Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument - July 6th, 2020
The first destination of our next loop around Colorado was Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument. Our campground reservation was for two nights at Eleven Mile State Park which is nearby. That gave us a full day to fully enjoy Florissant Fossil Beds. We’ve never been there before and we were looking forward to it.
We took the backroads to get to Eleven Mile State Park. At Conifer from US 285 we took S. Foxton Road (CR 97) to SW Platte River Rd (CR 96) to Deckers Road to (CR 126) to CO 67. When we got to Woodland Park, we headed west on US 24. Foxton Road was very scenic, with tight curves among large boulders. It seemed pretty popular with cyclists. Foxton Road follows alongside Casto Creek. It passes through Renoyld's Park, part of Jeffco parks. Quite a few people were fishing alongside the creek. We saw several kayaks paddling down the creek. When we reached SW Platte River Rd, there was a parking area where a handful of people were getting ready to float down the river in inner tubes. There were houses on the opposite side of the river from the road and it looked like they park on the roadside and walk over a pedestrian bridge to their houses. One had a cable instead of a foot bridge. That would have been interesting to see them pull themselves over on the cable.
All along US 24, there were lines of RV’s heading the opposite direction. It was the end of the July 4th weekend and many people were heading home. We were glad we waited until Sunday to start our trip to avoid the crowds. Well, we actually didn’t have much of a choice because Right Buddy (RB) couldn’t find any available camping sites on the weekend. Guess we started planning that trip a little late. Of course, it was nice to stay home and celebrate the 4th of July with the kids.
We arrived at Eleven Mile State Park just in time to have lunch. We’re not sure what time we were allowed to occupy our campsite, but we saw that no one was in our site when we arrived, so we settled in. It was raining lightly just as we pulled in, so we ate lunch inside the van. After lunch, it was still threatening rain so instead of going for a long bike ride around the reservoir or going for a hike on a trail, we grabbed our rain jackets and walked to the end of the North Shore Campground. There are several campgrounds all around the reservoir. North Shore is the one closest to the marina with several loops. We were in Loop A, the closest to the marina. The loops further out looked like they would be a little nicer to stay in. We saw pelicans, sea gulls, cormorants, and bluebirds. The people in the site across from ours had an open frame generator which was rather annoying, but they turned it off at 3 pm.
After our walk, we sat outside and started working. Then the wind picked up and looked like it was going to rain again, so we retreated into the van. For dinner we had sloppy joes and cucumber salad. The temperature was dropping, the high was only in the 70’s to begin with, so after a short walk to the reservoir, we again headed inside the van to work some more as we watched the sun set. A ground squirrel kept peering over boulders in a rock outcropping near us to check us out. There was a pretty good AT&T cell signal, especially with our WeBoost (paid link), but no Verizon signal.
We spent the next day at Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument. On the way, between Lake George and Florissant, there was a fence line with an old bicycle between each pair of fenceposts for about a quarter of a mile. It looked like the property belonged to a campground and mini storage business. Very cute.
Before lunch, we hiked the Petrified Forest Loop (1 mile) and Ponderosa Loop (0.5 mile) in about an hour. There were petrified redwood tree stumps along both trails along with informational signs describing the history of the area since the redwoods used to dominate the landscape there. The redwoods were buried in layers of volcanic ash which preserved them (Forming Florissant Timeline).
We ate our picnic lunch at a table near the parking lot of the visitor’s center. The visitor center itself was closed except for the restrooms. There was a booth setup outside where a ranger was handling admission. Another ranger under a tent was outside the center answering questions and swearing in Junior Rangers.
After lunch, we hiked a large loop around most of the property in a counter clockwise direction. Starting out on the Petrified Forest Loop and taking the split onto the Hornbeck Wildlife Loop. The first part of the loop is the Geologic Trail which has informational signs describing the geological history of the area.
After about a mile and a half we reached the Hornbeck Homestead, which is alongside County Road 1. We only saw one other couple on the Geologic Trail up to this point, but there were quite a few people at the Homestead, since there is a parking lot right off the road. A ranger was at the Homestead. He seemed very knowledgeable about the history of the Homestead which he was happy to share with everyone. The farmhouse and the root cellar are original to the homestead. There are three other buildings from the same time period which were moved to the property including a barn and a carriage house. The house was open for the public to walk through, but it was a one-way route from the back door of the house to the front door and people were asked to wait until the group of people ahead of them had vacated the next room before the next group enters it. It was evidence of a great story about Adeline Hornbek, an ambitious, hard-working and empowered woman in the 1800's who built the homestead along with her children.
After touring the Homestead, we continued on Hornbeck Wildlife Loop. When the trail intersected with Boulder Creek Trail, we switched trails. We could hear a hawk calling and we kept scanning the tree tops trying to see it, but couldn’t. The next thing we knew we saw two red tailed hawks flying overhead.
The next junction was with Hans Loop Trail. At the junction, a park staff member was laboring hard, repairing a culvert and replacing small boulders with larger ones. We stopped to check our maps and our pace to decide whether to continue on the outer loop or start heading back to the visitor’s center. The man told us Hans Loop was a nice trail, so that is the trail we took.
Not far after the Hans Loop junction, we came across the Sawmill Trail junction. That would get us back to the Visitors Center a little sooner, but it looked rather steep, from the junction anyway. So we opted for the longer, but more gradual climb by staying on Hans Loop Trail. We’re not sure if it was really less steep than Sawmill, but that was all the information we had to go on at the time. The Hans Loop curves around the ridge and then joins the Sawmill Trail before reaching the Visitors Center.
It turned out to be the right choice. As we were walking along the Hans Loop Trail, RB thought she heard an animal snort. As she quickly scanned the area, she spotted a small heard of elk in the distance. She managed to get a few pics of them before they took off as they appeared to sense our presence.
Completing the loop made for a long day of hiking. We counted the Florissant Loop Trail as hike #36 in our 52 Hike Challenge. The afternoon loop that we took was 7.6 miles with an elevation gain of 1029 feet and took us three hours and 15 minutes to complete. So our total hiking mileage for the day was over nine miles. Even though most of the hike did not include fossils or history, we enjoyed the nature and fresh air.
The trail was crushed gravel most of the way, but the surrounding terrain varied from wide open meadows, a few creeks, rocky outcroppings, and sparse forests. With all of the open meadows, there was quite a variety of wildflowers along the trail. Since it was in the low 70’s that day, with a nice breeze, it was a pleasant hike. It threatened rain part of the afternoon, but the storms all missed us. We welcomed the partial cloud cover to take a break from the sun.
It was about 3:30 pm when we got back to the Visitors Center. It looked like the rangers were starting to shut things down. The gate to the park road entrance closes at 5 pm, so we’re guessing they didn’t want people to start a long hike and not make it back in time. We were thankful that the restrooms were still open. As we were driving past the Hornbeck Homestead, it looked like it was already shut down.
When we got back to Eleven Mile State Park, we started dinner - roasted beet salad. We put the awning out, now that we had figured out why it was getting stuck. However, the wind suddenly started gusting as a storm blew over. We frantically dropped everything and struggled to put the awning back in before the wind ripped it from our van. Left Buddy’s (LB's) hat blew off his head, but he didn’t chase it down until after we had the awning safely put away. Luckily it had not blown that far away and he was able to find it. A neighboring campsite had some screen tents set up while they were gone and the tents ended up on their sides. Later in the evening, RB noticed an American flag in the bushes near our site. She asked our neighbors if it was their flag and they seemed very grateful to get it back.
LB tried testing out the Espar heater before we hit the road the following day. It would not ingnite. Then we heard some weird noises from under the van. We think it was some kind of rodent chewing on things. We haven’t figured out what they were chewing on…yet.
We emptied our gray water tanks and filled our fresh water tanks before leaving Eleven Mile State Park. We knew our next campground, Black Canyon of the Gunnison, did not have a dump station. When we changed out the gray water tank the day before, it was overflowing. Apparently we had forgotten to empty it after our last trip. After emptying both of the gray tanks, we added about a tablespoon of chlorine to the one tank and swished it around with about a cup of fresh water to try to kill any germs or bacteria that may have built up.
Despite the mishaps, we had a good time. We didn’t see much of Eleven Mile State Park, but that’s OK. Maybe the next time we go we’ll have a boat and be able to enjoy the reservoir even more. Florissant Fossil Beds is not a very popular national monument, but we’re glad we went and learned a few things along the way. Trips don’t need to be to the most popular or stunning places to have a great visit. What places are near where you live that you haven’t experienced yet?
Check out our related video: Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument
(RB)