Hike Of The Week: Science Behind Your Watershed & River Restoration

Living in a high desert climate, as all of Colorado falls into, water is the life blood of our communities. The snow that falls in our mountains each winter irrigates farms hundreds of miles downstream and fuels communities along the entire length of Colorado River. Closer to home, the headwater streams which drain the pristine mountain lakes we love to hike too and swell each spring with runoff from that winter’s powder days also support the complex ecosystems around us. Here in the Vail area, healthy watersheds are key to our economy, recreation, and wilderness! What’s even more unique about where we live, is that we can hike out our back door and see where our water comes from. Living so close to so much wilderness, we have the luxury of clean water--however even that we can’t take for granted, and Gore Creek and the Eagle River are both great warning stories, and success stories of watershed stewardship.

This coming Friday August 14th, Walking Mountains Science Center is partnering with the Eagle River Watershed Council for our second ‘Science Behind on the Trail’ Hike. For August’s iteration of this monthly hiking program we are exploring everything water! Join us for an easy hike along the Gore Creek Trail in the Eagle’s Nest Wilderness (right in East Vail) to learn about what makes a healthy watershed and how our mountain streams tie together the entire mountain ecosystem! Following this short 2-3 mile hike, we will visit a nearby river restoration site in East Vail to see what type of work is being done here in our valley to protect our water for us, and our neighbors downstream!

The program is free to attend, and $10 if you would like van transportation to the trailhead. For more information and to register visit www.walkingmountains.org/hike and scroll to the ‘Science Behind on the Trail’ Series program page. If you have any questions reach out to hike@walkingmountains.org.

Join us for another hike!

We also have a number of other weekly hiking programs. Our free community hiking series include the Science Behind hikes, our ‘Backyard Backcountry’ series of half day hikes, and our Citizen Science & Stewardship Series. Additionally our hiking club tackles challenging full day hikes twice a week on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and you can join for the day for $80, or join the Club and hike all summer and fall for $500.

Here’s where we’re hiking this next week!

Thursday 8/13: Mt. of the Holy Cross Full Day Hike

Friday 8/14: Science Behind Your Watershed & River Restoration at Gore Creek

Monday 8/17: Backyard Backcountry Half Day Hike: Alpine Wildflowers @ Shrine Ridge

Tuesday 8/18: Fancy & Mulhall Lakes Full Day Hike