5 minute read
Early Summer Hiking
story and photos by Dave Rusk
The boots were hanging out the passenger window. I wasn't sure why, but since the black suburban with Illinois plates was coming out of Rocky Mountain National Park and since the Park had been enjoying accumulations of snow about every other day through much of May, I assumed the boots were wet from the trail and the passenger was hoping get some air drying done before they hit a local eatery. It seemed like a good sign of a moist spring.
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Nelson's (or Nuttal's) Larkspur
Photo by Dave Rusk
Walking in the lower elevations of the Park now, I am seeing a plethora of blue Nelson's Larkspur and goldenyellow Whiskbroom Parsley, more than I usually see dotting the open fields. By the end of May, the spring snows finally gave way to afternoon thunderstorms.
Whiskbroom parsley
Photo by Dave Rusk
Water from a rising Big Thompson River overflows into the new grassy meadows of Moraine Park and it has started to back up into the Estes Park Post Office parking lot, giving us another way to gauge the early summer season. While much of Colorado west of the Continental Divide and the Southwest in general, remains hot and dry and has started to flame up already, summer is off to a pretty good beginning in our neck of the woods with a prediction of a good wildflower year.
I started this transitional time of the year with a hike up Estes Cone on May 20. It's a fun one that I have always thought was a good first-peak climb for a young hiker getting a taste of the Rocky Mountains. At 3.3 miles, the trail starts at the Longs Peak trailhead at 9,400'. The first 2/3 of the hike sees only a moderate amount of elevation gain and travels by remnants of the early 1900 Eugenia Mine at about the halfway mark. After crossing through Moore Park, with views of the final destination looking so close, the trail begins to climb up the south shoulder of Estes Cone to Storm Pass.
On the summit of Estes Cone
Photo by Dave Rusk
In the 2.6 miles traveled to Storm Pass, the hiker has gained only 836 feet. But, with just 0.7 miles to go, the real challenge begins, with 774' of elevation yet to overcome. Watch for rock cairns to keep track of the trail as it ascends though gnarled limber pines with glimpses of Longs Peak peeking through to admire while taking rest breaks. The hike culminates with a short rock scramble at the end, highlighted by a spectacular mountain backdrop, to give this hike its alpine climb experience. Topping out at just over 11,000', the views from the summit are 360 degrees, from the Diamond of Longs Peak extending north to the Mummy Range and down into the Estes Valley. As the days of May roll into June, and the Golden Banner begins to bloom, I get antsy to hike some of the lower elevation trails that I know will be nearly free of snow, in particular the trail to Cub Lake and the Fern Lake trail to The Pool are some of my favorites.
RMNP has reopened some of the trails previously closed due to the East Troublesome Fire.
RMNP map as of June 3, 2021
While the snow is still melting off of the higher trails, these Montane hikes can give me an afternoon nibble of summer. However, because of fires that blew into the Park last fall and did significant damage to a large swath of the National Park, numerous trails were closed through the winter and spring.
But at the end of May, the Park did open up a few trails (see the Map), including the Cub Lake/Pool Loop trail. So, on the last day in May, I ventured up to Cub Lake to see what things looked like. I am pleased to report that most of this trail remains as it was and I enjoyed a casual stroll up the 2.4 miles up to the lake. The landscape around Cub Lake had been showing steady signs of recovery after having been hit by the 2012 Fern Lake fire. Unfortunately, this area was once again scorched last fall, so the recovery process will begin again.
The hike to The Pool is a sobering sight, after the East Troublesome Fire caused significant damage last fall.
Photo by Dave Rusk
Having been encouraged by no significant impact on the Cub Lake trail, I wandered up the Fern Lake trail a week later. The devastation and destruction along that trail overwhelmed me. It was barely recognizable. Scorched trees looked like charred skeletons caught in a raging inferno of this human-caused cataclysm, paralyzed as the conflagration overtook them. The overflowing Big Thompson that used to flow through magnificent forests of pine and willows, was running in its usual full force, but now flowing by barren trees and over side channels of hardened ash, with sparse vegetation emerging through like the rising phoenix.
As I hiked the trail, I recognized rock steps I had photographed 4 years prior that had been lined with lush green vegetation, but were now entirely barren. The rocks were like dental records, the only thing in the landscape that was recognizable. The 1.7 miles to The Pool is just a small stretch of the 30,000 acres that burned inside the Park boundaries, 10% of the Park. Yes, fire is part of the natural process and, if given the chance, nature will heal itself. But this human-caused fire will take more than 100 years for the forest to fully recover, and the last fire in this area, also human-caused, was just eight years ago. Will the forest be given me to heal, I wondered?
The hike to The Pool in June of 2013
Photo by Dave Rusk
Of course this summer, I will hike in the other parts of the Park that weren't torched by fire. Those places will undoubtedly be spectacular in all of its Rocky Mountain splendor. It would be easy to forget this destruction and go on as if none of this ever happened. But I am certain I will return to the Fern Lake trail, I feel I must. Not only to remind myself of the destruction that is possible if we are not careful, or even to witness nature’s willpower to heal itself, but to hold reverence for the places in Rocky that are still untouched, that are still preserved, that are still able to show us the powerful force of life and can help teach us how to live our lives.
Seen on the hike to The Pool in June, 2021
Photo by Dave Rusk
Dave Rusk has been sauntering and taking photographs through Rocky Mountain National Park for decades. He is the author publisher of Rocky Mountain Day Hikes, a book of 24 hikes in Rocky, and the website of the same name. He is the publisher of HIKE ROCKY Magazine and an important content contributor to all of these endeavors.
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