Welcome to the Colorado backcountry

The vast acreage of wilderness and backcountry beauty in Colorado make it one of the more popular locations for camping, backpacking, and day-hiking.

In addition to a eight National Parks and Monuments, Colorado boasts an equal number of Wilderness Areas, millions of acres of National Forest and BLM land, and over three dozen state parks.

From mountains to deserts, and grasslands to canyons, one could spend a lifetime hiking the trails of Colorado and not cover all of them.

Colorado National Monument

A cold morning outing was well worth it for the images I brought back.


 
The trails are snow-packed and icy, but hiking around the base of the Monument isn't difficult.  Winter is a great time to visit many of Colorado's desert destinations.  Not only are they uncrowded (often empty), you'll see them in a very unique way.  The contrast between the rock and snow makes the vistas more striking than the same views in summer.