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Post by cweston on Jul 26, 2020 11:16:07 GMT -8
I just got back from a 4-day trip that was supposed to be a 5-day trip in the Gores. We had three consecutive days of weather I’ve almost never encountered in the Rockies in summer: continuously gray cloudy/foggy skies with off/on light rain, semi-clearing in the afternoon, with only insignificant small thunderstorm activity. It rained most of the night every night. WTF? I didn’t really even know how to read that weather. (In the Cascades, you typically get misty mornings and it clears in the afternoon. But not in CO in July. Normally you can set your watch by the monsoon storm cycle in late July: clear mornings, storm in the afternoon.) We turned our planned tour of the Slate Creek high country into a base camp at Upper Slate Lake due to not wanting to commit to high passes in that weather. Upper Slate is a great place for a base camp, of course.
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Post by burntfoot on Jul 26, 2020 12:47:40 GMT -8
Weather reports say it is the fringes of the hurricane that hit Texas. That must have been one big storm with all the rain we got these past 3 days.
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Post by cweston on Jul 26, 2020 12:59:18 GMT -8
Weather reports say it is the fringes of the hurricane that hit Texas. That must have been one big storm with all the rain we got these past 3 days. Yeah, we had a lot of off-trail planned, some of it bushwhacking below treeline. The Gores are the brushiest range in CO (by far), in my experience: off-trail can be really genuinely miserable when everything is soaking wet. Even the small amount of brush-beating we ended up doing was very patience-trying. We ended up in 10-foot tall willow at one point that made me want to curse God and die. Just for added fun, I broke a trekking pole in there. |
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Deborah
Trail Wise!
Yes, that's me.
Posts: 1,115 
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Post by Deborah on Jul 26, 2020 13:09:59 GMT -8
It rained most of the night every night. No fair complaining. We get so little actual rain, we are happy for it! |
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Post by cweston on Jul 26, 2020 13:18:12 GMT -8
No fair complaining. We get so little actual rain, we are happy for it! Yeah, we had a fine time anyway. My son and I have been doing a significant BP trip every summer since he was 13: he is now 28. Mostly it's just awesome to spend the time together, even if the weather sucks. We definitely spent a little more time than we expected in the tent together  |
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Post by oldbill on Jul 26, 2020 15:36:38 GMT -8
Great shots! Bummer about the weather. A lot of the intermountain West have drought conditions. Were trails crowded?
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Post by cweston on Jul 26, 2020 15:41:54 GMT -8
No, not particularly--we saw maybe a total of 7-8 parties (of one or two persons) over the course of 4 days. We were camped two nights at the end of the Slate Creek trail and each night there was one other party in the area. (It's a large lake, so two or more parties can make camp there without having any contact.) |
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Westy
Trail Wise!
Diagnosed w/Post-Trail Transition Syndrome
Posts: 1,952 
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Post by Westy on Jul 27, 2020 14:09:37 GMT -8
I bailed Colorado when the monsoon hit. Got in a nice multi-day hike in the Sangre de Cristo's without encountering a single human being. Weather started to change so I drove out to Bent's Old Fort and Sandy Creek Massacre National Monument to get some dwell time in the prairie. Wicked thunder storm one evening in La Junta. Town siren indicating flash flood warning was on for hours. Will try and come back to CO end of August.   Driving to Montana in the AM. Better forecast. Have developed a stealth road trip protocol to mitigate exposure to my fellow species. P.S. Thank you for this literary masterpiece. We ended up in 10-foot tall willow at one point that made me want to curse God and die. Just for added fun, I broke a trekking pole in there. |
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Post by marmotstew on Jul 27, 2020 18:26:48 GMT -8
Was in Frisco for a few nights. Non backpacking related. Weather was odd. It rained a lot. But it was that steady depressing rain that reminded me of the Midwest.
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Post by absarokanaut on Jul 28, 2020 6:08:19 GMT -8
We are getting much needed rain here in The Hole this morning. Glorious hike up high on Sunday and weather looks good for visiting Colorado College friends this weekend and early next week.
Westy I sure hope you don't get to much smoke up there, we had it Sunday but not to bad and it cleared up as it warmed up and the breeze picked up.
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