After managing to get a backpacking permit back in March, Lisa and I had a chance to hike to Crater Lake in the Indian Peaks Wilderness below the towering Lone Eagle Peak. The location isn’t far from Denver, close to the popular Brainard Lake hiking area, but it’s on the other side of the divide (accessible via Pawnee Pass).
We started our 8.1 mile, 2,066 foot climb from Monarch Lake in Grand County (behind Lake Granby), hiking for just over 5 hours to reach our campsite (No. 5) at Mirror Lake (since the campsites up by Crater Lake were all occupied by the time we arrived). We lucked out in terms of our location, because it was probably one of the most amazing campsites I’ve ever stayed at, with an amazing view of the extremely snargly Lone Eagle peak towering over the clear water. The only downside of our site was that where we placed our tent (which was really the only place to put a tent) was at a low spot in the ground and tended to collect water when it rained. This, normally, isn’t a big problem in Colorado - except for the two epic thunderstorms we had while we stayed there; one overnight on the first night, the second on our day hike the following day.
On our second day, we hiked 5.6 miles into the next valley to Pawnee Lake which was gorgeous, but not as amazing as Mirror Lake. On our return hike, the thunderstorm caught up with us, so we hiked in the pouring rain and hail, encountering a moose and her calf directly in front of us on the trail about 100 ft ahead (much closer than we would want to get). Thankfully, they continued to move and we were able to swing wide and avoid them entirely.
This was a gorgeous area and didn’t feel like Colorado - the mountains were extremely rugged and the area was just amazing!
