TL;DR
Distance: 14 miles
Type: Straight Through
Time: 2.4 Hours
Difficulty: Easy
Rating: 5 stars
After getting back from Sedona I was already itching to get back on the trail. I started looking up some easy trails to try out and I found one called Switzerland Trail in Boulder Colorado. That was pretty close to where I live so I decided to get the kids and head up there. To get there we had to go up Boulder canyon. My kids had never been to Boulder Falls so we stopped for a short hike up to see the view. The waterfall was very nice that day and the sounds and views were amazing. We stayed for a bit then headed off to Nederland Colorado to find highway 72 up to Switzerland Trail.
I have to say, Switzerland Trail is not marked well at all off of highway 72 also known as peak to peak highway. Once we got to the trail it was a really nice dirt road through a dense forest only a car width wide. There were a lot of little spots to pull off if you need to let someone by although we didn’t see anyone this far down. Most of the land around the this side of the trail was private property and there were signs everywhere to not pull into their driveways or so camp. Must have been having problems with people thinking it was open to camping.
Once we drove for a while the path started to widen a little bit and the road started to get more rocky and bumpy. It was nothing the 4Runner couldn’t handle and the view was nice, Mostly just heading through some trees and gradually heading up the mountain. After some nice driving with some nice trail driving through some thick forest we came up to a nice view and decided to stop and have some lunch. This was our view.
After lunch we headed back out and were met with a bunch of nice turns and deep ruts that made it fun to drive over. We then were driving up the trail hugging the mountain and has some awesome views and had to stop and get some more pictures.
It is hard to write bout this trail because it changes so much during the whole trip. That is what makes this trail so fun. There are many different type of terrains to drive over but nothing over easy. Mostly some large ruts that might give some people issues but you could drive slow and be fine making it over them. The next part of the trail was just amazing. So many views and things to see. Truly amazing.
There were so many sections where it would get super narrow and then wide again and then back to narrow through trees or on a edge of a cliff. It was truly amazing. There seamed to be a decent amount of spots to pull off if someone was coming the other way. I did run into someone in a Kia Sportage heading down and he let me go by since he was next to a pull off. That is the only person in a automobile we driving. Although we did see a Subaru Outback parked along the side of the road at a trail head. At the top of the mountain there is a spot with some picnic tables and what looks like a fire place. When you get close to the middle of the trail there is a spot where you drive right through some houses and there are a few choices for roads to take. Not many signs around with the names of the roads. Luckily I had a GPS trail map to see where I needed to go.
This was a awesome trail that I actually plan on taking again real soon. Here are the rest of the photos I took that day.
Be First to Comment