Mt Elbert Forebay

After a quick night at Clear Creek Reservoir, we headed back to the Twin Lakes area to find a more scenic campsite. By noon on Sunday, most of the campers had packed up and left. Despite numerous available campsites, we were hoping to take the place of the Sprinter van who had beat us to a spot by mere seconds around sunset the night before.

When we arrived to the location, we were disappointed to see the Sprinter van still parked in the site. We pulled into a gravel lot just down the road. It had several rough dirt roads leading to additional campsites, but two RV’s occupied what seemed to be the most accessible sites. As we discussed our options, suddenly the van’s brake lights illuminated and they drove away. Without hesitation I backed the trailer into the road, while Christy handled traffic control, and then pulled into our new campsite.

It wasn’t much of a campsite… more like a gravel turnout on the side of the road, but unlike most of the other camping opportunities in the area, it didn’t require crossing any rough roads or tight backing. It was flat and level, and best of all, it provided amazing views of Mt Elbert, La Plata Peak and the green and gold aspen covered slopes leading to Independence Pass.

Once we had unhooked the fifth wheel, we decided to spend the rest of the day driving over Independence Pass to Aspen. The drive was beautiful and so was the weather. The sketchier sections of the pass have been improved with signal controlled one way traffic through the narrowest bits.

Previously, the road would suddenly narrow from two lanes to about one and a half lanes as rocks on the uphill side of the road jutted out and the line dividing the lanes disappeared. If you happened to meet oncoming traffic on a blind corner, it could feel like a choice between losing a side mirror or going off the steep cliff to the canyon below.

We got fuel, had lunch and walked around Aspen for a couple hours before heading back over the pass. On the way back we stopped at a forest recreation area where a footbridge led to some hiking trails. We hung out on a serene river bend while Ben played monster trucks in the sand, then took a short hike to see some ice caves.

We made one final stop at the top of I dependence Pass and walked to the lookout point with a view of La Plata Peak.