Would you like to join with others who love hiking in beautiful southern Colorado?  Teller Trekkers is for you!

             This year Teller Trekkers will be splitting into two groups:

The 2-Boot Group will meet on the 1st and 3rd Saturdays, 8:00 am at the Centennial Trail Parking Lot in Woodland Park (Next to Pikes Peak Credit Union - across the street from Langstaff-Brown).  The 2-booters will stick to fairly level terrain, hiking 3 to 5 miles, 2 - 3 hours.     

Join The Harvest Center group on the first 2-boot hike of the 2010 season. Meet in Woodland Park to carpool to the Garden of the Gods Visitor Center on 30th Street. Nancy Remmler will guide the group on trails from the Visitor Center. Contact Nancy at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

This year the 3-booters will branch out a little more and add a couple of all day hikes.  3-boot hikes are usually 8 to 10 miles, 5 - 6 hours. The first 3-booter will be Wednesday, 12 May.  Meet at 8:30 am at the Senior Center and carpool to Penrose to hike Beaver Creek (West of Cheyenne Mountain).

To see tentative schedule and read trip logs from the last hikes - "Read more" below... 

For more information about upcoming hikes click on the link below or call Rip Blaisdell at 719-686-1408. 

Teller Trekkers Proposed 2010 3-Boot Schedule

• Trips are every 2nd and 4th Wednesdays and depart from Woodland Park Senior Center parking lot at 8:30 am.
• We need volunteers for July - take the group on your favorite trail.
• Note that all these are 3-booters; but most have easy options to return to the  trailhead early for those who do not want to do the entire hike.  If some of you would like to lead 2-booters, please call me.  Many of these 3-booters have 2-boot options.  For example, the USAFA hikes could include a 2-boot hike on portions of the 13 mile Falcon Trail system.
• You will notice that some hikes are over an hour drive from Woodland Park; we will want to car-pool or caravan.
• This is not a totally firm schedule; we can alter it if the group consensus is to change it.
• For more information, call Rip Blaisdell at 719-686-1408 or email at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

All who wander are not lost - they’re Teller Trekkers!

2 Sep 2010

Trekkers;
Next week, Wednesday, 8 Sep, we'll hike Sheep Mountain.  We tried to get to  this hike a couple of times last year, but could not reach it because of private land.  Kent and Guy have found a way, and say it is a great hike with spectacular views.
Meet at the Divide Sheriff's Office at 0700 and we'll shuttle to the trailhead about 1 hour on Gold Camp Road. Total round-trip is about 8 miles, 1600 feet elevation gain and will take about 5 hours.  We should be back to Divide by 1430.
Hope you can join us, this is a great time to hit these above treeline hikes.  We are going to have to start moving back to lower elevations soon.
Ripper
Rip Blaisdell
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Trip Logs: 

1 Sep 10 - Pikes Peak from the Crags.  Four hikers assaulted Pikes Peak from the west side.  This was not an official Trekkers hike, but it would make a great hike in the future.  We started from the Crags trail head at about 0545 and hiked up the Crags trail for about ½ mile, then split off to the right and over a bridge onto a wide and well maintained trail that zig-zagged up to connect with an old wagon road below the Devil’s Playground.  After crossing the Pikes Peak highway, the trail parallels the highway to a point about 3/4 mile below the summit.  The last 3/4 mile is the most challenging as it crosses a steep rubble pile which required careful scrambling.  The whole trail above the highway is well marked with cairns. It was unusually cold and windy for our hike, but you always have to be prepared for the worst if you are going to hike to 14,110 feet (we weren’t prepared and some got pretty cold before we got to the top). We had a shuttle pick us up at the top.  The total hike was 6 ½ miles one way, about 4000 feet elevation gain and took us about 5 ½ hours.  This hike is much less arduous than Barr trail.  It could easily be done round trip; just be sure you leave early so you are below tree line before thunder time on the return trip. Also, there is a route that we want to explore from the top of Cairned trail which will connect to the same top trail at the Devil’s Playground.

25 Aug 10 - Bison Peak.  Seven Trekkers hiked up to Bison Peak form the Ute Creek trail head on Tarryall Road.  This area continues to provide outstanding hikes.  After crossing Tarryall Creek at the trail head, the trail heads up Ute Creek on very good tread through pretty aspen groves and meadows.  After about 3 miles, the trail goes vertical and gets above tree line.  It eventually leads to a very large alpine meadow with a huge monument in the middle.  After crossing the meadow, it’s a short climb to reach the top of Bison Peak.  From the top, you can see the front range to the east and the Collegiates and Mosquito ranges to the west.  There is a trail in the large meadow that leads back to Twin Eagles trail head; possibly a future hike. Total hike was 12 miles, about 2500 feet vertical and took about 7 hours.

18 Aug 10 - East Buffalo Peak.  Six Trekkers explored the southern slope of the Buffalo Peaks.  To get to this trail, you take Salt Creek Rd. west from Hwy. 285 just a couple of miles north of Antero Junction. Go about ten miles west to the trail head (you will need 4 wheel drive). The trail is #918 and the beginning is vague.  If you hike north .3 miles, there are a series of beaver dams. Try to get across to the west side of the dams and you will be on the trail, otherwise, you may have to bush wack north, then west to find the main trail north. It’s about 3 miles to a broad alpine saddle above treeline, then west to the base on East Buffalo Mountain.  From there, it’s a scramble over loose, steep boulder fields, which turn this hike into a 4 booter.  Nice hike in beautiful setting.  The hike was 7.6 miles and took 5:20. We may try to access West Buffalo Peak from the Buena Vista side later. There is a saddle between East and West Peaks and this may be a better way to get to the top of both peaks.

11 Aug 10 - French Pass.  Eight Trekkers hiked French Pass since most of us had “scouted” Georgia Pass the week before.  This hike is definitely a “keeper.”  The trailhead is off the same SH 35 west of Jefferson.  It is a little hard to find if you do not have a good map.  SH 35 connects with SH 54 and eventually leads to the trailhead of  Trail # 651. The trail leads along the base of a large boulder field and crosses a stream before going above tree line into a very large alpine valley.  There was an abundance of all kinds on flowers (and wooly thistle) and a large snowfield just below the pass.  When we got to the pass (about 4 miles) we explored off trail up and to the west and scrambled across a loose field of rocks to a faint trail south to another ridge.  There were several abandoned mines along this ridge including one that was open and burrowed back into the slope for 50 feet or more. From this ridge, we could see down to Boreas Pass.  We bush wacked down a double black diamond slope for about a mile east back to the trail.  The hike was about 9 miles and took 5 hours.  A beautiful hike that we will repeat next year!

 4 Aug 10 Georgia Pass. Six trekkers “scouted” Georgia Pass from the trail head on SH 35 west of Jefferson. This trail head is in a state park and you have to pay $5.00 per car to get in the park.  The trail is the Colorado Trail (1776) and leads up a nice slope near Jefferson Lake and eventually gets above tree line and heads north to the pass.  From the pass, you can see the Blue River valley and Breckenridge to the north and the huge South Park high plains to the south.  On the way back, we took West Jefferson trail to the east to loop back to the trail head.  This trail is less traveled and led us below a large snowfield, still several feet thick in August! There were lots of flowers and a nice stream with an extensive wetland bog for at least a mile.  It rained on us for about an hour on the way back.  The only bummer about this way back is that it takes you through about a half mile of camp grounds. The scout was about 9 miles and took 5 hours.

28 Jul 10 - Hankins Pass.  Seven trekkers hiked Hankins Pass starting from the Spruce trailhead on Tarryall Road, north of Lake George.  This hike has all sorts of possibilities.  When we scouted it, we hiked up to the pass which takes you by Lizard Rock then east for 4 miles to the pass. Then we did an 8 mile loop north and back to McCurdy trail, resulting in a long, steep 16 miles total.  On 28 July, we went north on the loop, but explored the east side of that trail to see if there was a way to get on one of the rock piles on the east side of the Tarryalls.  We ran out of time, but plan to go back next year.  Another future Hankins Pass adventure will be to go from the Goose Creek trail head to the Spruce trail head and shuttle back.  This trek was about 10 mile and took 5 hours.

30 Jun 10 - Mt. Evans.  Three Trekkers drove to the Mt. Bierstadt trailhead to scout Bierstadt, but decided to try Mt. Evans instead.  The trail head is on the Guanella Pass Road from Grant to Georgetown. The trail starts out on the very well maintained Bierstadt trail east of Guanella Pass over a nice boardwalk.  But, when you depart the main trail, getting to the Evans trail involves bush-wacking through shoulder-high alpine willow and shin deep bog for about a mile before you can start up the west slope of Evans. The bush wacking was tough, but we did get to see moose tracks and scat along the way.  The trail passes a nice waterfall and scrambles through a steep boulder field before reaching a broad sloping meadow that leads to a ridge and another scramble and finally to the Evans summit.  One downer is that at the top, you are greeted with a parking lot full of cars and people complaining about how hard it is to walk the 100 yards from the parking lot to the summit. On top, you can see Mt. Bierstadt and Sawtooth to the south.  A future challenge might be to climb Bierstadt and traverse Sawtooth to complete a loop to Evans and back down to the trail head. The Evans climb was about 10 miles and took 6 hours, elevation is 14,264 feet.

23 Jun 10 - Cairned Trail to Sentinel Peak.   Twelve Trekkers made this great hike up Horsethief Trail to the NE side of Sentinel Peak and up the clearly cairned trail to the ridge east of the peak, then through a beautiful alpine meadow to the final scramble to the top.  The meadow on the way up entertained us with snow fields, waterfalls, and acres and acres of flowers, lichen and moss. From the ridge, we could see almost the entire Continental Divide from the Mosquito Range to the Collegiates. We almost needed to break our rule of not going anywhere we need ropes to get to the top, but managed to shinny around some boulders to get on top of the last few rocks. Eight trekkers made it to the top in 4 hours and it only took 2 hours to get back to the trail head for a total of 6 hours, estimated 9 miles (nobody had a GPS on this trek).  There are lots of possibilities on this trail; we could follow the ridge east of Sentinel and actually go all the way up Pikes Peak, or we could make a loop out of it by following a trail down Oil Creek to the west of Sentinel.

09 Jun 10 - Stanley Canyon - Again, only 4 Trekkers made this trip.  The weather was a little foggy at the Academy, but we climbed above the mist and enjoyed a nice day with gentle breezes and nice temperatures.  Stanley Creek was bubbling along creating beautiful drop pools and waterfalls all the way up the canyon.  Before we got to the reservoir, we cut off to the north and over the saddle to Goat Creek. Then, proceeded out to the end of the trail to the Academy overlook for lunch. After lunch, we did a loop back west on Shubarth trail, then south on FR721 to to Stanley Reservoir, then back down the canyon to the parking lot just west of the Academy hospital.  As predicted, the scree was pretty bad going back down; there were some bumps and bruises. We saw columbine and lot’s of flowering shrubs and a family of bighorn sheep in the canyon.  Overall, a very nice hike; 10 miles, 5 hrs, 20 minutes.

Cairn Trail on 26 May 2010. Only 3 hikers attempted Cairn Trail.  The other 75 hikers on the Trekker's mailing list had to rearrange their sock drawers or something. 
I said "attempted" Cairn Trail, because we did not make it to the top.  We encountered knee-deep snow drifts about halfway up the slope.  When Maureen disappeared into one of my "postholes", we decided we better give it up.  Sooo, were going to try it again on 23 June.  Even though we didn't make it to the top, it was a beautiful hike.  Lot's of trekkers have said they want to try this one, so we want to reschedule it. 
Next week, we are going to hike Stanley Canyon from the trailhead just west of the Air Force Academy hospital.  We'll leave the Senior Center at 0830 and convoy down to USAFA.  All you need to get in the gate is a Colorado driver's license. 
Stanley Canyon starts out a little steep for about the first mile, then levels out to a very gentle climb through beautiful elk meadows and aspen groves.  There's lots of scree on the steep part; wear good boots. We have an options to do a loop, go out to an overlook of the Academy and eastern plains, or go to Stanley reservoir.  Or, we can do all of the above, depending on the group.  Kent saw Bighorn sheep in the canyon last week. 
The drive to the Academy will take about an hour each way and the hike will take about 5 hours, so plan to be back to WP about 1600. 
Hope to see some of you at the Senior Center Wednesday morning.

14 Jul 10 - Mt. Bierstadt.  Four trekkers climbed Mt. Bierstadt.  The trailhead is on Guanella Pass Road from Grant to Georgetown.  The trail is very well maintained with a boardwalk across a wide wetland.  The trail is wide and not too steep with a nice tread most of the way.  This is a very busy trail that can be crowded, especially on a weekend.  Go early to avoid crowds and thunderstorms. Beautiful views, lots of flowers and wildlife; marmots, elk, pikas and signs of moose.  The climb is about 8 miles and took about 4 hours. Bierstadt elevation is 14,060.

Photos from Aug 12 Gillette hike August 2009: