2,500 foot elevation gain, 7 beautiful lakes, numerous waterfalls including a scramble up one!
In late August, four friends and I flew to Denver to experience some hiking in Rocky Mountain National Park (RMNP)! We had a short trip of 3 days which one day of it was spent in Colorado Springs to do The Manitou Incline so really had two full days in RMNP. We knew we wanted one difficult hike day and one day to at least see a lot of the park which meant more driving than hiking. This post will explain our long/difficult hike day where we went 13 miles in a loop route to Sky Pond (and 6 other ponds/lakes included!).
Let’s start at the beginning though! We flew in to Denver Int’l Airport, rented our car, grabbed groceries and were on our way to Estes Park! We spent the night at Estes Park Campground at Marys Lake, Colorado in the tent we brought in our checked bag. You have a view of the mountains from almost every tent site, showers/bathrooms, picnic table, and bear boxes for food. We set up our tent then made dinner which included Mountain House Chicken Fajita Bowls and for dessert we put Bailey’s, chocolate chips, and marshmallows in ice cream cones then wrapped them in tin foil and heated over a fire (delicious!).
After dinner, we got all our gear ready for our early morning hike because we knew we had to leave the campground at 5 AM to get into RMNP and secure a parking spot in the Bear Lake parking lot due to the increase of visitors on a weekend and in summer! We got to the lot around 5:30 AM and there was ample parking for us (Glacier Gorge parking was our back-up!) so we secured a spot, brewed some coffee and breakfast until the sun came up just a bit, and we left on our hike around 7 AM. Right at the beginning from Bear Lake, you head toward Glacier Gorge Trailhead, which is where we ran into some elk right along the trail feasting on their breakfast. We continued on our way toward Alberta Falls which would be our first waterfall of the day! (PS: I love bridges in nature so you may see a lot of those in this post!)
From Alberta Falls, we continued on toward The Loch which would be our first major lake of the day and a sign we were still on the right path to Sky Pond! We had beautiful views the entire way to The Loch and decided to take our first snack break when we got there to enjoy the beauty! (Watch out for chipmunks trying to steal your food!).
Next we continued on (starting more of an incline) toward Lake of Glass (still en route to Sky Pond) with plenty of incline and even a waterfall scramble along the way! The trail is so well maintained and as we continued getting closer to Sky Pond, we saw less and less people (because the waterfall scramble up Timberline Falls is NOT for the faint of heart! It had my heart racing in a few slippery spots!
After the intense scramble up Timberline Falls (have good trail shoes and take your time!), we reached Lake of Glass and the name perfectly explains the view! The glassy surface provides an amazing reflection of the snowcapped mountains on the other side! We stopped here for a few minutes to take in the view.
Fun fact: most people stop here because they THINK Lake of Glass is Sky Pond since they made it to the top of the waterfall so they take it in then turn around. Don’t do that! Keep going across the boulders to continue the trek to Sky Pond! You are ALMOST there- only 4.5 miles later (but about 2,000 feet of elevation climbed!)! We made it to Sky Pond, soaked in all of its glory while eating our lunch we packed before we started (PB&Js and beef jerky for the win…at 9:30 AM haha!), chatted with other hikers, snapped some photos, and sat in silence in awe at how lucky we are to be able to hike to such great views! (Tip: Look to your right from the pond and you will see The Sharkstooth-which is a series of jagged mountains that look like exactly what the name implies- see second photo below!)
Now, from Sky Pond, make sure you turn around and look at the beautiful view behind you to see Lake of Glass and the vast range of trail it took you to arrive at the beautiful view you’ve earned!
From here, we traveled back toward Lake of Glass, carefully worked our way DOWN the waterfall we had previously scrambled up, and continued a few miles back toward the way we had come (past Loch Vale). On the way back however, we turned left at Mills Junction so we could do a loop and hit a few more lakes and add some mileage! We headed toward Lake Haiyaha (which means ‘lake of many rocks’ and again, names appropriately!). After about a mile and a half of trail, we made it to a sign that pointed us to go left toward Lake Haiyaha and the last 50 yards required us hopping from one giant boulder to the next to reach the lake! It was amazing how vastly different this lake was from the previous we had seen earlier!
Next, we geared up to head back to the main trail and headed another mile to Dream Lake. Just past Dream Lake, on our way to Emerald Lake, it started DOWNPOURING which was a sudden afternoon mountain rainstorm which we had prepared for with our rain gear/ponchos! However, you do NOT want to be stuck in this so thankfully we were on the final mile of our hike for the day anyway and scurried back along the trail toward Nymph Lake to Bear Lake parking lot (just as the hail started) and warmed up in the car! Sadly I don’t have photos of the final two lakes because my hands were so cold and I was too focused on rushing back to the car! Looks like I will just have to return for this hike again to grab those photos 🙂 The third photo below has the Sky Pond route in red and the distance and elevation is if we would have done it straight out and back. We did it as a loop instead (blue line I added to show you the loop route) and had 2,400 feet elevation, 12.9 miles total, and saw 7 awe-striking lakes that are not all so easy to get to! But hey, if it were easy, everyone would do it, right?!
Now, ohhhh if only our adventure for our day ended there! We got to the car wet and warmed up a bit then headed straight to a brewery for a late lunch (yes our second one, don’t judge…or call it early dinner if you want) before heading back to our campsite to see the dumpster fire of our situation. Our tent was completely soaked so we opted we were too tired to deal with it and ended up booking a hotel room at a local hotel in Estes and calling it a day. BUT FIRST, because we fit in everything we can when we go somewhere, we had to stop at The Stanley Hotel (redrum? Here’s Johnny? Anyone?) for a cocktail or two before heading to our hotel.
From start to finish, it truly was an extremely eventful, laughable, memorable day! I hope this post encourages others to accept the challenge of hiking to Sky Pond (and even adding a few miles on to the end like we did!).
Separate post on our 2nd day in RMNP exploring! Go explore, friends!
Miles to Go: Adventure Awaits 