Snow at Lake Goodwin

We were up at 5:30 a.m. this morning because we wanted to beat the afternoon thunderstorms that the weatherman predicted for today. It was a beautiful morning, and we were greeted by a mountain columbine on the trail.  That was fitting since it is the Colorado state flower.  After trying to grow these in her carefully tended garden at home, Denisa is still amazed that this beautiful flower grows in the wild here!

It was just a little past the columbine, as we rounded a blind curve in the trail, that we heard a loud crash in the thick forest to the right of the trail.  We have been warned about bears on every trailhead sign, and by every ranger information leaflet.  We knew that it had to be a large animal to make the sound of snapping wood that we both heard.  We startled something big, but we don't have any visual proof of what it was.  A little unnerved, now we had to convince ourselves that it was an elk or a large deer.  We also realized that Denisa didn't practice good bear protocol, as her first inclination when she heard the sound was to turn and run.

Talking loudly now, so as not to startle any other large creature, we continued on more carefully now.  We were rewarded with more bright wildflowers along the path. 

The trail often ran beside Gibson Creek.  This little creek is swollen with run-off from the ice melt from the mountain, and it sounded more like Niagara Falls than a mountain creek.  We couldn't talk to each other while we were standing here.  After talking loudly during most of this hike so as not to surprise any bears, we were glad for the sound of the waterfalls.

 We decided to take this trail, because we had read that there was a nice meadow about 2.5 miles from the trailhead.  A short 5 mile hike should be good for getting us acclimated, and also get us home before the afternoon rains.  The meadow was a beautiful destination!  It is another one of God's wonders that we love to explore.

This red-red robin was bobbing among these dandelions.  We used to try very hard to eradicate the dandelions in our yard.  If we would have only known that they make an awesome landscape if they are mixed with a rolling stream and a mountain in the background!

Other winged creatures were really enjoying those dandelions as well.

We watched as this butterfly gulped the nectar from the giant dandelions that dotted the meadow.

We have all the bird and butterfly pictures because Mark was doing some consulting on the phone at the time.  We had an unusually good phone signal here, and he was sitting in the shade giving computer advice while overlooking that beautiful meadow.  What a great office he has!

One last picture of the meadow before we leave to return to the trailhead, and finish a good hike before the rain starts.

But wait, what other beautiful things might we miss if we turn back now?  We just have no common sense when it comes to keeping a hike short. We both suffer from a severe case of "what-will-we-miss-if-we-don't-finish-the-entire-trail" syndrome. We just had to see the end of the trail!  So we continued down the trail, and we were glad we did.  A little further and we could see glimpses of snow still sticking to the sides of the mountain.  We kept this picture just because the mountain snow looks like Casper the Ghost.

And we would have missed this cute squirrel, looking out from his moss draped home in a tree along the trail.

At an elevation of around 10,500 feet we came to our first patch of snow on the path of the trail.  It's always fun to play in snow at the end of June.  The obligatory snowballs were formed and thrown to celebrate summer snow.

Gibson Creek roared with water the steeper the trail got.  We had to cross the creek several times, and there were no bridges.  This water crossing was especially wide, and there were no handrails on the fallen log that Denisa is tight-rope walking across.  It might not look like a narrow log, but when you know that falling off lands you into that frigid water and carries you far down the mountain it takes on a new dimension of scary.

We thought it was interesting that this unusual water plant was firmly anchored in the middle of this raging creek.

We were well over 11,000 feet, very close to finding Gibson Lake at the end of the trail.  We climbed through an opening in the forest to find a huge patch of snow that was hiding the rest of the trail.  Again there were snowballs, but this was a serious patch of snow. 

We found we couldn't go around it, we couldn't go through it, so we tried literally crawling straight up the side of the mountain.

 We finally had to admit defeat.  We weren't going to be able to see that lake at the end of the trail after all.  For all we know, the lake might be underneath all that snow.  After climbing that very steep section, we carefully calculated our options for getting down.  Mark suggested sledding until we noted the huge trees at the bottom were our only method to stop.  Denisa finally succumbed to the only safe way down--scooting on her bottom.

The hike back to the trailhead was easy, as the trip down the mountain always takes a shorter amount of time.  Aside from a few sprinkles, the weatherman didn't deliver the early afternoon showers that were predicted so we didn't even get wet.  Our short 5 mile hike turned into a very rewarding 9 mile hike that we thoroughly enjoyed, and we are feeling pretty good about our acclimation to the elevation here.