The trail to Blue Lake in the Indian Peaks Wilderness of the Rocky Mountains is not easy. But the views yesterday were spectacular.

In the high country almost an hour from my Boulder apartment, the trail climbs about 900 feet in three miles until it reaches the 11,355 foot lake. The trail itself is mostly rocky, and where it isn’t rocky, recent rains made it wet and in some places muddy. Even though I got up at 4:30, I didn’t reach the trailhead until 6:30, about 45 minutes after sunrise. I wanted to arrive early to get the best light for photographs, the best weather (since the mountains usually cloud up on a summer afternoon), the most bird activity, and a parking spot at the trailhead. While the weather was sunny, cool, and calm on the hike up to Blue Lake, clouds rolled in just as I reached it at 11 and continued the rest of the day.

The day was long, because I hiked with record slowness, taking eight hours to complete the hike. Not only was the trail slow going but so too was my body. My energy was low from recent dieting extremes as I have been working ever more diligently to bring my weight down to my goal. I am almost there, but I had to take extra care as I hiked to make sure that I stayed vertical. I also stopped often to rest and to take photographs of the scene. Photography is, after all, what gets me out in nature and to get the exercise I need in places of beauty.

The most beautiful scene early in the hike was Mitchell Lake, about a mile from the trailhead and a few feet away from the main trail to Blue Lake. Mitchell Lake lies at 10,735 feet right at the base of Mount Audubon, which towers above the lake at 13,223 feet.

Mitchell Lake Lies Below Mount Audubon

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St. Vrain is an important name in Colorado and New Mexico history. Ceran St. Vrain was no saint, but he was both a gentleman and a pioneer fur trapper and trader, frontiersman, businessman, and soldier. He and his partner William Bent built Bent’s Fort on the eastern Colorado plains along the Santa Fe Trail. The only privately owned fortification in the West, Bent’s Fort was one of the most important trading centers with Native Americans as well as a rendezvous point for fur trappers.

On Tuesday my friend Sharon and I hiked the Ceran St. Vrain trail along South St. Vrain Creek to Miller Rock, about a seven-mile roundtrip. Hiking between 8,000 and 9,000 feet, we had cooler weather than Boulder was experiencing. When I last made this hike four years ago, Longs Peak, the highest summit on Northern Colorado at 14,259 feet, was covered in snow. This time we climbed part way to the top of the rock from where we could see the summit, which is snow-free this summer.

Usually Covered with Snow, Longs Peak is Naked This Summer

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Sharon and I escaped from the Boulder’s 100° furnace on Sunday to the relative coolness of the Lake Isabelle Trail in the Indian Peaks Wilderness. It was cooler because it is higher. The trailhead starts at 10,500 feet and after 2.2 miles it reaches the lake at 10,868 feet.

We got to the trailhead at 6:30 a.m. because we wanted to get one of the 30 parking places for this popular trail on a sunny weekend morning. On the way up we had the trail mostly to ourselves. But on our return hike we weren’t surprised that we saw many people, ranging in age from 6 weeks to 80 years. I commented to Sharon that most of the people we passed were smiling. I don’t know why they were.

Out in nature away from the city people always smile more and return greetings more often. Being in the wilderness makes people happy.

But maybe people smiled back at me because I practice smiling more than I used to. Ron Gutman’s TED talk, “The Hidden Power of Smiling,” got me to be a serious smiler. I am so serious about smiling that I promote it in one of the articles that I write for HealthCentral, “Smile: The Astonishing Powers of a Simple Act.”

Whatever the reason, everybody seemed happy, Sharon and me included. Before 7 a.m. I got my first photograph. It was of a little bird quite close to me.

A White-crowned Sparrow Perches in a Tree

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An airport might not seem like the most natural place for Burrowing Owls to live. But the best place to find them in Colorado is 40 miles east of my apartment in Boulder at Denver International Airport. These owls actually live within the city limits of Denver at the north edge of Denver International Airport, which in land area is the biggest American airport and second biggest in the world.

I haven’t seen any of them on the runways in competition with some of the biggest things that fly. The Burrowing Owls much prefer to live in the burrows that prairie dogs dug for themselves and reluctantly share with these little birds.

Sharon and I set off to find them a few days ago. Someone had posted on the Colorado Birds List that he had seen Burrowing Owls at two locations near the airport. We found them there, but in the distance.

So we moved on to where we had seen them exactly two years ago. We found a family of several owls and owlets there in one burrow close to a dirt road near the north end of one of the airport’s longest runways.

Most of the Family

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The Goshawk Ridge Trail always surprises me. It’s only 6 miles from my apartment in Boulder, but I never know what to expect.

When my best friend John visited me just before the summer solstice, we hiked the the four mile loop over Goshawk Ridge. This time was saw the wildflowers of late spring.

John and his wife Vicky came from California to visit me in Boulder and Vicky’s sister Marveen in Steamboat Springs. I had been visited Marveen and got back home just hours before John and Vicky arrived.

Here is some of the floral beauty we saw on our hike.

I Think This is a Miner's Candle

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The journey back home from Steamboat Springs didn’t go as planned. But it was still great for me.

At Rabbit Ears Pass, 22 miles southeast of Steamboat Springs, I crossed over the Continental Divide at 9,426 feet. Had my trip gone as planned, this would have been my only crossing of the Great Divide that separates the watersheds that drain into the Pacific Ocean from those river systems that drain into the Atlantic. But to get back home I had to cross it two more times.

At Rabbit Ears Pass I stopped near the Dumont Lake State Wildlife Area to look for birds. I found one of my favorites there.

A Mountain Bluebird in the Mountains

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Down from the mountains, I proceeded to North Park. Still pretty high above 8,000 feet, this sparsely settled basin is one of my favorite areas of Colorado. I especially love the Arapaho National Wildlife Refuge, so that was the first place in North Park I visited.

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Sandhill cranes were abundant around Steamboat Springs when I visited there earlier this month. But the best viewing was along U.S. Route 40 just a quarter mile south of the motel where I stayed in town.

My friend Marveen was driving us back from a couple of Colorado’s State Wildlife Areas when she spotted a Sandhill Crane just a few feet from the highway.

A Sandhill Crane near Steamboat Springs

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While we of course stopped and jumped out of the car immediately, many cars passed us by as we enjoyed the view, and not one stopped. People are just too blasé!

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When my friend Marveen told me that we had a good chance of seeing Blue Grouse near her cabin above Steamboat Springs, it immediately became the bird that I most wanted to see during my recent visit there. I had never even heard of a Blue Grouse before. And when I looked it up on iBird, that app didn’t show it. So I knew it must be special. Then I searched the Web for “Blue Grouse,” and found that this is the former name of what we now call the Dusky Grouse.

Even better, I hadn’t ever seen or even heard of the Dusky Grouse either. Greater Sage-Grouse in eastern Oregon and in the Arapaho National Wildlife Reserve and Greater Prairie Chickens in eastern Colorado, yes. These species of grouse I had seen before. But not Dusky Grouse. And we didn’t see them until just before sunset. Of course, that’s the best light for photographing birds as long as they are in the sun.

I spotted one beside the road and immediately hopped out of the car to follow him around. Fortunately this flamboyant male paid me little attention as he was strutting around looking for the attention of a nearby female. Here he crossed into a patch of light.

A Male Dusky Grouse in the Last Light of Day

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Fish Creek Falls has to be one of the top natural attractions for anyone visiting Steamboat Springs, Colorado. When I went there a few days ago, my friend Marveen took me to the falls.

Since Marveen was born and grew up in Steamboat Springs, she knows the falls well. But she has an even closer relationship to them.

Her brother Steve, who Marveen introduced me to, had been responsible for the construction of the trail to the falls overlook. He had persuaded the powers that be to build an accessible trail for people with disabilities, so that their father, who by that time had been confined to a wheelchair, could continue to see the falls. I got my first view of the falls from the end of this trail.

Fish Creek Falls Cascades 283-feet Over a Cliff in Routt National Forest

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After walking up to the falls overlook, Marveen and I hiked down to the base of the falls just as the failing light of a glorious day came to its natural end. From this location I made a 13-second film clip of these wild falls that are just three miles from Steamboat Springs. See it and here it roar on YouTube at “Fish Creek Falls!”

And this is the still shot I took from there.

Looking up at Fish Creek Falls

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For a place known to the rest of the world as a ski resort, Steamboat Springs sure has a lot watery attractions — the Yampa River, lots of lakes, and this tremendous waterfall. Of course, a ski resort relies on water too, just one that falls in an even whiter form than this.

During my visit to Steamboat Springs I always got up at 5 a.m. so I could enjoy nature, hiking, and birding in the best light. Steamboat Lake State Park is 26 miles north of Steamboat Springs, but I still managed to get there early in the day.

While I took about 300 shots there, only two of them pleased me. One shows the scene from the 1.1 mile Tombstone Nature Trail along the south side of the lake. This is a part of Steamboat Lake and Sand Mountain, one of the most beautiful mountains in the Elkhead Mountain range. It rises 10,847 feet to the southwest of Steamboat Lake.

Sand Mountain Rises Above Steamboat Lake

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The other shot that I liked was of just a common Raven. But doesn’t it look powerful!

A Raven in Early Morning Light

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A Raven to some people may be just another big black bird. But to me it is one of the smartest. Maybe because it gets up early every day.