We decided to take a slow day and kicked it off with an eBike ride around the Glacier Basin Campground and over to the Park & Ride lot across Bear Lake Road from us. The Jetson Haze bikes performed well and, unlike in Texas, there were hills that the Haze’s throttle was made for. The Park & Ride lot wasn’t packed yet, so we decided to take the bus up to Bear Lake and hike the Nymph Lake / Dream Lake / Emerald Lake trail.
We had already experienced hiking on hard-packed snow/ice, using our spikes and trekking poles, during the hike from Bear Lake to our campsite, on Day 3. I was taken aback by the number of people hiking on this surface in sneakers or sandals. Yes. Sandals. People were slipping and falling on the ice, but seemed determined to hike the trails.
The entire hike is 3.6 miles (round trip) with an altitude gain of 605 feet from the trailhead. The trail is also around 10,000 feet above sea level. The great thing about this hike is that you walk by 4 lakes, if you count your starting point being at Bear Lake. Once underway, the first lake you pass is Nymph Lake.
Nymph is the smallest of the lakes in surface area and has a triangular shape. Being the lowest in altitude, it had a pretty large percentage of its surface thawed. As you can see in the photo, there was plenty of frozen, slushy snow at the southern tip of the lake.
If you could stand the cold water temperature, there’s definitely a way to get in the water and swim. (more on that, later…)
Just past this point on the hike, the snow began covering the trail completely.
Just before you reach Dream lake, you come upon the stream leaving it. There are logs forming a makeshift dam.
The lake is deceivingly long. The view of the far end is obscured by a large rock outcropping on the right shore.
The last lake of the trio is my favorite, Emerald lake. I’ve seen it, in the summer and from the opposite end and it’s as green as the emerald in “Romancing the Stone.” At the eastern end of the lake, there are large stones where hikers sit and take in the dramatic scenery. There are fallen trees, whose bark has been worn smooth by generations of hikers sitting on them. We usually have lunch while sitting there. The view to the west includes the well-known profile of Hallet Peak and the pinnacles, but not the peak, of Flattop Mountain. Between the two mountains are the Tyndall Glacier, but you can’t see it from Emerald Lake.
Oh. About swimming at Nymph Lake… As we neared the southern corner of the lake, a completely naked woman rose out of the water and walked to where her clothes were located and got dressed. Just another day at RMNP!
