Autumn begins

September 19 & 20

After spending the past several weeks packing, moving and getting settled into my new (to me) mountain home, I was itching to get out and hike again, it had been too long!

On Saturday I chose a hike near a very popular leaf peeping area and it slipped my mind what time of year it was. Turning off the highway at 7:30am there was already a trail of cars heading up the pass. As we approached the main trailhead off the pass (not where I was heading) we passed at least 100 cars. I immediately started to think I’d made a poor choice coming here but decided to continue on course in hopes that the hike I picked wouldn’t be so popular.

Pulling up the the parking lot, there were about 10 cars. This was the parking lot for two trailheads so 10 cars wasn’t bad at all!

We headed out and onto the less traveled of the two trails. The path led up through the forest at a steep incline, past a stream and into a beautiful meadow. Fall colors were just starting to pop.

After about 2 miles of climbing through the forest, we reached tree line and the alpine tundra, my favorite next to desert landscape!

Having put most of my time and energy into moving recently, I had become quite out of shape and the steep climb combined with the altitude was taking it’s toll on both Chili and I. We slowly made our way across the autumn tundra towards the summit.

At the top we met a lone bow hunter and talked to him for awhile about how overrun the area had become, then he headed down the mountain, leaving Chili and I to take in the views.

The wind started to pick up and a few drops of rain fell so we headed back towards the Jeep. On the way down, we passed three people. I was very pleased to have found such a lightly trafficked trail in such a crowded area!

On Sunday we did a quick hike near our new home, I only took two pictures of note. And the raspberries were delicious!