hike up vail mountain

{meant to post this last night... whoops. So, this post is from yesterday, and I'll work on today's if I don't take a nap all afternoon.}

Here I go again, attempting to log the time we've spent exploring. Stay tuned tomorrow for our attempt at our first 14er. 

The forecast looked like rain and storms all day so we didn't think we'd go for a hike at all today and instead walked down to Lionshead to explore more shops there. We stopped at the visitors center and didn't think some of the trails up Vail mountain by the Lionshead gondola looked to hard. We quickly decided to get on the "Berry Picker" trail, which we hated, because it switched back across the mountain so much.  The top of the mountain has Adventure Ridge where they have a ton of activities so we thought, instead of taking the gondola up there, it would be fun to just hike up there. 

The map below is blurry, but hopefully you can get the idea. (The orange is trail, once again, we took Berry Picker)

The steepest part of the trail occurred right away, and after that it wasn't too terribly awful. It just seemed like it took FOREVER to get to a place that didn't look so far away. The estimation time is 2-3 hours one way, and we got up there in two, so we did well.

Right after the beginning steep incline you have a gorgeous view of Lionshead area below.

Eventually we made it to some fields and were able to see the mountains. As I'm sure anyone will tell you, the pictures don't do these views any justice at all. I'm so sad that there's no way to really capture how incredible it is! 

Along the trail, people on their way down warned us to "turn around" because of the storms approaching. We didn't listen...I mean we figured once we got to the top we could just sit inside one of the areas at Adventure Ridge anyway. 

You can see some cool clouds over yonder -- 

Happy in this picture because I thought we were almost done....hah.

We weren't ready for hiking remember, so Jake lugged this backpack up the whole way. Tomorrow we will definitely bring the hiking pack :)

AND...finally, we made it to Adventure Ridge area. We could have kept hiking to the top but they had food here, and then we got sleepy.

It was definitely COLD up here, the sun was not out. We shivered, and could see our breaths. I would guess mid-40s.

Jake headed straight for the restaurant area.

And then we wandered around for a bit, found the gondola and just decided to ride back down.