Crystal Mill

We journeyed up to the old Crystal Mill outside of Marble, Colorado on a beautiful fall afternoon. The colors were glorious, and the hike was majestic - aside from the jeeper dust.

Aspen to Crested Butte for Vinotok

For my birthday, some friends and I decided to hike 12 stunning miles from Aspen to Crested Butte on West Maroon Pass. We began our journey at 5:00 am, hoping to avoid the crowds of tourists that tend to gather at the Maroon Bells - and we did just that.

It wasn't until we began ascending West Maroon Pass that we saw other people on the trail. The top of the pass revealed remarkable views of the surrounding valleys that reached toward Aspen and Crested Butte. It was a beautiful fall day, and we lingered quite a while on top of West Maroon Pass.

The descent was quick and in a short amount of time we found ourselves back in the trees. We popped out of the trees into the parking lot about six hours after we began hiking that morning. We enjoyed a cold beer and some lunch before piling into the vansion and heading into town for the Vinotok Festival.

Vinotok proved to be even weirder than expected. I treasure small towns, free spirits and wacky festivals.

Saturday Sopris Summit

"The early bird gets the summit," is the mantra I repeated to myself as I rolled out of bed at 2:30 am. Hitting the trail at 3:00 am was rough, and even though there was a full moon, we still needed headlamps. The trail was rocky and hiking it in the dark was not ideal, but we hiked on.

Finding ourselves above tree-line as the sun began to rise made hiking in the dark for 3 hours totally worth it! It was a magnificent sunrise; one I won't ever forget.

Sopris defeated me last summer, and I was determined to summit that stubborn mountain this summer. From the trailhead to the summit the hike is around 13 miles roundtrip. When you combine that with the intense elevation gain it makes for a really long day. The summit of Mount Sopris stands at 12,966' high.

We reached the summit around 9:00 am, and were happily surprised by the lack of wind - and people! We spent an hour alone on the summit of Mount Sopris sharing snacks and celebratory beer!

We began our decent at 10:00 am and were thrilled when we made it to Thomas Lakes around noon. We took a long break at the lakes and as the storm clouds began rolling in we decided to keep heading down to the car.

The last 2 1/2 miles of the hike felt like an eternity, but we kept trucking none-the-less. It was the perfect Saturday to summit Sopris, and I couldn't be more excited to have made it to the top!