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Rocky Mountains National Park | June 30th, 2019

A quick hike through some Rocky Mountains is nothing short of amazing...

Quick Stats
1 hour up, 45 minutes down
Park at Park & Ride, catch the shuttle to Bear Lake
Hike Bear Lake > Dream Lake > Emerald Lake
Need: water, summit snack (apple/orange)
Optional: hiking poles, snow spikes

Getting Started

While visiting my buds in the glorious state of Colorado, we swung by Rocky Mountains NP for a quick hike up a large hill. Knowing I’m a fan of hiking, National Parks, and saving money, a few months ago I dropped $80 on an annual NP Pass. These allow you into any and all National Parks across the US, which normally range about $30 for a week per park, per car.

So – back to the very large hill or relatively small mountain (still a casual 8-10k+ feet). We were a ragtag crew of walkers, not fully acclimated and wanting to take it easy. For this reason, we approached a 4-mile hike, down and back, with 3 main lakes along the way.

This was to see Bear Lake (5 min from drop off), Dream Lake (30 min from drop off), and Emerald Lake – the main attraction (1-hour 10 min from drop off). To be honest, they all look super similar. Perk of the second two is you can get a whole lot closer than at Bear Lake.

Dream Hike

Emerald Lake just about intersects with a hike that adds on a good 5 miles. I would adore doing this, but we were not prepared. If we had some more water, some snacks, and weren’t running from the rain there’s a good chance we could have made it. We really needed some more snacks though.

In order to complete this, get to Bear Lake, pass Dream, see Emerald Lake, backtrack to the Glacier meetup and make your way to Alberta Falls (not pictured). This lands you at a point where you can catch a shuttle and head back to Bear Lake, or add an extra couple miles and walk back yourself.

Timing & Getting There

We were walking maybe 2 mph, summiting the 2-mile hike in 1 hour and 10 minutes. There is about a 2,000-foot elevation overall, so there are a few spots where you feel like you’re doing straight stairs. It’s very well marked, and when you’re 0.7 miles from the end theirs an additional sign of encouragement (it really just shows the spit off to another hike and some info about Trout)

 Only takes about 45-55 minutes to climb back down. This includes the pics and breaks we took on the way up, and the rain we moved a little quicker to avoid on the rain down.

 

 

We entered the park through Beaver Meadows and stopped at that visitor center to top off our water and use the (last clean) bathrooms before the hike began. They informed us Bear Hike parking lot fills by about 9 am and unless you happen to catch someone just as their leaving, you’re unlikely to find a parking spot.

 

Snow & Wildlife

You’re on a mountain and it’s the day before July so obviously you should worry about snow. Not my first thought yet but we’re working on it. My buds split a set of hiking poles and while not useful for the majority of the hike, the very end gets icy. Having a hiking pole or some shoe spikes to add on will not disappoint.

Along the way, we saw a number of large deer. Smaller than a moose or elk, larger than a…mule? Don’t approach, don’t touch, don’t get between them and their babies, do take pics and act like tourists! 

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