Monday, August 8, 2016

Rifle Falls Hike

 For our Humphries family vacation this year we traveled to Rifle Falls, Colorado. Located approximately 30 minutes away from Glenwood Springs the campsite is popular with day hikers who come by to view the beautiful waterfall and limestone caves.

The campsite was not very shady but it had electricity and was generally well maintained. There was a site between our camp and the rest of the family. At first we thought we hadn't been able to get adjacent sites because had already reserved it for part of the time, but no one ever actually stayed the night. We figured it was a designated site for large trailers to park on the way to see the falls, or to fill up their water tanks. We saw several trailers pull into the site, but none stayed longer than a few  hours.


We got a peek at the fall at dusk the first evening we arrived. They were beautiful so we decided to explore the area as a family the next day.

There were a few trails around the camp. The one we chose took us above the falls and along a path that led to the entrance to several limestone caves. Some were large enough for us to explore, and so we did.

It was fun to explore with the kids but the air was filled with dust at times making it hard to take pictures because of all of the particles floating in the air, which we couldn't see in the pitch black but were readily visible in the photos we took.

The trail eventually descended to the base of the falls and up again on the other side where we could walk underneath them. It was actually quite refreshing to feel the mist of the water on a hot day.