mountain-jeep

Sometimes we can't get to the summit, and that's not too bad...

Thu, 08 Dec 2022 03:25:41 GMT

Weather can limit how far we can make it up Pikes Peak Highway, but even the limits can still be amazing.

In the winter, snow and winds can close Pikes Peak Highway in places and limit how far we can go up. There are a few places they will close the highway, and some of those places aren't worth going to. However, there are two places we feel still offer great views and a fun time.

Glen Cove and Devil's Playground. If we don't feel we can make it to either of these, we will generally recommend cancelling the tour, but we will still go if that's what you want. If we feel we can make it to Glen Cove or the Devil's Playground, we will leave the choice to you. This blog is to help you make that decision.

The road crew is always diligently working to open the highway as far as they can. They are looking out for people's safety and don't open the highway until they feel confident it is safe.

The Devils Playground

Sometimes the Devil's Playground is as far as we can go. Getting here is still a fantastic journey with views that defy language. You can see 90%

of what you can see from the summit here. The other 10% is largely just the plains...and they're fairly plain.

It is 16 of the total 19 miles of the highway, and an elevation of right at 13,000 ft. It is on top of the mountain, just not the summit. It is above

treeline. Of course, you still get all the fantastic views up to this point, which is most of the stops we make anyways.

For the best views, there is a little bit of hike up some rocks. It's not hard, but not necessarily easy as we are at 13,000 ft. Most people have opted

to take the hike, but some declined to do so. And that's okay. They were still pleased with the experience.

There are great views of not only Pikes Peak, but the Sangre de Cristo, Sawatch, and Front Range mountains. The Sawatch and Front Range mountains are also part of the Continental Divide.

Some picture we've taken at the Devil's Playground

Glen Cove

Sometimes Glen Cove, or a little further at a place called Cove Creek, is as far as we can go. We used to feel bad this was as far we could go as it

is not above treeline and at the base of the mountain as opposed to on the top. But we realized that people still love it, especially if they've

never been to Colorado, and are thankful they decided to go. There is not a place within 2 hour's drive to get the views you get from here,

especially in the winter.

Glen Cove is still uniquely Colorado. Snow, snow capped mountains, and spruce trees. There is also a gift shop, restrooms, and concessions,

as well as several areas to walk around and get interesting pictures.

While Glen Cove is not above treeline, it is still 11,450 ft. It is 13 of the total 19 miles on the highway. There are some places on the way that

you can see the Sawatch and Front Range mountains. You can still see for miles and miles and are higher than the closest mountains.

Some pictures we've taken at Glen Cove

On the way to either

Of course, we make the normal stops along the way up and down from either Glen Cove or the Devil's Playground. We even add a little more

since we can only make to Glen Cove....and usually add either a quick tour of Garden of the Gods or Manitou Springs when we get

back down when we can only make it to Glen Cove and if time permits (sometimes we still spend a good

amount of time on the mountain).

There are plenty of views still to be had, even when we can't make it to the summit.

We go out of our way to give you the best experience, even if we can't make it the summit.

We know when we say we can't make it to the summit people question if it's worth it. We hope this helps you decide if the experience is right

for you when the mountain doesn't cooperate with us. There is still much to see even when we are limited.

We think it is important to note, none of these people made it to the summit, yet there's still smiles for miles. That's what we do.

Aspen season

james@mountainjeepllc.com (James Coakley) — Sat, 17 Sep 2022 20:21:59 GMT

Aspen season in Colorado. It's a beautiful time of year.

I thought I'd document the change of Aspen colors this year. There is something special about the "quaking Aspens". Even before the fall season, the Aspens are beautiful trees. The leaves are a darker green on one side than the other and the way the wind shakes the leaves back and forth, it makes for a very interesting visual effect. The Aspens almost appear to shimmering or glittering when the wind rustles the leaves up. Hence, "quaking Aspens".

From the quaking, to root system the clones come from, to the "eyes" that native Indians believed was their ancestors watching over the land, to the bark being similar to aspirin and wildlife chew on for a pain reliever, to powder on the bark that serves as a natural sunblock, Aspens are incredibly interesting trees!

That said, it is the fall colors of the Aspens that are the most amazing aspect of the trees. "Leaf peeping". People take days in the fall just to drive around to see the Aspens. And it's a worthwhile endeavor. Most leaves turn this golden yellow color, but every so often you'll see some orange and red.

Below is an example of the "quaking Aspens".

August 29th was my first sighting of some of the leaves turning.

Just a handful of leaves. The semi translucency of the leaves makes for an interesting visual when you get the tree between you and the sun. When you get an entire Aspen grove between you and the sun, it's spectacular.

It does seem the turning has been slow this year. The experts seem to be suggesting Aspen season could go a little later in the fall this year. Works for me.

9/16 Update

I stop here on Pikes Peak Highway so guests can get pictures of these Aspens. I've gotten some, "ohhh, so pretty" at this spot. They are some of the most vibrant up there at this point. You can see the ones in the distance starting to turn.

These young trees are on the way to the Catamount Reservoirs, one of our favorite places. This is all just getting started.

The natural color of the Aspen leaves are the fall colors. Chlorophyll fills the leaves during the summer, making them green.

During the fall, the Chlorophyll leaves. I got a close up of this phenomenon in the pictures above. Quite fascinating.

These are some of the popping colors of the Aspens on our Cripple Creek/Back Country Experience today.

9/20 Update

The colors are changing rapidly.

These are the photos from the same spots posted earlier on Pikes Peak Highway and the road to the Catamount Reservoir.
This is just a 4 day difference.

Some recent photos of the Aspens on Pikes Peak Highway .

9/22 Update

People have been enjoying getting pictures with the Aspens! Fun!

Remember early on when I said some Aspens are more orange and red? Here's a red one....

Some dull chemistry and stuff later, the Aspens with a higher sugar content are more on the red side.

The golden Aspens are their claim to fame, but the darker oranges and reds tend spruce things up a bit!

While finding yourself in the middle of an Aspen grove in the fall is uniquely spectacular, Aspens grow in the forest and usually within a

bunch of pine trees. The pines are always green, and seeing the Aspen colors peppered throughout is pretty neat.

The two images above demonstrate this. All the lighter green you see, will eventually be the fall colors.

9/27 Update

Contrasting this image with the one above it, you can see the Aspens peppering the landscape just a little bit more.

This red one I took a picture of earlier that stands beside a yellow one. There's just not a lot of red ones around here. They are

pretty neat though. I wished there was more.

Above is the road to the Catamount Reservoirs off the Pikes Peak Highway . These Aspens are slowly turning. It is a wonderful

drive through this area when they've finally turned. I'm getting a little excited. It won't be long.

Above is an image collection of some of the colors on Pikes Peak Highway . There's places with some great colors that there is no place to pull off the road and get good pictures. There are some great places to get some pictures with pull off areas but they haven't turned yet.

Sadly, all good things must come to an end. Above are the same tree, and the one I took several pictures of people in front of. It was

one of the first to really get some deep color, but is now one of the first to lose its leaves.

Luckily though, I have found a new spot to safely pull off and get some pictures of guests with some Aspens.

People love the Aspens! I can't say I blame them.

10/02 Update

This image is from western Gold Camp Road, part of the Cripple Creek/Back Country Experience during the fall. It truly is an amazing site to see the Aspens peppered into the pine trees like this. This is one of my favorite aspects of Aspen season.

This has been a somewhat odd Aspen season. As you can see here, some of the Aspens haven't turned yetwhile others are bright colors and some have lost their leaves already. They are typically a bit more uniform in their stages.

Above is an image collection of some of the Aspens we saw this day.

I saw this little red guy last year. This is the only one in the area.

10/05 Update

Image collection of some of the color still on Pikes Peak .

Alas, some trees have already lost all their leaves, and this group is thinning out pretty quickly.

They don't last very long after their peak, and they lose their leaves.

10/09 Update

We found this patch of red Aspens today. It's unusual to find this many in this area. Very nice.

I like how this picture turned out. Aspens with fresh snow-capped Sangre de Cristo Mountains!

The timing was right.

A few images from the Cripple Creek/Back Country Experience . You can find some nice colors still, but they are fading fast.

10/14 Update

We still do have some nice color on Pikes Peak in some places. This season has been a little odd in that there's a staggered timing of the Aspens turning colors. Some leaves are already gone, and some have just started turning.

We don't normally have any trees with leaves still on them this time of year.

Above is an example of some of the Aspens have just barely turned this late in the season. The trees to the left still have some green leaves, and not that many of them either. I love the more orange colored Aspens (on the right).

This is from the same spot as one of the photos above in the 10/5 update. There are no leaves left on this Aspen stand.

It won't be much longer and the season will be over.

10/21 Update

There's only a small portion of Aspens with any color at all. Many of the ones left look like the above. These trees likely will have all their leaves gone in the next few days.

As I stated earlier, the turning of color has been odd this season. This tree is still more green than yellow.

This one is still more green than yellow as well, but the leaves are getting crumbly and ready to fall off. Many already have. We had a late snow this year (May 21), a dry spring, and a wet summer for Colorado Springs. I'm sure this has something to do with the strange behavior this season, but I can't say why.

Update 10/25

We had some serious winds come over the weekend. The leaves on the Aspens are all but gone. Some of the Aspens in the lower elevations still have a few leaves, but the color isn't very vibrant.

Season is over. Until next year.

Bad weather days aren't necessarily bad

Fri, 16 Sep 2022 00:59:25 GMT

Sometimes the weather days are quite nice.

Last Saturday, there was dreary weather in Colorado Springs. Cloudy and rainy. The cameras at Pikes Peak showed heavy fog. I started to contact people and let them know I couldn't say what they may or may not could see, nor if the clouds would clear or not.

Everyone but one couple cancelled their tour. Bodie and Jonnie booked a Pikes Peak tour and decided to go for it. We met and made our way to the mountain.

On days like this, we go straight to the summit to get the maximum amount of opportunity to see the views. Ute Pass was just rain and clouds. I had figured that much. Once we got to Pikes Peak Highway and got in the gate, we were shortly afterwards in the clouds. Fog. Rain. Nasty. It remained this way for much of our trip up. "Ugh", was my only thought.

The tour went on as normal. I went through the normal information I give and chatted to get to know Bodie and Jonnie. They were a sweet couple from California. Jonnnie was here for business and Bodie joined her for a few days for fun.

Once we reached the switchbacks, we broke through the cloud layer and was on top of the clouds. Clouds were still present, but we could finally see! We made our way to the summit. The wind was heavy and it was cold. The clouds rolling over the summit was just hard for the mind to process. I took several videos, but none actually captured the feeling.

We walked around the summit, just taking in the awe that the clouds and weather was presenting to us. The feeling of the wind and cold. Being above the clouds, yet watching the clouds roll over the mountain. Awe is the only way to describe it. We made our way around the platforms. The clouds were broken enough to be able to see the surroundings.

I've been up the mountain many times, but sometimes I am still stunned at what I see.

We finally came back down the mountain after this incredible experience. We stopped at the normal stops and made our way to Glen Cove. The clouds there was just impressive as well. Watching the clouds roll and undulate. It's hard to find the words to describe it.

We made out way back down the mountain and back to rain and fog. We chatted about various things and about what we had experienced. Great people! What an exciting day!

The moral the the story is, sometimes you just have to go for it. There is no reward without some risk, right?