In The Shadow of Longs Peak
Sourdough-Rainbow Lakes Exploratory
19 October 2022 and 07 November 2022
19 October 2022
We arrived at the trailhead at the south end of the Sourdough Trail just before noon with the sun high, the sky a deep blue, clear and cloudless, and hardly a breeze.
Our intention was to find a winter off-road route from the parking lot to the Rainbow Lakes Road and avoid having to take our skis off and walk the main road.
Gary hiked over to the trailhead and pointed out a trail that went to the southeast from the parking lot. We will keep this in mind and will investigate later, but for now we hiked along the west side of the parking lot till we found what looked like a route to negotiate a passage thru the ponderosa pines. Not too far back was a large fire ring and just beyond that an open stand of pine. Beyond that, the land dropped down. I went to the edge to investigate and does drop, not steeply, into a shallow southeast trending drainage.
We headed in the opposite direction, to the north. On our right was the parking lot, so we bear left but now seem like we’re headed toward the road, so we bear left again, going past another fire-ring, this one smaller.
Downhill is a road and powerlines. We walked down, followed the northwest trending road and powerlines and shortly were back at the road. We hop up. Gary wonders in the woods for 10 minutes while I take a break.
We head up the road and it turns out that we are just yards from the Rainbow Lakes cut-off and walk as far at the gate then head back, bushwhacking thru the trees till we come to a small stream. I climb back up to the road, turning off when I get to the power lines and find a good sitting rock and wait. Gary ended up climbing out of the streambed and back up to the road and joins me.
Now we continue back along the road until it begins to drop. Here we head left, passing both fire rings and are back at the parking lot.
Next, we try and find the trail shown on the trailhead topo, but to no avail. Later, at home, I look at a more recent topo which does not show that trail at all.
Sourdough-Rainbow Lakes Exploratory
07 November 2022
A continuation of our October 19th outing. We walked south from the parking lot about 400 yards to a clearing we could see in a satellite photo that was adjacent to the road we had followed on the previous outing. We followed this northwest, passing an abandoned camp with a structure that looks like a kiln, again coming out on the road and walk to the Rainbow Lakes Road.
There was no alternative way to the Rainbow Lakes Road. But this route is more pleasant than carrying our skies up the main road.