I completed the map of the Boardstand/Old Military Road Loop on Winding Stair Mountain and added one for the Shady Lake Recreation Area (origin of the Tall Peak Trail) east of the Caney Creek Wilderness in the southern Ouachitas.
Moving a bit farther east, I also added a new page for information on the area around the Eagle Rock Loop, including a new 2-page map of the ERL.
That pretty much clears my backlog for now. It’s time to get out and collect more data!
Since returning from the Cecil Creek trip and producing that little map, I’ve been on a mapping rampage. I finally got all my data for the Upper Buffalo River area organized and published, along with maps of all the trails. I’ve added maps for the North Sylamore Creek Trail and Shores Lake/Whte Rock Loop, added information and maps for “new” trails on Mt Nebo, and have refreshed almost all other maps. One general improvement is the addition of labels for roads. A long-overdue up-coming project is to create a map for the Old Military Road & Boardstand Loop on Winding Stair Mountain.
Located in the Buffalo National River, the 2.2-mile Cecil Creek Trail (CCT) and the adjoining 3-mile Cecil Cove Bluff Trail (CCBT) form (with a 1.5-mile road walk) the Cecil Cove Loop. The trail head is in the historic community of Erbie – between Compton and Marble Falls. I and three others (TC, CC, and CE) set out for a little President’s Day trip exploring the creek, nearby waterfalls, and historic sites. The area is well-described in Tim Ernst’s Buffalo River Hiking Trails and here is a map of the area that is 1:24000 scale if printed on 8.5×11″ paper.
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The third and final leg of the big late-summer ’22 trip is the Tetons Range. We were mostly playing tourist this time but there has already been a bit of discussion about returning to get up-close and personal with the Tetons on a backpacking trip.
The second leg of the big late-summer ’22 trip. We came in the East Entrance from Cody WY after our Beartooth Plateau backpacking trip and drove all the way across the park to the West Entrance to get to our KOA cabins (and a shower!) outside West Yellowstone MT.
Rather than make trip #7 to the Wind River Range, RC, TC, CC, and I opted this year to begin our late-summer trip with a 4-day, 21-mile loop across the Beartooth Plateau in the Beartooth Mountains of NW Wyoming & SW Montana.
This trip is described in Doug Lorain’s Backpacking Wyoming (trip #6 in first edition) and Beartooth Publishing has a great map for this area. Here’s one I made for the trip. Much of the route is in or on the edge of the Absoroka-Beartooth Wilderness. It begins at Beartooth Lake in Wyoming (in the shadow of Beartooth Butte) and crosses into Montana before returning to Beartooth Lake. This is an area where everything seems to be named Beartooth-something. Indeed, it’s accessed from the super-scenic Beartooth Highway.
The Lost Creek Wilderness covers about 120K acres of the Pike-San Isabel National Forest northwest of Colorado Springs and southwest of Denver. It’s a popular place due to its proximity to those population centers.
The recently-retired TC and I did this 20-mile loop in the southern part of the Wilderness over 3.5 days. We had pretty good weather – mostly clear skies with no rain. A high of about 90F on day 1 but only about 80F on the other days. Lows in the 38-45F range made for great sleeping. A full moon made the headlamp redundant.
The Eagles Nest Wilderness is about 133K acres in north central Colorado encompassing the Gore Range, just north of Silverthorne and Dillon. A friend (JH) and I planned a 4-day excursion there for September 27-30. This was the first time I’ve been in the Rockies late in the season to see some of the autumn color. Unfortunately, something went wrong when recharging my camera after the last trip and I was unable to get as many photos as I would have liked.
Continue readingWind River trip #6 is in the bag. I and 3 of the usual suspects (RC, TC, & PDC) did a 6-night 35-mile “lollipop” (Aug 29 – Sep 4 2021) that took us past Toboggan, Little Divide, Lightning, Dream, Bobs, Sandpoint, Middle Fork, Rainbow, Dream, Raid, and South Fork Lakes, and then out past Lightning, Little Divide, and Toboggan Lakes again. We spent an extra day at Middle Fork Lake with a day-hike up to Donna Lake at the base of Pronghorn Peak.
Continue readingWe’re driving for miles across a gently-rolling landscape covered with sage brush and an occasional small shrub. Suddenly, there’s a giant crack in the earth. We’ve arrived at Black Canyon of the Gunnison, specifically the North Rim of the National Park. It’s not really a crack but the result of millions of years of the Gunnison River cutting down as the surrounding land was uplifted. However it formed, the result is pretty awe-inspiring.
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Michael R - The Compulsive Hiker
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The Compulsive Hiker 
