GC7K1KY Before the Switchbacks
Type: Traditional | Size: Regular | Difficulty: | Terrain:
By: Path Pacer @ | Hide Date: 03/03/2018 | Status: Available
Country: United States | State: Colorado
Coordinates: N40° 27.019 W105° 26.830 | Last updated: 08/30/2019 | Fav points: 0
                       

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The road over the saddle with the switchbacks wasn't the first from Glen Haven to Estes Park. The original track started behind the old firehouse (destroyed in the 2013 flood) next to the Inn and slanted up the ridge towards the H-G Ranch. It was rough, rocky, and very steep. You can just make out the old roadbed from the cache site. Speaking of which, watch out for some old barbed wire fencing and rehide it well; quite a few people use this old track as a shortcut down, which is why there's a path along it.

In the early 1900s, someone constructed a "corduroy road" straight down into Devil's Gulch. This was made of logs placed crossways. In wet weather, the logs rolled in their mud packing and their surface became treacherous, making it too slippery for horses pulling a load.

The switchbacks were built in 1910 when George Dennis was appointed County Roadman, and paved in the 1960s.

You can hike from Estes Park along the old road to Piper Meadows, but you have to park at the intersection of Devil's Gulch and Dry Gulch Roads, then walk along the gravel road to the H-G trailhead, or get someone to drop you off.

This picture from 1915 shows where the road angled off up the hill. The Inn will be built just to the right of the intersection. You can still see this part of the old road if you look at the slope behind the Inn.

This cache is part of a geotrail of historical caches in the Glen Haven area. Retrieve the code from all 14 caches plus the found date of the virtual and receive a commemorative geocoin. The cache list can be found here: Historic Glen Haven GeoTrail. And remember not to be a cache pirate! If you take something, leave something at least as good for the next cacher.

Additional Waypoints

P07K1KY - Parking
N 40° 27.120 W 105° 27.025

04/15/2019 By WE_hikers
Cache in good shape. Took nothing, left nothing

10/21/2018 By jmuser
Superb fall day for hiking, caching, biking, etc. Out with the Mrs to get a little hiking in. Grabbed this one on the way to Knapps Knob. Neat to see the old road bed still there. Lots of history. Makes you wonder how they did it back then without paved roads or the internet! Thanks for a neat one! TNLN_SL. :-)

07/26/2018 By Libertarian Lad
Last find today on my cross-Crosier hike, descending into Glen Haven. I found it quickly, but realized it was the old trail. I think I have been on it before. Not sure. Thanks again for placing these and the history. You make Glen Haven an even more interesting place!

06/28/2018 By mesa finds
we are so excited about the new caches and the GeoTrail on our favorite mountain, great project for the summer!! Thank you PathPacer :)

06/23/2018 By COpackrat
I hadn't been on Crosier in ages, since I did many of Tahosa's caches up here, so this was a nice opportunity to return to these trails. Thanks for putting these caches out and giving me a better understanding of the local history

05/29/2018 By Denali41
Since my early days of geocaching Crosier Mountain and its surroundings, including the Glen Haven, the Miller Fork, and Dunraven areas, have held special allure for me. The caches by Tahosa and Sons on Crosier and Round Mountains initially captivated my attention, eventually resulting in my development of the Celtic Cross Tribute cache on Crosier. And of course Crosier is so large that the complex contains four distinct ranked peaks, augmented by the adjacent Triangle Mountain, all of which I had hiked up. My attraction to the area had also been nicely enhanced by Path Pacer’s earlier cache placements in the area, and I eagerly sought out each after the publications of her caches. So when this GeoTrail series was created I became excited! I had previously found six of the 14 caches on the geotrail and enjoyed reading the cache descriptions for the more recently published eight, including this one. Cumulatively a great synopsis of the history of the area, indeed.

Well, most of the new caches were published while the Big Thompson Canyon Highway was closed for renovation. To reach Glen Haven from Wellington using the detour through Lyons takes an extra 1 ½ hours round trip. So I decided to wait on getting after the eight remaining caches until the highway reopened. It did, but I was in Cincinnati at the Giga Geowoodstock Event when that happened. Today was the first chance I had to make the drive up the improved Big T highway and on to Glen Haven; I was accompanied by my puppies Orizaba and Chimborazo. We had a fun time chasing down seven of the eight new caches, and thinking about the historical themes associated with each. I had expected to also get up Triangle Mountain for the final cache of the geotrail, but the weather was not looking promising; that final adventure is reserved for a future date.

Thanks for this cache and thanks for this entire geotrail series, Path Pacer! I'm pleased to record the {FTF} on this nice cache!

From this cache and on up to the top of Knapps Knob are many snarls of old, rusted barbed wire. This would be a fine area for a future CITO event, with the objective focused on coiling up all the wire that is lying or still stretched out here and there in this area.

03/08/2018 By BlueRajah
Published