OUR FIRST HIKE IN COLORADO

The rain and snow finally stopped, and we had several days of partly cloudy weather with some sunshine mixed in. It was time to take our first Colorado hike of the season. We found an easy/moderate hike starting at Rhyolite Regional Park in the nearby town of Castle Rock. In 2007 the town purchased 44 acres on top of the mesa to create Quarry Mesa, a 133 acre open space portion of Rhyolite Park. The quarry was the town's mainstay until 1998 before the last of the usable rhyolite was removed.

What is rhyolite you ask? Rhyolite is a lightweight pinkish and gray stone that was used as a decorative building stone in the early 1900's. The large stones were hauled to the bottom of the mesa by horse drawn wagons. Later, Silas Madge, the first quarry owner, built a 2.5 mile railroad spur to the top of the mesa to remove the large stones. Once the stones were brought to the bottom, workers carved the stone into usable blocks by hand. Iron machines like this one were later used to cut the large stones. The Madge Trail on top of the mesa is named in honor of Silas Madge, who opened the area's first rhyolite quarry here in 1872.

A fairly large red rhyolite stone that were dug out of the quarry is displayed at the park..

And a gray rhyolite stone.

The Madge Trail system has more than 3 miles of trails on the top of Quarry Mesa, several hundred feet above the valley floor. The views from the mesa were spectacular. If you look closely at the left horizon, you can see a mountain covered in snow far in the distance to the south. This is Pikes Peak. 

Here is a view of Pikes Peak taken with a telephoto lens. We are nearly 30 miles from Pikes Peak, which rises 14,115 feet above sea level. Neighboring Colorado Springs is just over 6,000 feet above sea level.

Paul is standing next to some tall plants left from last summer. These Mullein are over 6 feet tall. In the summer, the new Mullein will have yellow flowers on them.

Looking to the northwest, we could see this panoramic view of the Rockies to the west of Denver, which is about 30 miles away. Still lots of snow at Colorado's famed ski resorts of Vail, Aspen, and others.

Paul is standing next to the side of the mesa as the trail meanders upwards. The gray portion (bottom two thirds of the photo) felt like course wet sand to the touch.

A close-up view of the area above Paul's head shows the bright colors of the remaining stone.

We started out at the bottom of mesa and hiked up over 400 feet to the top of the mesa along a trail that was about a 30 degree incline. At the top of the mesa, we wound our way around Quarry Mesa and were hoping to finish the entire trail loop. However, the path turned into a mud bog. The mud stuck in large clumps to the bottoms and sides of our hiking shoes, making them very heavy and uncomfortable to walk. So that was the end of following the path.

On the way down from the mesa, we stopped to take a photo of our car, documenting how high we had climbed.

At the end of the hike, we banged our filthy shoes against a cement wall for quite a while, sending most of the mud flying off, before climbing back into the car. After returning to the motorhome, we still needed to scrub the soles with a grout brush to complete the cleaning process.  A messy job, but well worth the views.

This was a good first hike, since we are still getting used to the altitude. Our campground is about 6700 ft. above sea level.  We hope to return to the top of Quarry Mesa later this summer when the weather is drier so we can continue to enjoy the mountain panorama along the entire path.