Trail Ridge Road

Rocky Mountain National Park’s Trail Ridge Road is one of my favorite places on the planet, and a place I try to revisit regularly. Trail Ridge Road is the highest continuously paved road in the United States, reaching an elevation of 12,183 feet() above sea level. 11 miles of the road are above treeline (11,500ft) providing sweeping views of the Rocky Mountains and the chance for everyone to experience a little bit of tundra life.

The Prime Lens Challenge

Since it’s a place I get to visit often, I like to use my time at Rocky Mountain National Park to experiment and improve my skills as a photographer. Since it’s not a once-in-a-lifetime trip for me, I can try new things and not worry about getting a bad result. I can always go back, which is not true for many other places on the planet.

So for this trip up Trail Ridge Road I decided to take on one of my favorite photography exercises: the Prime lens challenge. Instead of relying on a zoom lens to frame my shots, I used only 2 lenses, my beloved 100mm 2.8 Macro and the 24mm 3.5 TS-E. These are fixed focal length lenses – there is no zoom. If you want to change what’s in the frame you have to move your feet. The 24mm 3.5 TS-E is also a tilt-shift lens, which lets you do many wonderful things, including focus and blur parts of the photo in interesting ways. So you’ll see a lot of tilt-shift photos in this set too.

The End of the Season on Trail Ridge Road

I had been up in the park last week to catch the fall colors, and was excited when the weather was still good for making it up Trail Ridge road this weekend. Trail Ridge Road usually closes for the season in mid-October, and when we arrived the signs at the park entrance said that Trail Ridge Road was closed temporarily. We made it as far as Rainbow Curve, only to find the road closed there, so we hiked up to see the bristlecone pines just in time to see a park ranger driving down the road. He told us that it would be reopening momentarily, so we got to make it to the top after all.

After Rainbow Curve the road quickly jumps over treeline. The trees at the edge of treeline are incredible, windblown and subject to brutally low temperatures in any season, but especially Winter. It was also a windy day, so windy that it was difficult to stand up at times, but the reward for that was stunning lenticular clouds in every direction.

Forest Canyon Overlook

The Forest Canyon Overlook is above treeline on Trail Ridge Road and offers spectacular views of the forested valleys below, as well as one of the gems of Rocky Mountain National Park: the majestic Longs Peak.

Notes for visitors to Trail Ridge Road

If you haven’t spent much time at altitude, you may be surprised by how much colder and windier it is above treeline than even in Estes Park. It can feel like a different season entirely from Denver. So you don’t want to wear shorts, and you do want to bring a warm coat and gloves, ideally wind-resistant. You may also experience altitude sickness, especially if you’re coming to Colorado from sea level. You won’t want to attempt Trail Ridge Road on your first day in Colorado. Give yourself a day or two to acclimatize, and be sure to drink lots of water and know the symptoms of altitude sickness.

Want to explore more of Colorado? Check out the Colorado Travel Gallery.

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