Monsoon Season

August 28th, 2022

I did not know that Colorado had a monsoon season. However, everyone around here and the local news are reporting it. After returning to the Leadville area, I again found a campsite along Halfmoon Creek. I was a little worried, as it was a Friday, and that weekend was when Leadville held it’s 100 mile ultra-marathon race. There were not as many participants as the mountain bike race, held the previous weekend, but I assumed a lot of people would be camping. It is possible that many cancelled plans due to the weather, which called for rain, wind, and cold temperatures. There were very few campers for a weekend.

It was overcast and rainy for a week. My trailer batteries were unable to recharge using the solar panels, and were drawn down to 30% by this Friday morning. There was a little sun in the morning, but Saturday was sunny most of the day. I spent my time keeping the two portable panels facing the sun most of that day, bringing the charge back up to 60%. The warm sun was a welcome relief after being cooped up in the camper for a week.

Today, Sunday the 28th, I decided to hike a trail up near Independence Pass. The pass, at just over 12,000 feet in elevation, separates the Arkansas River drainage on the east, from the town of Aspen and the Roaring Fork River on the west. My destination was the trailhead for Linkin Lake just beyond the pass on the west side.

The trail is not very long, but rises over 600 feet in a half mile from the parking area. Imagine hiking up 60 floors in a tall building. Then imagine that some of the stairs hang on the outside of the building, rather than the stairwell. On some sections there was a good bit of exposure. Exposure can be translated as “if I stumble, how far will I fall before I start bouncing”.

I had plenty of energy to make it up to the lake, as I was acclimated to the elevation after camping above the 9,000 foot elevation for the last 2 months. The return trip back down was slower and more difficult. You had to reduce speed to avoid stumbling or sliding, and the shock to your joints to hold your speed back was substantial.

I had the trail and the lake to myself, as it was early in the morning. There was a group of about 24 volunteers on the other branch of the trail, but they were below. They were performing trail maintenance, which is to say, using picks, shovels, and rakes to mitigate the effects of erosion on that trail.

It was good to get out again. Hopefully the rain is over for a while. Looking to the future, I will be camping in this area for a couple more weeks. The aspen trees should paint yellow swathes across the mountain sides soon. My son, procured a couple of tickets for us to see a Colorado Rockies’ baseball game and following that, I will need to move out of the high Rockies to avoid freezing temperatures and head into Utah’s canyonlands and the desert southwest.