Pole Hill (in/out) & Johnny Park (west to east)
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Meet with a group to travel Pole Hill (in & out) and Johnny Park
(west to east with a back-n-forth for a couple obstacles). Last fall's rains produced a washout trench in Pole Hill's meadow, two slumps of hillside onto the trail and a second washout section of trail. I was curious as to what the trail would be like this season. The meadow washout has been opened up / repaired (by the Forest Service) but a nice section of trail has been blocked off. I will be curious (might check with the FS) to see if the blockage is permanent or temporary. If temp, for how long? |
| A westward view at Pole Hill's trail set. |
| Panorama (click for a larger size) |
| Panorama (click for a larger size) Looking west, over Estes Park, to Rocky Mountain National Park. |
| We walked up to Panorama Peak (9284 ft) and found this lookout tower (and it was open!). Up stairs and into a nice room then more stairs to the roof. A nice view! |
| Walking back to the gate where the vehicles were parked (it would be quite nice to have the gate open to drive up). |
| Working down to the meadow. |
| The meadow (with nice spring green!) with a nice view to the Rockies. |
| This is about where the washout trench started... |
| The vehicle width, three foot deep trench has been removed. |
| Jay's about at the end of the repaired washout. |
| What's this on the right?!?! An unpleasant sight. Temporary or permanent? |
| A closed trail - the one we would typically take at this intersection. Now to take "the other way". |
| The power lines (that Pole Hill Road brings utility vehicles to repair) with Estes Park and Rocky Mountain National Park. |
| The Notch |
| Panorama (Click for a larger size) |
| The small slump. Hillside material, on the right / high side, loosened in the saturating (4-day) rains of last September. A bit of the hillside let loose and slumped onto the trail. |
| Perhaps fifty feet later is the large slump. It seems to have been tamed as last season it was somewhat difficult to navigate. |
| Spring GREEN - wonderful! |
| Ahhh... |
| Driving south on Highway 7 we come across this slide. |
| On the Johnny Park trail. A harvested area - bare with refuse. |
| Heading down the more difficult obstacle area - with a nice view to the plains. We would process down through it, u-turn to drive up, then u-turn again to continue east. |
| Johnny Park is done (the eastern spur is gated / closed) so we're on the county road heading down to US-36. A fair bit of this road (wherever it is now gravel) has been washed out by the floods. |
| It used to be asphalt |
