Tree Hugging
We never ventured farther north than Long Lake our first day out. Farther south, on the way to Rabbit Ears Peak we passed an old miner's cabin sitting at the edge of the trees near the Bowls at the Ears. We tried to climb the Bowls but flat light prevented us from gaining much elevation. When you climb you want to be able to see much more clearly than what we could that day.
Our next destination was Elmo Point (10,692 feet), which in sunnier times allows you to have some incredible views but this day it was a bit eerie with the clouds hanging around. You definitely don't want to come barreling out of the trees around here or the earth just might drop out from under you. We stopped on the edge of a rather abrupt dropoff and peered into the fog and while not being able to see much, we could see the several hundred foot drop down to the valley floor below.
Back to more tree riding and exploring. We crossed several parks (remember, that's what they call big wide open play areas in Colorado) or rode along the edges near the trees if we were worried there would be too many open creeks that were barely visible in the flat light.
We found a couple of challenging drainages that we battled with the snow to climb up and out of. We won one and lost one. But it was fun trying and because there were enough trees towering overhead, we had some definition which allowed us to at least try.