Not quite the overnight backpack I wanted (snow a bit melted out, rocky even up high), but still a wonderful night to be out. Very warm and beautiful days! Read More ...

Continue reading Mt Evans Wilderness Winter Overnighter at PMags.com.

Some trail work with Friends of Mt. Evans and Lost Creek Wilderness. Read More ...

Continue reading Mt Evans Wilderness Trail Work – July 2015 at PMags.com.

A quick weekend backpack with my buddy Josh. Read More ...

Continue reading Mt Evans Wilderness Walkabout at PMags.com.

An attempted S24O in the Mt Evans Wilderness with Cam “Swami” Honan of thehikinglife.com .

Through my activity in the backpacking community, I’ve been able to correspond and get to know many people over the years without actually meeting them.

With many people, I’ve had years of correspondence and discussion about many topics, cracked a few jokes and exchanged information.

And one person I’ve exchanged emails with a fair amount over the past few years is Cam Honan aka Swami.  A very accomplished backpacker I’ve written about before.

He is currently in Colorado helping out the with CDTC . It also gave us a chance to get in a quick backpacking trip before another event on Sunday morning.

I figured it was a good chance to show off something that was not on a long trail. A little bit of Colorado enjoyed by the locals.

The trip did not go as planned, but it was still enjoyable.

Continue reading Blaze Orange, Blow Downs and Beer: Mt Evans Wilderness at PMags.com.

An overnight backpacking trip in the Mount Evans wilderness.

In the mood for an overnighter backpacking trip, but not the crowds and traffic of Summit County or the Indians Peaks Wilderness, I decided to do a quick trip to the Mt. Evans Wilderness.

My original plan was a modification of a trip d-low and I did a few years ago. I’d still be camping near Hell’s Hole, but rather than go straight to Gray Wolf Mountain, I’d hike to the Sawtooth, (tag Mt. Evans if feeling ambitious/crowds don’t deter me)  head over to Spalding, up to Gray Wolf and then down back to my vehicle to make a nice, challenging loop.

Alas, freakishly early t-storms dissuaded me and lent itself to a shorter, but still satisfying loop.

Drove up through Clear Creek Canyon, exited I70 in Idaho Springs and made my way to the trailhead. From the Hells Hole trailhead, I walked along trail by West Chicago Creek.

Continue reading Autumn is coming – Mt. Evans Wilderness at PMags.com.

This past weekend, I joined my good friends Wendy and d-low for a fairly easy backpacking trip in the Mt. Evans wilderness.

The planned trip was to drop my vehicle at Echo Lake at the base of the Mt. Evans auto road, pile into another car and drive over Guanella Pass to start the trip.

After some car shuffling, we started our jaunt from the Abyss Trail Head with a striking view of the 14k ft+ Bierstadt. On this June day, the trailhead just up the road for this peak was crowded. On this trail? We had it all to ourselves.

 
After hiking in the open meadow for a bit, we quickly entered a trail lined with aspens.
 

 
The warmth, the easy tread and the subtle scenery made the miles go by.
 
Eventually we entered more open terrain…and saw the increasingly dark clouds, felt the wind pick up and felt the pressure drop.

Continue reading Mt. Evans Wilderness Backpacking at PMags.com.