Everyday Adventure // Waterton Canyon

Colorado never ceases to amaze me (at least it hasn’t yet in the almost seven years I’ve been here). For example, you can drive 30 minutes from the city and swap cycling commuters for bighorn sheep as your trail companions. This is a fantastic swap, like getting someone in third grade to give you their Cheetos for your carrot sticks.

So what do you do if you have a super short visit to Denver + you can’t make it up I-70 all the way into the mountains? You should MAKE time, but that’s another argument for another day. In the meantime, go on this hike. Get your nature on without sacrificing being able to make it back to civilization for happy hour. This is how you win at life (you’re welcome).

And if you don’t care about making it back for happy hour (or anything else for that matter), you can actually hike 500 miles all the way to Durango on the Colorado Trail, which starts here at Waterton Canyon. I hiked another portion of the Colorado trail when I summited Mt. Elbert, Colorado’s highest fourteener.

I’m getting so excited for this new hiking season – there is still a lot of snow up in the high country at this point, but my mind is on all those summer adventures. Afternoons in the sun with the mountain breeze at your back + views for days. Evenings making s’mores, staring up at the stars + waking up smelling like campfire. Time seems to move more slowly in these warm months, + seeing as the year is almost halfway over already, I’m ready for that. You blink on New Year’s + suddenly it’s Memorial Day!

I like to make a seasonal bucket list so that I get as much into these long days as possible, and it seems like it’s about that time. Do you have big plans for the summer?