Wanderlust

Clear Creek Trail in downtown Golden is a super mild and pretty trail. It's easy to find, too. Pass The Golden Hotel on Washington Avenue, cross over the bridge and hang a left.

I've walked this dozens of times now after stopping for coffee at either The Windy Saddle on Washington Avenue or Pangea on Cheyenne Street. From either of these locations to where we end our walk is normally about 3 miles.

During the summer, the section near the bridge gets pretty busy with inner-tubers and waders. There is an RV park part way up the paved section of the trail that always seems to have visitors, but especially this time of year (springtime). Recently, we've also watched kayakers training on the rushing Clear Creek, as it's rained quite a bit.

A mile or so down the trail, the pavement gives way to gravel and dirt. It has never seemed too muddy after rain or snowmelt because of the amount of loose gravel that is strewn here, so this would be a good walk after inclement weather passes.

Make sure to check out Clear Creek History Park across the bridge near the beginning of the trail. There is a little garden and a chicken and rooster pen on the grounds, which are lined with lilacs, spruce and other local plants. Recently, I've seen hops growing there!

For our first trek into the wild since moving to Colorado, we chose a much warmer than normal day to venture out into the mountains. I had pretty much figured that because we don't have awesome cold-weather gear yet (snowshoes/boots?) we didn't want to go out until the snow had a chance to melt a little.

I was right; on the shady sides of the mountains, snow was nestled into all of the nooks and packed down on one section of the Lookout Mountain trail near the base by Windy Saddle Park. There's a parking lot with picnic tables near the entrance. Hang a left to find this trail (it took us a minute), but make sure you walk up to the cliff edges and take in the view.

My husband is the tall, dark figure with the dog that blends into the rocks. From here we could see so much, even to the furthest brilliant-white, snow-covered peaks. Amazing doesn't cover it.

We brought both dogs, and there seemed to be plenty of space on most of the trail for runners and bikers to move past. Let me tell you what, though, that incline was pretty rough for a minute for someone who hasn't fully adjusted to the altitude yet. Once I get used to it, the hike will probably be much more invigorating.

I suppose this is about halfway up the trail from the park to the Lookout Mountain Nature Center. The tiny city in the valley is Golden, CO, and since we knew what we were looking at, we even noticed the Coors brewery from here.

Maybe I should start another blog about the beer here, hmm ...

And off to the far right in the above picture is downtown Denver. The best of all worlds!

The path splits off at one point, but we continued to the left and upward to stay on Lookout Mountain trail. At the top of the trail, we could see the road and across the street the Nature Center. Sitting on a rock bench, we could see this:

We were up much higher than we thought (it's a long way down!), but by no means is this "tall" by Colorado standards at 7,500 feet.

Passing on the outside of the Nature Center, we were having a good time until we met up with these guys. We didn't want to tempt fate with our wily dogs, so this is where we turned around. About four or five mule deer (from what I can tell - thanks, Google) were on the other side of the fence, but one was just ahead on our side and staring us down. I didn't try to get a close-up.