This weekend I FINALLY went hiking!! I had big plans to hike a lot this summer, but I ended up fishing a lot!
It can be hard to get out there and hike because my kids are not old enough to enjoy hiking like I do. My kids love nature and to run around, but Lotus won’t walk more than a mile and Jeffery hates sitting in the baby carrier (plus he is heavy!!). If I can find a trail that is flat and short, my kids do really well, but most of the time that’s not the type of hike I want to do.
Luckily, my husband watched the kiddos so my friend and I could go do a hike! I wanted to go somewhere beautiful (which is pretty much everywhere in Colorado) and with water! I found Ouzel Falls that is located within Rocky Mountain National Park!
Rock Mountain National Park (RMNP) is fairly close to Denver and does not require a lot of crazy mountain driving. While getting to RMNP is easy, it’s not really my go to spot to hike. Yes it is beautiful. Yes there are amazing views. But, there are so many people there! It is a huge tourist spot. I understand why so many people want to see it, but sometimes the number of people can be overwhelming! So unless I find a hike I’m super excited about, I tend to stay away.
I was incredibly excited about Ouzel Falls and I actually decided I wanted to hike it before I realized it was in RMNP. I’m kind of a sucker for a waterfall! I’m really glad I decided to do this hike because it was so beautiful and has multiple waterfalls.
My friend and I left pretty early for the hike. We left around 6am and it’s about an hour and a half drive. From my experience with seriously any hike in Colorado, the earlier you get there, the better! Trailhead parking spots tend to fill up fast and you can find yourself walking a mile to just get to the start of your hike!
Now, tip #1 for Ouzel Falls! DO NOT put in your GPS Ouzel Falls. It will not take you to the right place. You need to go to Wild Basin Trailhead, which is located in Allenspark, not Estes Park. I had a hard time finding it on a GPS apps so if you can’t find it, just get yourself to Estes Park and take highway seven. You’ll follow highway seven for about 12.5 miles and you’ll see signs for Wild Basin Trailhead. You follow that around to the RMNP south entrance where you’ll come to a ranger station. The trailhead is about two miles past the ranger station.
When you get the the trailhead, there are maybe 50 parking spots. There are other parking spots along the road leading to the trailhead but some of them are over a mile away! So, tip #2 get there early!! We got there around 8:30am (because we set our GPS to Ouzel Falls originally) and there happened to only be a spot at the trailhead because someone was leaving! Also, if you get there early, there will be rangers directing you to where you can park so you don’t get in trouble and you don’t waste time looking for a spot. They will tell you where the best spot is!
Now to the good stuff! This hike is amazing from the start! About half a mile in is the first waterfall, Copeland Falls!
The thing I loved the most about this hike is that almost the whole entire way you can hear or see water!
The water made this hike so peaceful! And even though the parking lot was full and we thought there were going to be a ton of people, we actually didn’t see many at all. There are a lot of different trails that this one splits off into so that might have been why.
If you keep going about a mile and a half past Copeland Falls, you’ll come to Calypso Cascades!
I have seen some pictures of Calypso Cascades online and the water does flow a bit more than it was when we were hiking. It is really beautiful though!!
After hiking about 2.7 miles on the trail, you’ll come the Ouzel Falls! Tip #3, do not just stop at the bridge and look at it or you will be very disappointed. From the bridge, there was no flowing water. But, if you hike up the left side, you’ll see the actual falls!
The waterfall was so pretty and well worth the hike! You can even climb around on the rocks and get pretty close to the waterfall!
Up to this point, the hike was not bad at all. There were some steep portions but nothing difficult. The trail to climb up to actually see the falls isn’t marked very well so you have to find your own path, but that wasn’t hard at all. Also, Ouzel Falls is the only falls that isn’t marked for some reason so if you see a large bridge, don’t go past it without hiking up the side to the falls!
My original plan was to just hike to Ouzel Falls. But after we got there, we decided to go all the way up to Ouzel Lake! Tip #4: Go all the way up to the lake! On the way up, we over heard someone saying the lake was worth the hike, and it really was! This was without a doubt my favorite part of the hike!
The hike up to the lake was way more difficult (or tiring) than the hike to the falls. There are some steep portions that I thought were never going to end! But after about two miles, you’ll run into this cute little stream that leads into the lake! Once you start following this stream you’ll come through some trees and come to this:
It is so gorgeous! And the air was so cool and crisp and it just felt so perfect! I fell in love with it instantly!
I’m so glad we went the full 5.4 miles to the lake! This was definitely one of my favorite hikes for the lake alone. And we found you can camp up at the lake which would make for an awesome overnight backpacking trip! You can also fish in the lake!
If you decide to do this hike, do be aware of wildlife! The ranger did warn us that there were a lot of bears in RMNP and we also saw a moose! One hiker told us the moose was actually hanging out on the trail before we got there.
All together, we hike 11 miles and it was all worth it! Even though my knees hurt and I have a huge blister on my foot, I would do it again in a heartbeat!!