| Fish Creek
Falls
Locations:
Routt National Forest, north of Steamboat Springs, CO
October 6, 2012 Andra and I began from the parking lot in 35-degree sunshine around 11:00. Peak fall color had passed, but the aspen retained some yellow leaves, and the Gambell Oaks were burnt orange and brown. We strolled down the wide path towards the bridge over Fish Creek. Lots of people congregated at the water, snapping pictures of the impressive falls. Two branches of Fish Creek converge just upstream, and each one drops a couple hundred feet within ¼ mile of the bridge. Pretty impressive. We continued on the trail uphill through the aspen, spruce and river birch. The carpet of brown bracken ferns softened the forest floor, and complemented the yellow-red foliage of the serviceberry scattered amongst the dark Douglas fir. After a series of switchbacks, we emereged into an impressive stretch of mature aspen, mostly defoliated but nevertheless impressive against the deep blue fall sky. The trail leveled off and continued through the aspen grove for several hundred yards. We left the aspen grove and started up a steeper rocky stretch of trail paralleling Fish Creek, found a spot to sit, and spent awhile enjoying the view to the north. Fall color makes every forest scene a painting. When the chill sank back in after our uphill march, we set off downhill, and back through the aspen grove. As the trail steepened and entered the switchbacks, we took one of the side trails that led off towards Fish Creek. This little path climbed a bit over sharp rocks, then reached a flat clearing with a fire pit. The ground sloped down towards the creek where a series of nice falls bubbled over shady rocks. Shortly downstream the earth dropped away, and water splashed down over dark granite rocks so far down I couldn’t find a spot to see the bottom. I laid down on the rough granite near the cliff and peered over, staring down the falls. Still couldn’t see the bottom. Andra crawled out on the rocks and took a peek. Pretty impressive point. We retreated to the trail and headed back down to the bridge. On oujr way back to the parking lot, we took the cutoff to the picnic area, and then took the paved trail to the overlook areas. Lots of people were on the trail by then, and the temperature had warmed up to the mid 50’s, feeling much warmer in the intense sunlight. We strolled back to the car via the paved overlook trail, a beautiful route through a varied forest of oak, aspen, spruce, serviceberry, sumac, wild rose and ferns. We reached the car about 2 hours after beginning, concluding a very enjoyable hike. Afterwards we drove over to Strawberry hot springs for a very enjoyable soak. ;)
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