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Serpents Trail: The Crookedest Road In the World

Heart of the World | Wednesday, September 10, 2025

I had some time to continue working on my Heart of the World project after work today and decided it was time to cross the Serpents Trail off the list. It’s been a long time since I hiked the Serpents Trail in the Colorado National Monument and I honestly don’t even remember when the last time was, but I would guess it’s been at least eight to ten years now? It’s interesting to think about because there was a time when I hiked this trail pretty regularly to stay in shape, but I guess that’s the main reason why I started this whole project in the first place- so I could return to some of the trails in the Monument that I have not been back to in a long time. Although it was still over 90 degrees out this afternoon when I started hiking up the historic route, there was a strong wind that helped keep it feeling a bit cooler out, plus there were plenty of clouds that helped block the sunlight and made for some nicer photos.

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Fringes of the Raggeds: Yule Pass to Daisy Pass

Raggeds Wilderness | Friday – Sunday, September 5-7, 2025

This weekend I returned to the Elk Mountains near Crested Butte so I could hike up to two passes in the Ruby Range that have been on my to-do list for far too long, both of which are found along the fringes of the Raggeds Wilderness above the Slate River Valley. Even though I didn’t have the best experience trying to find a campsite near Crested Butte back in July, there are still a lot of places in the area that I want to hike and explore so I decided to give it another shot after Labor Day weekend, which seemed to work out much better this time. As usual, I left from work on Friday afternoon, stopped for a quick dinner in Delta and then took the Kebler Pass Road over into Crested Butte and followed the Slate River up to the Paradise Divide where I found a campsite for the night. It started to rain on and off while I was driving over Kebler Pass which would keep up throughout the rest of the evening. Once I was settled in at camp I spent the remainder of the evening wandering around Paradise Divide when it wasn’t raining.

Mountains of Minerals: Denver Pass to Grouse Gulch

San Juan Triangle | Sunday & Monday, August 31 – September 1, 2025

After staying home to attend a concert on Saturday evening, I was up early on Sunday morning and headed down to the San Juan Mountains so I could spend the remainder of the holiday weekend hiking and camping in the San Juan Triangle, which is one of my favorite areas to explore in the mountains. After making it over Red Mountain Pass to Silverton, I followed the Animas River to Animas Forks and then continued up the North Fork to Denver Lake. I parked nearby and then started my first hike of the day up the old mining track to Denver Pass. Although I have already hiked most of the peaks in this area and driven all the open roads, I had neglected to hike up to this pass before and was looking forward to finally checking it out!

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A Smoky Drive Through Grand Teton National Park

Saturday, August 23, 2025

After leaving Yellowstone National Park through it’s South Entrance on Saturday morning it was time to start our drive back home, but since we would be driving through Grand Teton National Park for the first time we decided to spend a few hours in the park stopping at overlooks and viewpoints along the way and even going on a couple of short hikes. Unfortunately, there was still a lot of smoke in the air from wildfires and the hazy light during our late morning and early afternoon visit was pretty terrible, so these are just some snapshots I took during our brief visit to the park. Maybe it’s because we drove through on a Saturday, but I was a bit shocked at how busy this park was! I was expecting Yellowstone to be packed with people, and aside from the popular geyser basins it wasn’t as bad as I envisioned, but Grand Teton was what I was expecting Yellowstone to be like with vehicles lining both side of the roads and overfilled parking lots and trailheads.

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Plateau of Fire: Yellowstone National Park

Tuesday – Saturday, August 19-23, 2025

Up until about a week ago Diane and I were planning to spend the latter part of this week backpacking in the Wind River Range in Wyoming, however some things came up that prevented us from going on a longer backpacking trip at this time, so we decided to change course and throw together a last minute trip to Yellowstone National Park instead. Neither of us had ever been to Yellowstone before and I’ve certainly always avoided the park because of the massive crowds it attracts, but I guess it was finally time to give the world’s first National Park a shot. So late last week I reserved a site at the Bridge Bay Campground for three nights and then came up with a rough itinerary that focused on visiting some of the areas around the lower Grand Loop Road, entering the park via Cody and the East Entrance and then leaving through the South Entrance into Jackson Hole. I had never even thought about planning a trip to Yellowstone before last week or been this far north in Wyoming before, and I had to consult a lot of maps and guidebooks to help me figure out the layout of the park rather quickly so our itinerary would make some sense.

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Category: Hiking

Serpents Trail: The Crookedest Road In the World

Fringes of the Raggeds: Yule Pass to Daisy Pass

Mountains of Minerals: Denver Pass to Grouse Gulch

A Smoky Drive Through Grand Teton National Park

Plateau of Fire: Yellowstone National Park