Overland Camping Roadtrip Blog
Travel Day 20:
Total km driven to date: 4196km
Total km walked to date: 164.15km
Fourmile Recreation Area, CO – Lake Creek, CO
92km drive
12.54km on foot
Another short travel day with another huge hike. I started my morning in Fourmile Rec. Area and did the 15km drive back out to Hwy-24. We came down out of the mountains again and through the town of Buena Vista. Its a small town (with no WiFi) on the banks of the Arkansas River and seems to be built around catering to rafting and river adventures. Shoehorned between two sets of mountains on either side it was hot in the valley, yet stopping to check out the river and it was ICE COLD, full of snow runoff and really high in the banks right now I can’t see it being a very fun trip down the river getting doused by ice water around every bend. Driving through town we pass a small church with a sign out front that reads “Sunday, bring your jeep or ATV to service!” which I thought was quite funny and very Colorado. We turned onto Hwy-82 only 50km from Aspen now, I can tell we are getting close since I have been passed by multiple Ferrari’s and Lambo’s, who have no time for my old rig puttering along the mountain roads.
We stop for a quick break at Twin Lakes and walk down to check out the water, it’s actually quite warm, which is surprising after feeling how cold the Arkansas River was. I decide it’s time for the first swim of the trip and me and Axel take a bit of a dip on a hot day (27*C today, not that bad considering). Refreshed we get back on Hwy-82 and continue towards Aspen. Passing a large sign warning that no vehicles longer than 35′ are allowed on this road due to switchbacks I am looking forward to the drive, this is far from any Interstate! We pass by an amazing looking spot on Lake Creek with a bunch of firepits in the trees and multiple rivers converging and crashing over the boulders and decide this is as good a place as any to spend the night. We find one of our best campsites yet and get situated right on the river and decide to go for a nice long hike. Heading up from the truck at 10,403ft we hike up an old logging road for over an hour and a half and eventually break out above the tree line into a valley that is surrounded by mountain peaks still covered in snow. Unfortunately I dont have my GPS with me to tell me the elevation but we are well above 13,000ft as we explore the high country. It looks like someone has spilled Chocolate Coco-Puffs all over the place but they must be really old since they tasted really gamey and stale, weird thing to bring into the mountains! I filled my water bottle from the stream (which I don’t normally do, but considering I could see the snow that the water was melting from a few hundred feet away I figured it was better than any Wal-Mart water). I wanted to summit one of the peaks but considering we had already hiked 6km uphill and it would be at least another 2-3km to get to the top of one of the mountains we headed back down instead. So far this week I am on pace for walking 75km, which would be a new record for me! A bit of a scary moment on the way back down noticing new bear scat on the trail, it took me a minute to figure out why it was so full of hair, then I realized that’s because the bear had ate something covered in hair……..and Axel and I are also covered in hair. So I sung punk rock songs to Axel as we covered the 6km back down to camp. Did some housekeeping back at camp and made a great dinner and worked on some photos to cap off another fantastic night in Colorado.
