M-Photo | Field Notes

Memorial Day trip to Devils Tower and the Black Hills of South Dakota. There were a several planned sites on the itinerary, maybe a few too many as I often do. Saturday we got to Devils Tower around 11:00 am and started hiking the red bed trail.  Only 2.8 miles, piece of cake, right?  This wa a brutal hike!  We hike a lot, it should have been that hard.  It was only 5000-ish feet above sea level and we were dying.  It must have been the heat, it was 90degrees and I guess we are not quite climatized for summer yet. We are still have that crazy spring weather in Denver and definely no 90 degrees days yet.  We stopped and rested often and finally finished the hike in like 3 hours.

https://www.alltrails.com/explore/trail/us/wyoming/red-beds-trail
Wyoming is super green, they have been getting a lot of rain and the grasslands were amazing.  Mile after mile of emerald green.
Antelope Sightings Wyoming: 89 South Dakota: 4 Colorado: 7

Quick trip to Taos New Mexico to hike Tent Rocks National Monument. Hiking in the searing heat, what were we thinking? This was a rather spur of the moment excursion on a Friday night after work and hit I-25. We stayed in historic Taos arriving well after dark. The only goal on this journey was hiking at Tent Rocks. Beautiful scenery! The slot canyons were pretty fantastic too. There were a fair amount of people this time. Our previous visit was back in February 2013. Winter is definitely the best time to go for sure - cooler and less people. We saw a lot of people hiking without water, how is that possible?

We didn’t get a chance to see The Pueblo. That gives a reason to go back! We didn’t realize that Tent Rocks is a two hour drive from Taos which didn’t leave us much time to explore Taos either. On the way home we stopped at the bridge on the Rio Grande River. While crossing the bridge on foot I spotted some, what looked like sheep. Are those fake? You know, like some k…

James Bishop’s life’s work is this spectacular castle located off of Hwy. 165 in the San Isabel forest, about three hours from Denver. James started the project when he was 15 and continued work on it with his father for the next ten summers. Five decades later the castle is still unfinished and stands at 160 feet tall. Construction is funded by donations and the gift shop which unfortunately burned to the ground in March.
There are many narrow staircases that wind up to the various landings where you can get a bird’s eye view of the forest. The interior is vast and light fills the room from the floor to ceiling windows and sky lights. There is even an elevator, which appears to no longer function.

Bent's Old Fort was a trading post for trappers, traders and travelers on the Santa Fe Trail back in the 1830's.  The National Park is a reconstruction but it looks pretty authentic to me.  This place is amazing!  You can go into all the rooms and they are decorated with period artifacts.  Bent's Fort was constructed of adobe bricks and was a meeting place for traders and travelers.  Beaver pelts were traded and when the Beaver supply diminished Buffalo furs took their place.  In the middle of the fort was a press that flattened out the furs for shipping.  The two story structure was made up of guest quarters, dining room, a bar complete with billiard table, a blacksmith shop and storage rooms filled with gun powder and food stuffs.

Beautiful day in Colorado for a spring hike.  No elevation hiking today, we wanted to enjoy the warmth.  After months of bundling up in winter gear it is really freeing not to wear a coat and feel the sun on my skin.  I am solar powered after all.

Two and half hour, 3.56 mile with 659 ft elevation gain.

Horse Tooth Mountain Trail