We wrapped our way along the marshy meadow up to the base of our snowfield. We climbed up the rocks to where the snow cave began, then took a break for some lunch.
Paul and Dave serve as a sense of scale.
Flowers barely waited for the snow to recede before blooming.
Fascinating marbled rocks
The view from our lunch perch over the valley we had just crossed
A glance to the left. This leads to Arapaho Pass, where the old stagecoaches used to cross the mountains.
Just behind and above us was the entrance to underneath the snowfield
More plane wreckage
Paul let us sample some chocolate-covered chia powerbars. They weren't nearly as bad as they looked!
Keeping an eye on the storm. Virga is the observable streak of precipitation that falls from a cloud but evaporates before reaching the ground.
We finished eating then made our way into the cave. Dave has been coming here 8 years in a row now. He says it is different each year. Some years it is huge and you can walk the entire way though it, exiting at the top of the snowfield. Other times it is much smaller, and one year it even melted entirely away within just a few weeks.
Wondering what it's going to look like now...
... Unfortunately the cave was only deep enough to climb in a short ways.
Under a snowfield at 11,290 feet!
Not only did extremely cold water flow quickly beneath us but it poured from the ceiling as well.
Still more plane wreckage, recently released from its winter prison
We walked around the base of the snowfield for a bit. There was so much water everywhere! But the clouds were moving in quickly and we weren't sure if we were going to be hit with a storm soon or not, so we packed up and decided to start back down.
Again, thanks guys for the scale!
Looking up the snowfield and at the gushing waterfalls that were creating the caves beneath it
Water, water everywhere
Parry’s Primrose is named after Charles Christopher Parry (1823 - 1890, a British-American botanist and mountaineer) who collected this plant in 1861.
White Marsh Marigold, of the buttercup family, is an extremely hardy little flower... literally pushing its way up through the snow in high alpine meadows.
An emerging Alpine Lily
"Sedges have edges"... The square stems of this small plant let us know that it isn't a grass or rush.
We began our descent on the other side of the meadow, down a steep slope lined with yet another snowfield.
The turbulent waters raced down alongside us.
Once back down at the large meadow, we crossed to the far side and took a different route off the mountain. Our path took us though many marshes and along numerous small streams, ponds and lakes.
Goodbye, snow cave!
Paul prepares to cross the stream.
One final glimpse of our snowfield
