I was lucky enough to spend last weekend in Glenwood Springs with my good friend, Becky. Just me and Becky. NO TODDLERS! Don't get me wrong, I love Tyler more than life itself, but mama needed a vacation! We had an absolutely phenomenal weekend with hiking, biking, enjoying the hot springs, lots of yummy food, and lots of silliness (mostly on my part!). I got some fantastic pictures and wanted to highlight some (ok, maybe a lot) of them here.
Saturday morning, Becky and I did the Hanging Lake hike. This is a hike that I have been wanting to do since we moved to Colorado, but Glenwood is just far enough away to make it really difficult to do as a day hike. I knew that the hike was supposed to be spectacular, but I had NO idea just how gorgeous it really is! The trail is super rocky in spots and follows the path of a creek all the way up to the lake. Since it's pretty much straight up, there are tons of waterfalls all along the way.
Getting ready to head up the trail (I like how they try to warn you off!)
Looking up the trail...yes, there is a trail there!
Me on the trail...really, I swear there's a trail!
Cool mossy waterfall along the trail
View of some fall colors through an opening in the canyon
The lake itself is absolutely breathtaking. The pictures I got are great, but don't do it justice at all. The golds and reds of the fall colors just added to the beauty!
First view of the lake
The lake and waterfalls
Becky and me
We took a short side trip a few minutes further up the trail to Spouting Rock. It was well worth the trip. Spouting Rock is an incredible waterfall that somehow cut its way through the solid rock and bursts right out of the middle of the rock cliff.
Spouting Rock
After a trip back to the hotel for some lunch, and a check or ten on the weather, we decided to head out for a bike ride. Neither of us was too sure that our legs would hold out for long, but we really wanted to get a ride in, so off we went. We rode the couple of blocks from the hotel to the Glenwood Canyon bike path. The path is 15 miles long one way and follows the highway and the river for pretty much its entire length. It's a really beautiful trail, and oddly enough, you don't even notice that you're riding right under/alongside an interstate highway. We ended up doing 20 miles, our legs survived, and we didn't even mind getting rained on a bit!
After our bike ride, it was back to the hotel and then over to the Hot Springs pool to soak out some of our stiffness and soreness. We drove down to Basalt for a nice dinner and then slept HARD after a practically perfect day!
The weather was looking pretty iffy on Sunday, so we decided it would be a bad idea to try to do any hiking or biking. Since I'd never been to Aspen, we took a drive down there both to see the fall colors and so I can now say that I've been there. :-)
Aspens over Aspen
On our way back up towards Glenwood, we stopped in Carbondale and had a fantastic brunch before hitting the road and heading home. It was a great weekend, with a great friend, and I hope I get to repeat it sometime soon!