Come along as we go sightseeing atop Rabbit Ears Pass this morning!
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"We'll be your tour guides! Hang on as we tow you along!" say two of the most
entertaining tour guides you'll ever meet! |
Fun fact about the previous photo: in summer you would be standing on the ground and looking UP at the big hiking & camping info sign behind Max & Zorro. But, today Max & Zorro are as tall as the top of the sign. That's about 5-6 feet of snowpack at this location!
Okay, since you cannot read the info sign buried in snow above, Max & Zorro will give you the tour:
Not everyone knows that Rabbit Ears Pass is an open range in the summer/fall. Once all the snow melts (bringing tons of vegetation to life), it is a incredible natural grazing land for cattle.
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"No cows in this pen!" states Zorro looking at the cattle staging pen in front of us.
"None in the pen to the left either!" says Max glancing left to another pen just off camera.
Guess we'll have to come back in July to see the fresh beef :) |
Coming up a slight rise in the trail as we come upon the Rabbit Ears Snotel. A snotel is a device that measures snowpack, snow water equivalent of snowpack and other weather readings (temps, wind, etc). The snowpack and snow water equivalent are the primary reason snotels exist as they allow scientists, farmers and water managers to plan for how much (or little) water will be generated from Colorado's annual snowpack. An integral part of farming and managing water relies on this data. Max, Zorro & I, on the other hand, are most interested in the snowpack - as long as the snotel reports sufficient snow, we can go!
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| "Cool; but wish it had more!" say my snotel guides. |
Still going, still more to see... Here we are sprinting along the nice snow crust as Rabbit Ears Peak comes into view to our left. The rock formation atop the peak you see in the upper left are the "ears" from which Rabbit Ears gets its name!
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| "Here we go, look at the peak if you can; but we are flooring it!" say the sprinting pair. |
Finally, the official marker of Rabbit Ears Pass:
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| "Look quickly as we tow you on by..." say the trotting tour guides. |
A fun day sightseeing Rabbit Ears Pass with the two best tour guides I know: 9.3 miles traveled with 900 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 20 MPH.
2016/2017 Season to Date: 107 days on the trails covering 891.4 miles with 95,000 feet of elevation climbed.
Doug, what GPS do you use? I am using an old Garmin Forerunner 205.
ReplyDeleteHmm, no "Dougs" here. Just Brad (human), Max (red boy) and Zorro (black boy) as our skijoring team.
DeleteBut, if you still want to know about our GPS, we use a Garmin etrex Vista Hcx. The "H" stands for "high accuracy" (or some similar synonym) and was important when we bought it. But, it is 5+ years old so I expect Garmin has some more improved/accurate models now.