Stella Lake

I survived the 4th of July weekend! We were pretty swamped Friday to Sunday, and then slow on Monday. We all wondered if people thought we were open. Friday also marked the start of the full summer season schedule. I had my first campfire program Sunday night and have my first alpine trail rove and bristlecone pine grove talk coming up soon.

While getting paid to hike is the most awesome thing in the world, the past few days, rangers have come off the mountain saying there's way too much snow still and they spent most of their time rescuing lost hikers. There was also an incident with an injury caused by falling through slush. I was getting a bit nervous to go up there and decided to do a test run on my day off today.

The sky was rather suspect when I went up, but made the green colors look all the more beautiful.
Reports said Stella Lake was accessible. The road is only open to the Summit Trailhead at the moment, so I got up there, parked, and started my hike. It was beautiful and cool and smelled wonderful. It was a short hike, and although it was over 10,000ft, I was fine. I came up to Stella and it was beautiful!

I found a fallen log that was willing to snap a photo of me by the lake. I had lunch and just marveled. I also had my first encounter with a limber pine and it was so fun to play with those incredibly flexible branches.

I couldn't get over the colors! The aspen and the pine and the mountain meadow grass...all those different shades of green were absolutely beautiful. Add the snow, and the sun reflecting off it, or the dark rain clouds, it was nature at its finest!

Not wanting to take the same way down (I have a goal to hike every trail in the park by the end of the season) I headed toward the Wheeler Peak Campground. However, I soon found the trail to be covered in snow and lost it completely.

I followed the footprints of some other soul who I hoped knew where he or she was going. The snow was kind of slushy in some parts and I post-holed it a few times and thankfully didn't step in a stream or get a tree branch stuck in my leg.

I finally made it to the campground and was only a few yards from the actual trail. I decided I'd had enough and didn't want to try for the Bristlecone grove. Maybe by next week when I have to do it in uniform, there will be less of that white stuff.

And if you're tired of summer heat and need a break...any and all visitors welcome!