The Loch & Timberline Falls
It's another weekend and we went on another hike, big surprise! This time we decided to make it to The Loch, a lake that is 3 miles from the start of the Glacier Gorge Trailhead. We figured once we were there we could decide to go on to Timberline falls and then maybe make it to Sky Pond. We ended up making it to the lake and it looked oddly familiar. It turns out that we hiked to The Loch last year and thought we were at Mills Lake. Because of all the snow when we went last year, all the signs were covered and we must have taken a wrong turn. Since we had already made it to The Loch before, we had to go on, so we trecked another mile and another 600 vertical feet to Timberline Falls.
Timberline Falls is by far my favorite waterfall in Colorado that I've been to. The waterfall was visible from The Loch, as well as about a quarter-mile from the destination. It was nice being able to see the thing you're hiking to. The other thing that made the waterfall magnificent was that it was up on a giant hill in front of a massive meadow.
We hiked on, passing Glass Lake and finally arriving at Sky Pond about 3/4 of a mile from Timberline Falls. In total, the hike took us a little over 4 hours and 30 minutes, which was a lengthy 9-mile hike with a little over 2,000 feet of elevation gain. Surprisingly, this hike seemed significantly easier than the hike last week, which was just a little over 9-miles but had about 500 feet more of elevation gain. I guess more than 2,000 feet of elevation gain is killer.
9 mi
4.5 hrs
10,245 ft
2,069 ft
Alberta Falls
We quickly made it to Alberta Falls, which is less than a mile from the trail head. Since it was crowded and since we had been there before, we only spent about a minute before trekking on.
Powell Peak
You can see Powell Peak in the distance, basically out hike ends at the base of Powell Peak
Through the Apsens
This hike would be great in the fall! We hiked through several patches of Aspens.
Timberline Falls
You can see Timberline falls at the very bottom of this photo just left of center. Katherine spotted the waterfall and we didn't realize that was one of our destinations until about half way to the waterfall.
Green Field
Clouds Rolling In
The clouds started to roll in, but none of them looked all that threatening.
Timberline Falls
About a quarter-mile from Timberline Falls and we could see our destination. Since it was up high and in front of a giant meadow, it was hard to miss.
At the Falls
Katherine at Timberline Falls.
Bokeh
I brought my bokeh filter this time. Unfortunately the background was too lit up for the photos to turn out great, but you can see the stars. I'll keep experimenting everywhere I go.
Purple Flowers
There was a patch of purple flowers directly in front of Timberline Falls.
Timberline Falls Panorama
Yelow Wildflowers
Sky Pond
We finally made it to our destination 2 hours and 38 minutes into our hike. The trail ended here, so we had no choice but to hike back down.
Sharkstooth
One of these is the backside of the Sharkstooth.
Dark Clouds
On our way back from the hike, we got rained on for about 15 minutes. I threw my camera into my bag and we walked quickly to the trail head. We were about 2.5 miles from the trail head when the rain started, and it stopped before we hit Alberta Falls. There were some other darker clouds coming, so we hiked quickly back to the parking lot where we took the shuttle back to the park & ride.
