Hikes, Travel Blog

Hiking Among the Aspens of Beaver Creek Mountain

I just returned from a book event in Colorado outside of Vail, Colorado. As many on the blog know, it is hard for me to visit places like Beaver Creek without hitting the trails. I have previously written about my love for Colorado and the many wonderful areas for backpacking and hikes. I wanted to share a few pictures from my hikes around Beaver Creek Mountain.

There are a great number of trails around Beaver Creek, but one starts near the Hyatt Resort at the base of the mountain. The overlook trail goes straight up the mountain for about 3.5 miles. If you reach the top, you can take a gondola or ski lift back down the mountain. However, the last gondola leaves around 4 pm. so you need to take care of your time. Also, on all of these trails, you need to take plenty of water. The air is quite thin and it is easy to get dizzy if you are not acclimated. It can take five days to get used to the altitude. Water is essential.

I ended up passing on the gondola in favor of hiking back down the mountain. It made for some long hikes, but it was rejuvenating.

One of the things that I look forward to on Colorado trails is the aspen forests. My hikes around Beaver Creek offered an abundance of such spots. It was wonderful to just sit among the aspen and listen to the wind.

There were also fields of wild flowers. Locals explained that the abundance of wild flowers was due to increase in rain fall this year and warmer temperatures. The flowers were a second blooming that offered a surprise bonus.

I saw plenty of bear signs but never was able to spot any. However, after complaining to my driver on the way to the small airport in Eagle that I had not seen any bear, a young bear ran in front of our car.

Another surprise was to see burn piles on one side of the mountain. The piles are meant to clear the undergrowth to reduce wild fires.

Here are a few pictures from the two days of hiking that I was able to fit into the trip:

 

 

51 thoughts on “Hiking Among the Aspens of Beaver Creek Mountain”

  1. * I can’t see the forest for the trees!

    Looks like the pursuit of happiness. I’ll be at the Hyatt.

  3. As a Colorado native thank you for showing the beauty of our state. So glad you were able to see for yourself. The Aspens are even more beautiful when they change color in the fall. Hope you can see them then. God Bless

  4. So Turley has returned from a hiking trip to Colorado. He says he spent 2 days hiking. He spent at least 1 day at a book event. Another 2 days travelling time, there and back, adds up to at least 5 days that he has been gone.

    Over those 5 days he posted 8 articles. Who wrote them?????

    The answer is simple. As I have repeatedly posted here in the past, Turley does not write this garbage. This stuff is written by Rupert Murdoch’s minions at Fox and the NY Post.

    Turley has not monetized this blog. No ads, no subscription. It costs money to run a blog of this complexity. He has sold the blog to Murdoch, who writes a fat monthly check to use Turley’s name.

    2. JT goes on a trip for 5 days and you question how he keeps this blog going.
      Joe Biden has been sleeping on the beach for weeks and Kamala Harris has been preparing for the big interview and the debate for the last month and you aren’t even interested in who running our country!

      1. Hmm, you must have missed Harris making a career out of waxing enthusiastically about trivial things! 😂😂😂

    3. Hmm, says a DNC “Minion” eager to display his hatred for all people he doesn’t agree with!

    4. “run a blog of this complexity.”

      Lmao at you, lawn Boy the booger eating troll. Complex. Bwahahahahhaha genius.

      No one could possibly write while traveling. Spastic.

      Most of the content are articles from his columns in various publications and his live interviews are usually the same content.

      Get a grip on yourself, drunktard.

      Have another sip of that cooking sherry, you’ll feel better.

    5. Turley used to have “guest bloggers” write posts on his blog. Those people always disclosed their authorship. But for some reason you want people to believe that Turley has decided to put at risk the trust he has built with his 80 million readers by allowing posts written by others to be published under his name. Then he takes the credit, or the criticism, for those posts. Is that right?

      Worse, you take it a step further. You claim, without a shred of evidence, that Turley has sold his non-revenue generating blog to a 93 year old man who you claim pays someone to write posts on Turley’s blog using Turley’s name. And you think all of this sounds reasonable and rational to normal people?

      Gigi claims an unnamed Fox News employee tells Turley what he can write about on his own blog. I have always wondered if the same unnamed person also tells the liberals at Fox News, like Juan Williams, what to say and write.

      Your party pretends to care so much about disinformation, yet you have to qualms about sharing evidence free assertions.

      Are you aware of the existing academic literature that has found a higher rate of mental illness in liberals than conservatives and the general population?
      https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/unique-everybody-else/202103/personality-traits-mental-illness-and-ideology

  5. Ya see, Turley went to communist Colorado. Now how can he possibly be a Trump flunky?

    1. BC is fairly Conservative. An island in a deep blue swamp. Those Creekers might be for Trump, but they are no flunkies. The money was self-made for the most part, including being responsible for inventing some of the everyday items you might be using. No civil servants who made a fortune feeding off the government. And they give back bigly.

  6. Jonathan: While you are hiking among the Aspens in Colorado some of us are dutifully at work trying to point some important news this week. This comment is devoted to Elon Musk–the owner of X and the guy you think has brought “free speech” back to Twitter. So what happened to Musk this week?

    Musk is now in a face off with Brazil’s Justice Alexandre de Moraes. On Thursday Musk missed a deadline to appoint a legal representative as required by Brazil’s law for all companies doing business in the largest country in South America. Musk refused to comply and per orders from Moraes, yesterday Brazil’s telecommunications regulator suspended access to X until Musk complies with court orders and pays more than $3 million in fines.

    It should be pointed out that, unlike the US legal system, Brazil’s SC Justices have independent powers to investigate and make rulings without lower court review. In this case Moraes has been investigating X for peddling disinformation and conspiracy theories about a variety of local issues. In particular, Musk is backing former president Jair Bolsonaro who is under criminal investigation for staging an attempted coup after he lost the 2022 election to the current president Luiz Ignacio Lula da Silva. Bolsanaro and DJT are close. DJT backed Bolsanaro’s coup attempt. I have close friends in Rio and locals refer to Bolsanaro as the “Donald Trump of South America”.

    Musk responded on Friday to the court orders by attacking Justice Moraes–calling the Justice a “lapdog”, an “evil dictator” and “criminal”. Musk even posted an AI generated photo of Moraes behind bars. Musk then closed all X offices in Brazil.

    The Q is why would Musk choose this time to pick a fight in one his largest markets? About 40 million Brazilians use X. And this comes at a time when Musk is in a similar fight with EU regulators over moderation of X content that permits the dissemination of hate speech, neo-Nazi propaganda and conspiracy theories. And Musk’s X is losing money because advertiser have deserted the platform.

    Musk knows that every business operating in Brazil must name a local legal representative. So why pick an unnecessary fight at this time? It’s probably because, like DJT, Musk thinks he is above the law. In Brazil Musk is finding out that’s not the case.

    1. And the world must have eschewed freedom and acquiesced to Hitler also, right, Brainiac?!

  8. Johnathan

    Please try the hike to the base of Holy Cross Mountain and a deep lake ( the Bowl of Tears) at 12,000 ft in Colorado. You won’t ever forget it. B

    1. B, probably not a great idea to send The Professor, who lives below sea level in swampy DC, to 12,000 feet – at least not for a few weeks.

  9. Colorado is a beautiful state but I preferred the area down around Durango and especially the town itself. As far as beauty is concerned the Grand Canyon has a grandeur of beauty on just a massive scale. And then there is Yellowstone, to me the most beautiful place I have ever seen. Nothing like having a Buffalo come up to your car and stare you down. Around every corner is a majesty of surprises that simply take your breath away.
    Aspen forests are gorgeous, no doubt about that. And your photographs are beautiful and well made
    I don’t ski so I just enjoy the beauty that nature has placed before us. It seems truly to change the tenor of your mind when you can see nature’s bounty in all it’s unrestrained glory.

  10. I would have brought a fly rod and wading shoes, there most likely a fish-able creek or stream around. But that’s me. Awesome photo memories you have there. Cheers!

  11. Trees are Nature’s greatest gift. We take them for granted. Hug one when you have a chance.

    1. Aspens are especially wonderful. Native Americans revered them and used the powder on their bark as sun protection. Sadly, there is a blight that is killing so many. First we had bark beetles that decimated the lodge poles now this.

  12. Very enjoyable reading Professor! Your photos are beautiful and revealing of God’s creation. May you be richly blessed. While I do not understand all the legal Constitutional debate that takes place here, I greatly appreciate your wisdom and thoughtful discourse. You claim to be a Democrat, but I know only that you are a man of truth who loves this country and a true Constitutionalist!

  13. As you are hiking amidst the beauty of the west, did you realize that you are walking among the world’s largest plants? That title belongs to the Aspen, due to many trees growing from a single root ball.

  14. Im glad you had a wonderful time when you were here. Thank you for all your articles, be safe

  17. A beautiful place to take a break from the DC area. Stunning photos! Thank you for sharing.

    1. The bears are hardly the problem. But tear gas would be advisable to fend off the rabid commies.

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