Hiking adventures

I wanted to share some of my photography from a couple of hikes Travis, Cleo, and I have done since being up here in Colorado. It's been really nice to drive to the mountains on the weekend and see some beautiful scenery! I love being able to get out of the city so easily to go and get some fresh mountain air. It really helps to silence my brain....which is something that is not easily done, but much needed!

These photographs were taken from two hiking trails during the last two weeks. One of the trails is called Cerean St. Vrain trail, which followed a beautiful little creek for about 2 miles in. Before you actually reach the trailhead, however, you are blessed with these amazing mountain and valley views as seen above and below. Below are also some photographs of the creek that we hike along as well. 

 

 

And of course there were beautiful little wild flowers everywhere that we picked and put on our kitchen table at home. I couldn't help myself....I just love flowers!

The next weekend we were planning on going on a hike to Brainard Lake near Boulder, but when we arrived it was so crowded! The park rangers had us wait on the road until groups left the parking lot so that they could make sure there was enough room for every car going in. Well, there was about 8 cars in front of us when we arrived and after talking to the park ranger who said there was at least 380 people on the trail at that moment my husband decided that did not sound relaxing or fun at all. So he pulled the car around and was out of there before I could even say a word. :) He tends to not like crowds at all! As we were driving back down the mountain we ended up seeing a little sign that said Rainbow Lakes trail with an arrow pointing right. So instead of continuing our trip home we went down this little dirt, extremely rocky and bumpy road, for about 4 miles in our little Toyota Corolla. I was very proud of our car to say the least. It ended up being a 30 minute drive to travel maybe, at most, 4 miles. But we made it and it was well worth the trip. Upon arriving at the trail head we were able to see glaciers and even more spectacular mountain views!

Along the trail, about 1.5 miles in, you come across the first of a series of 4 lakes along the hike. The water is crystal clear with mountains and clouds reflecting above. To me, it really looks like heaven and this is when I kept saying to myself "I can't believe I get to live here." It makes me almost feel like I'm on vacation when I see these mountains. Someone on the hike also told us that these mountains were the continental divide and that we were about 10,000 ft up. Well, I knew we were high cause I could feel myself breathing much harder than usual when walking as well. Anyways, here are some photographs on the lakes along the hike below.

And here are some wildflower photographs from that hike as well....

 

Hope you enjoyed!