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Carlsbad Caverns National Park and the Guadalupes

Lost in the Land of Enchantment | Monday – Wednesday, November 11-13, 2024

After spending a cold and snowy weekend at Bandelier National Monument and elsewhere around the Pajarito Plateau we headed further south into New Mexico until we reached Carlsbad, which is located in the Permian Basin just east of the Guadalupe Mountains. It was quite a bit warmer here which was a pleasant change from the previous couple of days further north. After checking in to our hotel we still had plenty of daylight left, so we drove over to Carlsbad Caverns National Park so we could start getting acquainted with the park and maybe even find a place to catch the sunset. This turned out to be an excellent idea because as we entered the park we noticed a sign that said there was a Bat Flight program this evening at the Bat Flight Amphitheater. According to the park’s website the Bat Flight Program only takes places from Memorial Day weekend through October, so I didn’t think we would be able to go to one on this trip, but since it was still happening we were excited to check it out!

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The Kaibab Plateau: Cape Final to Point Sublime

Fall Colors along the North Rim of the Grand Canyon
Saturday – Monday, September 28-30, 2024

After spending the preceding week on an amazing rafting trip through the Canyon of Lodore in Dinosaur National Monument, our group got off the river in the early afternoon on Friday and I made it home a few hours after that. Then I spent the rest of the evening unloading all my river gear and packing up my car-camping gear into the Jeep so I could leave on Saturday morning to spend a full week along the Arizona Strip and North Rim of the Grand Canyon with my friend Jared. Although we typically spend this first week in October wandering around Southern Utah, every so often we like to change it up and venture a little further south into Arizona. Thankfully we decided to begin our trip with a couple days on the Kaibab Plateau because it happened to be very warm all over the southwest this week and at least it was a little bit cooler up at these higher elevations. Plus, we got really lucky with the timing of our trip and managed to see the peak of the fall colors on display while we were up on the Kaibab Plateau, too!

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The Zirkel Circle in the Mount Zirkel Wilderness

Friday – Saturday, September 20-21, 2024

This weekend I headed up into the Mount Zirkel Wilderness of the Park Range for what will most likely be my last trip into the mountains of the season. Since I’m leaving for a week-long river trip early on Monday morning and need to finish prepping and packing for that, I was hoping to stay closer to home on Saturday by heading up into either the San Juan Mountains or The Flat Tops, but the weather forecast was not looking good for any of the ranges nearby this weekend, so I had to start looking for alternate options. After looking at the forecasts for other areas throughout Colorado and Utah, the only place that looked like it might have decent weather on Saturday was the Park Range, so I decided to drive a little further east so I could hike the Zirkel Circle, which has been on my to-do list for a long time anyways. I left from work on Friday afternoon, grabbed a quick dinner in Rifle and then headed north where I started following the Yampa River and Elk River into the heart of the Park Range. I found a campsite on the ridge above the South Fork of the Elk River shortly before sunset and then went for a short walk until dusk.

Colorado Trail: Carson Saddle & the Continental Divide

Friday – Sunday, September 6-8, 2024

With the mountain season coming to an end in just a few short weeks and a busy schedule for me later this month, I wanted to make sure that I got out for some more hiking above treeline in the high country this weekend before it was too late. I thought a good way to do that would be by hiking part of the Colorado Trail along the Continental Divide in the San Juan Mountains starting from the Carson Saddle above Wager Gulch, so that’s where I headed when I left work on Friday afternoon. I didn’t want to deal with the Middle Bridge over Blue Mesa on US 50, so instead I opted to go over Red Mountain Pass into Silverton and then took the Alpine Loop over Cinnamon Pass to the Lake Fork of the Gunnison River.

Chepeta Lake: Eccentric Benchmark & Daggett Peak

Headwaters of the Whiterocks River | Friday – Sunday, August 9-11, 2024

After last week’s backpacking trip to the Red Castle Lakes in the High Uintas Wilderness I didn’t have any plans on returning to the Uinta Mountains anytime soon. However, after keeping an eye on the weather forecast around Colorado for the upcoming weekend, I couldn’t find a mountain range within a couple hundred miles of home that didn’t show stormy weather all day and night. It was going to be a wet and stormy weekend in the mountains of Colorado! I was originally hoping to spend the weekend hiking along the Continental Divide in the San Juan Mountains, but on Friday afternoon I made a last-minute decision to head up to the eastern end of the Uinta Mountains with hopes that I would be able to get some hiking in since the weather forecast for this area looked like the best around with only the typical afternoon storms. So for the second time in as many weeks I left from work and drove over Douglas Pass on my way to the Uinta Mountains. After a quick stop for fuel in Vernal I headed out across the Uinta Basin and then followed the Whiterocks River up to it’s headwaters at Chepeta Lake.

Tag: dusk

Carlsbad Caverns National Park and the Guadalupes

The Kaibab Plateau: Cape Final to Point Sublime

The Zirkel Circle in the Mount Zirkel Wilderness

Colorado Trail: Carson Saddle & the Continental Divide

Chepeta Lake: Eccentric Benchmark & Daggett Peak