propel ourselves up to almost the same height. We took a dayhike up to one of the loveliest settings in the area, Waterdog Lakes. (Also hiked to in 2009, although then we got there from above, not via the steep trail up from the highway!)

The views are worth it, but, boy! that trail is steep! I guess gondola infrastructure would spoil the beauty of the trail environment, but occasionally I wished for something like that. Maybe a Star Trek transporter would work?

But a picnic place like this, all to ourselves (there were a lot of folks coming up the trail as we were on our way down, but we were the early birds and caught the worm of solitude up at the lake)...well, let's just say it is worth it!

Early birds also are rewarded with plenty of sunshine and white puffy clouds, instead of the rather ominous gray ones that habitually roll in later in the day....

We like to think that we used up enough calories so that a yummy dinner at the Twisted Cork in Salida that evening didn't result in weight gain. But since I somehow keep forgetting to take the scales out of the closet, who knows?!

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A quick trip up north to Breckinridge is on tap for the weekend, so look for some pictures of another part of this great state in a few days.

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.

Together again--briefly

Our little family, plus most of my son's delightful in-laws, are making Colorado our home for another day or so.

Our first meeting place was the humongous but generally pleasant enough Denver International Airport, whose space-age-looking main terminal roof I photographed from below. Sally arrived early Saturday morning, I came in around mid-morning, the New England in-laws shortly thereafter, and the South American travelers in the early afternoon. What a marvel of modern technology is air travel!

We proceeded to drive three hours to the little town of Garfield, familiar to readers of this blog. Our first day there, high in the Rockies, was Sunday, and we did a lot of soaking up of scenery.

First we took a hike up to the top of Monarch Pass' gondola ride—much better exercise than riding up, right? On the right you'll see the end of the hike, a veritable forest of towers that we assume are for cell phones and other types of telecommunications magic. The little building on the far right in the photo is the top of the gondola ride, which was up there long before the cell phone towers, having been built in 1966.

From the top of the hill you can see for miles around. Even though it was a bit hazy, which interfered with views of distant mountain peaks, it was easy to see the Monarch ski area, where we were in March. Here's the way it looks from the pass, without snow, with Sally in the foreground (there will be more about the ski area later today and in my next post):

We did opt to ride the gondola down, so we would have time to hit some more scenic spots. Here's a shot out the cab's window. Pretty nice view, in seated comfort:


Next stop was a geo-caching expedition up old Monarch Pass, which is a few hundred feet down the highway (U.S. 50) from its newer cousin. The really cool thing, as far as I was concerned, about this little side trip, is that the old Monarch Pass road skirts right next to the ski area. We even ended up at the top of sidewinder, one of my favorite runs! On the left is a picture Sally took of me by the id sign for it, and below is a shot of the pleasant meadow that becomes the ski run with the addition of a few tons of the white stuff.


After this invigorating series of outings, we headed back to Garfield, and then Salida for dinner at our favorite Salida eatery.

And, a meeting-up with the only still-missing member of the fam, Henry the wilderness paddler. He met us at Amica's with boats in tow and stories of his adventures on the Rio Chama. As soon as he has several hours of uninterrupted internet time I'm sure he'll post some fabulous photos and entertaining stories on his blog. On the right you can see our place's mudroom full of his river gear, for an idea of what a big deal this expedition was.

Well, my computer's about to run out of juice at Bongo Billy's comfortable coffeehouse and free wifi headquarters. So I'll stop here and continue my stories next time I get a chance to snag some internet. Unfortunately, when that happens, my little family will be scattered to the four winds again. But it surely has been wonderful having them close, however briefly it was.