Hooray for Ouray!

We had never spent any time in Ouray, and since it is only 14 miles down the road, it was a great day trip.  The first stop was the visitor center, where we  needed a lesson on how to pronounce the name of this town.  It is pronounced "You ray" and the emphasis is on the last syllable so that it sounds like "Hooray!"  It's a beautiful little town with hanging baskets all over town.

Known as "Little Switzerland" because of the tall mountains that surround it and some Swiss architecture, this lodge took advantage of the nickname.

The advice from the visitor's center was to hike the perimeter trail--a five miler featuring the cliffs and mountains surrounding the town.  Starting right across the street from the visitor center, the trail would take us up a steep incline for a great view of Ouray.  Hemmed into a box canyon, this little town is nestled between several 13,000 foot peaks.

The first stop on the perimeter trail is Lower Cascade Falls.  Coming from western Oklahoma where waterfalls don't exist, Denisa has a soft spot for visiting a good fall.  This is a big waterfall, and just to give it some scale you can barely see her in a red shirt at the bottom far left of the photo.

Because we love to go to waterfalls, we decided to tackle the Upper Cascades Fall as well.  The sign on the trail said it was only 4/10 of a mile away, so we took the side trail towards the larger fall.  The trail was a tough one, going straight up.  After 4/10 of a mile we found the next sign that explained we had just made it to the trail head.  Now it would be another 1.7 mile up to get to the falls.  What?  We had been tricked!  So we took this picture of the still far away upper cascade falls and headed back to the perimeter trail.


Next stop was the "Baby Bathtub."  The visitor center volunteer had explained that Native American mothers had bathed their babies in the shallow indentions that are all over this chalky rock.  This little waterfall looked like a good rinse cycle for bathing those babies.

We finally made it to the highest section of the perimeter trail, for great views of those majestic peaks that surround town.

Like so many of our hikes, with the afternoon comes rain showers.  We found a large tree beside a boulder to shelter us from the hard rain.  Too bad we didn't notice that the tree was sappy as we huddled close to its trunk.  We were sticky for the rest of the day.  As fast as the rain came up, we were again blessed with blue skies while we were still sporting our rain coats.

 



We took another side trail to visit the Box Canyon park.  As we trekked along a metal walkway into a canyon, the sound of the thundering falls got louder.  The waterfall is actually inside the mountain.










 








The end of the canyon was a wet experience, as the mist from the waterfall filled the air.  Because the water fall is inside the mountain, it is impossible to photograph.  That white misty vertical line is all that we could get into the picture.  But it was great to hear and experience it in person.










After climbing a quarter mile back up the mountain, we were treated to great views from the suspension bridge, and then the trail headed through an old water tunnel.

Work is being done to increase the length of the trail to the west side of town.  In fact, the needed foot bridge is supposed to be installed later this summer.  Until then, the trail ends at the south end of town where you can walk down Main street back towards the visitor center.  With several detours, we had stretched our hike to 7 miles and we were hungry!  We stopped at Maggie's Kitchen for a "voted best hamburger in Ouray" on our way through town.  The long line to order verified that it is a popular local place because it is not only tasty, but affordable.

We also rewarded our hiking efforts with an ice cream cone on the way back to the car.  It was a good day exploring the town of Ouray--and its beautiful perimeter.  Hooray for Ouray!