On October 8 we did our annual hike of the Aspen Vista Trail. In contrast to the blazing sun of the past two years, this was a cooler and less sunny walk, but beautiful still the same.
We lucked into a wonderful window of reasonably bright weather combined with threatening skies--which made for some great shadows and colors.
I would say that we were a few days past peak--good color on the lower and more protected slopes (at about 10,000 feet) but lots of lost leaves as we climbed higher.
Moments before we left (the temperature had already dropped about five degrees) a heavy, cold mist blew in. The time between the first and last of the following photographs was no more than four minutes--in the first you can see the entire valley from the parking area; by the third. the valley has been totally obliterated.
Time to hop in the car and go home! The mountain was covered in clouds the rest of the day, but the next morning we could see that the peak was clearly snow-covered.
Click the links to read about our 2008 and 2007 walks, with lots more detail on the Aspen Vista Trail!
