Pawnee Pass V

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Aug 182010
 

One of the striking differences between my hike to the Indian Peaks Wilderness Area at the end July and my hike last week was the water level of Lake Isabelle. This is how Lake Isabelle looked in July:

Lake Isabelle - July 30, 2010

Lake Isabelle - July 30, 2010

 And a mere two weeks later:

Lake Isabelle - August 13, 2010

Lake Isabelle - August 13, 2010

What happened?? Well, you see, the water rights to Lake Isabelle have been owned exclusively by an entity called the Left Hand Ditch Company (LHDC) since 1907. (For those of you not familiar with the American West, water rights are a very huge issue out here and the Rocky Mountains play a very major role in the fight). At some point in the past, the LHDC dug a tunnel from Lake Isabelle through the glacial moraine that forms the lake and every year round about the first of August, the tunnel gate is opened and the lake is drained. The water is gobbled by LHDC shareholders to irrigate parched crops in the Boulder Valley below. It sure makes Lake Isabelle rather unsightly, not to mention kind of smelly. Remind me not to hike to Lake Isabelle after August 1 anymore.

Lake Isabelle 2010 IV

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Aug 042010
 

Just after the trail reaches Lake Isabelle, a junction sends one trail ahead to Isabelle Glacier and another trail to the right to Pawnee Pass and beyond. The beginning of the Pawnee Pass trail presents a gorgeous wonderland of rushing streams, lake and peak views, boulder fields and flower-filled meadows.

The pointy peak in the photo below is Navajo Peak with its accompanying glacier. The little “gendarme” sticking up on the right side of the peak is known in climbing circles as “Dicker’s Peck.” Cute.

The two men on the trail in the photo above had already made it to Pawnee Pass and were on their way back down. I wonder what time THEY got to the trailhead! They didn’t advise pushing for the pass due to the weather. Nevertheless, I kept going. I told myself that I was just going to make it to treeline, then turn around.

The views down to Lake Isabelle were gorgeous.

I met one of the locals sunning himself on a rock. Mr. Marmot and I hung out for a bit. He thought I should go ahead and go for the pass.

Wow, talk about a room with a view! This little guy lives in the coolest place!!!

So, I kept going. However, the sky was looking worse by the minute and it didn’t take long until I began to question the wisdom of heeding the advice of a marmot. When another passing hiker told me that it was probably another hour and a half to the pass, I decided that it was probably a really good idea to head back down.

I spent quite a bit of time at my turn-around point photographing the abundance of flowers in the immediate area, including this herd of little pink elephants:

Incidentally, it was pointed out to me yesterday that I have neglected to post a wallpaper calendar photo for August. Oops! I’ll try really hard to find something suitable and have that ready by tomorrow.

Lake Isabelle 2010 III

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Aug 032010
 

The 2-mile hike to Lake Isabelle is generally a pleasant, easy walk through the fir and spruce forest, but the closer you get to the lake, the steeper and rockier the trail gets, with this part here being just about the worst of it.

Compare the photo above with THIS PHOTO I took at close-to-the-same-spot during my first hike to Lake Isabelle at the end of June, 2008. Pretty dramatic difference, eh?

RIght where the trail starts getting steep, you encounter this little stream tumbling headlong down the rocky slope. The banks of the stream were awash with wildflowers.

After after making it to the top of the steep pitch and crossing the aforementioned stream, it’s a quick jaunt to the shores of Lake Isabelle.
 

This truly must be one of the prettiest spots in all of Colorado. As you can see, the clouds had started to build by this point and it was only going to get worse.

Lake Isabelle 2010 II

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Aug 022010
 

When we last saw our intrepid photographer, she was beginning to slog her way through a ridiculous number of photos from her Lake Isabelle hike. On my first pass through the photos, I discovered that I had created a few duplicates and even triplicates during the download, so after deleting those and a few obvious non-keepers, I’m down to a much more manageable (HA!) 1888 photos. And I’m a mere 114GB away from filling up my new(ish) 750GB hard drive. Looks like I’ll be in the market for an even BIGGER hard drive soon.

Following are a couple of photos to show you just how beautiful and clear the day started out.

The photo above is an overview of the Indian Peaks area with Brainard Lake in the foreground. The sky is completely clear and wonderfully blue. My goal for the day was Pawnee Pass, which is the saddle just to the left of the two higher peaks on the right.

Long Lake is the first lake one encounters once on the trail and it was as smooth as glass and provided a perfect reflection of Niwot Ridge. I had reached the trailhead at about 7:30am and was happy to find that there were still plenty of parking spaces available. I was also delighted that once I left the parking lot, I hiked for an hour and 20 minutes in perfect solitude before I saw any other people. It was quite idylic.

My favorite spot along the trail to Lake Isabelle is a beautiful little rock garden on the side of a hill a little more than halfway to the lake. I found that a fairly large tree had fallen across my rock garden since last year, but this group of Colorado columbines seemed unaffected by the intruder:

Not too far from the rock garden, I found a little patch of monkshood. They’re awfully cute, but quite poisonous so I made every effort not to eat any.

That’s all for now… more tomorrow!

Lake Isabelle 2010 I

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Jul 312010
 

The Lake Isabelle hike was fabulous. Just after the trail reaches the lake another trail veers off to the right to Pawnee Pass. That was my goal yesterday, but I didn’t quite make it to the pass due to the threatening clouds. I didn’t particularly care to be caught above treeline when those clouds let loose. I’ll have to try for the pass again another time.

I took approximately 2280 photos yesterday. Good grief. It’s going to take me years to get through all of those! Here’s my favorite one so far:

Indian Peaks fireweed

Indian Peaks fireweed

Wallpaper – July 2010

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Jul 012010
 

The wallpaper for July is a photo of one of my very favoritest places to be in the Rocky Mountains in July – Lake Isabelle in the Indian Peaks Wilderness Area. This photo was taken during a July 2008 visit.  

 If you’re not sure how to set a photo as your desktop background, follow the instructions HERE.

For 1024 x 640 click HERE.
For 1024 x 768 click HERE.
For 1280 x 856 click HERE.
For 1440 x 900 click HERE.

If you need a different size for your background, email me at 39DegN@gmail.com and let me know what size you need.

Enjoy!

P.S. The 39° North Photography blog hit a little milestone yesterday… for the first time, we went over 100 unique visits for the day. :) In fact, we went WAY over. According to my stats plug-in, we had 152 unique visitors yesterday! Whoever you are, thanks for visiting and welcome to my blog! I post something new pretty much every day, so keep coming back! A huge thanks to all of my regulars, too – all 21 of you! ;)   I do it for you.

Lake Isabelle

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Feb 112010
 

The hike to Lake Isabelle in the Indian Peaks Wilderness Area is one of my all-time favorites. My first hike there was in late June of 2008 and the trail was hanging on to quite a bit of snow, but it was doable. While on my way back down, I came across an elderly woman sitting on a rock on the side of the trail. We struck up a conversation and she told me that I really needed to return and do the Lake Isabelle hike in late July when the wildflowers were at their peak. I told her that I’d certainly try to do that. She exclaimed, “No, you HAVE TO!!!!!” So I did.

Shooting star

Shooting star

Side stream

Side stream

Orange agoseris

Orange agoseris

Little pink elephants

Little pink elephants

The 2-mile hike to Lake Isabelle is, for the most part, a fairly level and very pleasant stroll through the forest, until you’re almost to the lake and the trail gets a bit steeper and rockier. Overall, it’s rated as an “easy” hike and the wildflowers were indeed lovely in late July. The lake itself is surrounded by the jagged Indian Peaks and it’s quite a stunning scene when you come up over the last rise.

Lake Isabelle and some of the Indian Peaks

Lake Isabelle and some of the Indian Peaks

Butterfly on dandelion

Butterfly on dandelion

As is typical during summer in the Rockies, however, the midday clouds started to gather and threatened to soak my hiking companion and me, so we didn’t linger much on the way back to the car.

Brainard Lake and Indian Peaks panorama

Brainard Lake and Indian Peaks panorama

One caveat about choosing Lake Isabelle as a hiking destination: it is a VERY popular hike and especially if you go on a weekend, you have to get there early to get a parking spot in the sizable lot at the trailhead. And by early, I mean before 7:00am.

Summer

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Feb 012010
 

February is the time of year when I start wishing that summer would hurry up and get here. Don’t get me wrong, I love winter and I love snow and I love that I’ve finally discovered the joys of winter hiking. BUT… I’m really craving some sparkling high mountain lakes and gurgling streams and meadows filled with wildflowers right about now.

My favorite place for hiking and photography in Colorado’s Front Range is the Indian Peaks Wilderness Area, so to indulge my summer craving, today I will share some summer scenery from that beautiful place.

Small waterfall along the Diamond Lake trail

Small waterfall along the Diamond Lake trail

Diamond Lake

Diamond Lake

Blue Lake

Blue Lake

Lake Isabelle

Lake Isabelle

Niwot Ridge

Niwot Ridge

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