Rocky Mountain National Park's Greatest Hikes

Rocky Mountain National Park's Greatest Hikes

Lace up your boots and get ready to discover the vast wilderness of Rocky Mountain National Park, where the windswept tundra contains an ecosystem of hundreds of species of wildflowers, and the sculpted peaks silhouetted in opposition to the blue sky function a dramatic reminder of the final ice age. Traverse this nice backbone of the Continental Divide and listen for bugling elk or spot contemporary bear scat beneath your feet. Come celebrate the a hundredth anniversary of one among America’s oldest nationwide parks within the time-honored tradition – backpack on, strolling sticks in hand and sense of marvel restored.

It’s a big place, so to help you find your approach, here are some of Rocky Mountain’s greatest hikes.

Bear Lake
Bear Lake is likely one of the park’s most popular locations for first-time visitors, and with good reason. From right here you’ll have a front-row vantage point of the dramatic glacial valleys and hulking granite summits that make Rocky Mountain such a singular landscape. With ten lakes within the space and superb vistas, it is best to definitely count on large crowds.

Hikes right here range from straightforward jaunts round Bear Lake (0.5 miles) or to Alberta Falls (1.6 miles) to more challenging excursions that follow the glacial valleys up to their origins. Mills Lake (5.6 miles) is a good choice, as is the Loch (6.2 miles), which can be extended to the exquisite Lake of Glass and Sky Pond (9.eight miles), both of which are as serene as their names suggest. And while Flattop Mountain (12,324ft, 8.eight miles) is probably not the park’s greatest summit, there’s no denying its magnetic pull from down below. Use the park shuttles to get to the trailhead.

Bear Lake to Fern Lake
This dayhike is a ranger favourite and known for its various scenery. On this hike you will climb as much as the treeline and an alpine lake before dropping back down through fields of scree and right into a forested valley. Right here you’ll pass more lakes, waterfalls, aspen groves and elk-inhabited meadows.

Thanks to the park shuttle system, this is a one-means journey that requires no backtracking – and what’s more, it’s mostly downhill. You can’t miss Lake Helene, which sits serenely beneath the imposing tough-cut cliffs of Notchtop and Flattop mountains. To do this hike, park at Fern Lake Trailhead (the endpoint), california posters then take the shuttle to Bear Lake Trailhead. Shorten the trip by simply going to Lake Helene and back (5.8 miles).

Longs Peak & Chasm Lake
Iconic in every method, Longs Peak is the head of RMNP and one in every of Colorado’s traditional climbs. The tallest peak in the park (14,259ft), its exhilarating and exhausting Keyhole Route is on many visitors’ to-do list. The top of this route is the crux, consisting of slender traverses, vertiginous cliff faces and coronary heart-pounding clambering up polished slabs of rock. Most individuals begin the climb by 3am with a view to attain the summit before noon.

The great news is that you simply don’t have to reach the summit or flip your legs to jelly. Chasm Lake, located on the foot of the Diamond – Longs’ legendary east face the place technical climbers rope as much as scale the 1000ft wall – is routinely rated as one of the park’s best hikes. Chasm features all the spectacular scenery of the height with out the risk and arduous ascent. However, at 8.four miles spherical journey, you’ll still need to be in excellent shape.

Gem Lake
On the northeastern end of the park is Lumpy Ridge, composed of 1.eight-billion-year-old granite formations that have been sculpted by the elements fairly than by glaciers. This markedly completely different type of abrasion has resulted in an array of whimsically formed boulders, balancing rocks and colossal domes. The path to Gem Lake is a good way to discover the realm, with superb vistas back to the Continental Divide all the way in which as much as the bijou-like lake.