Hi Blog Readers,

As discussed in the last blog entry, I awoke from the Ice Lakes near Ouray in 27 degree weather.  After packing up my campsite and rubbing my hands together fiercely in an effort to keep them warm, I dropped down out of Ouray and stopped at a Denny’s in Ridgway, where I took in some much needed calories.  During breakfast, I overheard an old man bragging about his son “the wine maker” who made it big in Paso Robles, and I’m now kicking myself for not asking which winery his son operated.  It would have been fun to visit.

Once I finished breakfast, I drove and drove and drove.  Colorado’s an interesting state – if you hate the geography of where you’re at, just drive for 20 minutes and you will find that everything has changed.  Anyways, by midmorning I had made it to the canyon lands of Glenwood Springs, and I pushed forward to the Hanging Lake trail.  This is an incredibly popular trail in Colorado, very touristy, and I had to wait approximately 20 minutes just for a parking spot.  I felt like I was “Disneyland hiking.”  Tons of people, too many people.  For some reason there was this old Asian man just standing there staring at a tree as I started the trail.  When I got back, he was still standing there staring at the same tree.  Total zen, but at the same time, why?  This was the sort of stuff I was trying to grapple in this place.

The start of the Hanging Lake trail is completely vanilla with a concrete sidewalk leading towards the lake.  However, dire warning signs saying “Danger!  Difficult!” were hanging around the trailhead, and due to the sidewalk’s presence, I couldn’t tell if the signs were ironic or genuine.  At the end of the day, I found out that the answer lied somewhere in-between, and that the trail turned to dirt and was actually fairly strenuous, about the same level of difficulty as the steep portions of the Whiskeytown Falls hike, but carrying on for about 1.5-2 miles rather than the 1/4 mile or so of steepness on the Falls trail.  Still, it was nothing for me.

On the way up the trail, I bumped into some SCA trail builders and offered my condolences.  I myself did similar work on the Whiskeytown Falls trail back in college, and understand the pain they’re going through.  Other exciting moments on the trail included an old shack and a cave.  
This is what houses looked like before the internet was invented.

This is what houses looked like before wood was invented.

Finally, I made it to the top of the trail, and the views and trout-filled lake were truly stunning and worthwhile, worth the crowds, just completely worth it.

Beautiful!

By the time I made it down from the trail, it was only early afternoon, and feeling completely rejuvenated from the views, I decided to push onwards to my next destination, St. Mary’s Glacier (see next entry).

Cheers,

Rob