Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado - Snowshoeing

Just because I have decided that I'm over Winter does not, of course, mean that winter will cooperate and yield to Spring. The Winter season tends to linger for a long time here in the Mountain West and it's not unusual to see snow fall in May and even into June.

The first attempted snowshoeing trip of the season was with Josh in Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado. It was Halloween weekend and the weather was so warm and dry that we ended up carrying our snowshoes on our backs the entire way.


Where's all the snow?

A few weeks later, Rob, Ryan, Lesa and I found lots of new snow on a trek up to White Pine Lake in Little Cottonwood Canyon. Between November and February I managed to get out snowshoeing quite a few times and even invested in a fancy new pair of MSR snowshoes. By the time February comes to an end, I'm ready to be done with the snow and cold. Four months is enough.


Lesa, Ryan, and Rob enjoying a lovely day in White Pine Canyon

Rob needed to head over to Denver and decided it would be fun to make a long weekend trip out of it. We spent two nights in Estes Park, CO in a great cabin before heading down to Denver on Sunday. My friends Kevin, Josh, and Justin joined us for one night in Estes Park and Rob and I spent two days snowshoeing within Rocky Mountain National Park.


Rob on the way to Flattop Mountain - Rocky Mountain NP

On the way to Flattop Mountain - Rocky Mountain NP

Windblown trees on the way to Flattop Mountain - Rocky Mountain NP

Windblown Rob - Flattop Mountain

On the way to Flattop Mountain - Rocky Mountain NP

Bierstadt Lake - Rocky Mountain NP

Rob giving me a ride on the ride - Bierstadt Lake

Winter started and ended for me in Rocky Mountain National Park. I'm sure there will be more snow over the next few months, but it's time to move onto biking and hiking.

Anchorage and Denali National Park, Alaksa - Sightseeing

I'm back! I just got back to SLC this morning after an awesome week in Alaska. The weather was so unbelievably perfect!! Hardly a cloud in the sky all week and temps in the 70s. I didn't wear any of the cool weather gear that i lugged up - just shorts and t-shirts. The mosquitoes up in Alaska weren't as bad as i feared. I only broke out the 100% DEET one time.

DAY 1 - flew up to anchorage ... via phoenix (booo!!)
DAY 2 - hiked Flattop Mountain near anchorage with Jeff - awesome views up top and a pretty good hike. hit up Kincaid Park and the Coastal Trail later that day.
DAY 3- Alaska art and history museum in Anchorage. Then drove up to near Trapper Creek to spend the night. awesome views of Denali on the way up. watched the sun set over Denali after 10pm (stays light almost all night up there).
DAY 4 - all day biking with Jeff through Denali national park and preserve. Finally met up with Tim! He managed to hitch a ride on some random flight and they landed and tossed him out on the road near where i spent the night. We sat outside almost all night and waited for the northern lights - they never came. So weird how it never gets totally dark at night.
DAY 5 - tram ride and then a hike up to the summit of Mt. Alyeska south of anchorage. touched my first glacier. Tim and i played in the glacial runoff for hours - amazing views of the inlet and surrounding glaciers.
DAY 6 - saw a bunch of people fishing for poor defenseless salmon. boat ride out to Portage glacier - so awesome! saw chunks of ice falling off the glacier into the water.
DAY 7 - flew back to SLC via phoenix again. saw the northern lights and Perseid meteor shower from the plane!

Some Alaska pics...