AURORA — She was eight months pregnant when she was forced to leave her Denver homeless shelter. It was November.

Ivanni Herrera took her 4-year-old son Dylan by the hand and led him into the chilly night, dragging a suitcase containing donated clothes and blankets she’d taken from the Microtel Inn & Suites. It was one of 10 hotels where Denver has housed more than 30,000 migrants, many of them Venezuelan, over the last two years.

First they walked to Walmart. There, with money she and her husband had collected from begging on the street, they bought a tent.

They waited until dark to construct their new home. They chose a grassy median along a busy thoroughfare in Aurora, the next town over, a suburb known for its immigrant population.

“We wanted to go somewhere where there were people,” Herrera, 28, said in Spanish. “It feels safer.”

That night, temperatures dipped to 32 degrees. And as she wrapped her body around her son’s to keep him warm enough that he could sleep, Ivanni Herrera cried.

Seeking better lives, finding something else

Over the past two years, a record number of families from Venezuela have come to the United States seeking a better life for themselves and their children. Instead, they’ve found themselves in communities roiling with conflict about how much to help the newcomers — or whether to help at all.

Unable to legally work without filing expensive and complicated paperwork, some are homeless and gambling on the kindness of strangers to survive. Some have found themselves sleeping on the streets — even those who are pregnant.

Like many in her generation, regardless of nationality, Herrera found inspiration for her life’s ambitions on social media. Back in Ecuador, where she had fled years earlier to escape the economic collapse in her native Venezuela, Herrera and her husband were emboldened by images of families like theirs hiking across the infamous Darién Gap from Colombia into Panama. If all those people could do it, they thought, so can we.

They didn’t know many people who had moved to the United States, but pictures and videos of Venezuelans on Facebook and TikTok showed young, smiling families in nice clothes standing in front of new cars boasting of beautiful new lives. U.S. Border Patrol reports show Herrera and the people who inspired her were part of an unprecedented mass migration of Venezuelans to America. Some 320,000 Venezuelans have tried to cross the southern border since October 2022 — more than in the previous nine years combined.

Just weeks after arriving in Denver, Herrera began to wonder if the success she had seen was real. She and her friends had developed another theory: The hype around the U.S. was part of some red de engaño, or network of deception.

After several days of camping on the street and relieving herself outside, Herrera began to itch uncontrollably with an infection. She worried: Would it imperil her baby?

She was seeing doctors and social workers at a Denver hospital where she planned to give birth because they served everyone, even those without insurance. They were alarmed their pregnant patient was now sleeping outside in the cold.

Days after she was forced to leave the Microtel, Denver paused its policy and allowed homeless immigrants to stay in its shelters through the winter. Denver officials say they visited encampments to urge homeless migrants to come back inside. But they didn’t venture outside the city limits to Aurora.

As Colorado’s third-largest city, Aurora, on Denver’s eastern edge, is a place where officials have turned down requests to help migrants. In February, the Aurora City Council passed a resolution telling other cities and nonprofits not to bring migrants into the community because it “does not currently have the financial capacity to fund new services related to this crisis.” Yet still they come, because of its lower cost of living and Spanish-speaking community.

In fact, former President Donald Trump last week called attention to the city, suggesting a Venezuelan gang had taken over an apartment complex. Authorities say that hasn’t happened.

The doctors treated Herrera’s yeast infection and urged her to sleep at the hospital. It wouldn’t cost anything, they assured her, just as her birth would be covered by emergency Medicaid, a program that extends the health care benefits for poor American families to unauthorized immigrants for labor and delivery.

Herrera refused.

“How,” she asked, “could I sleep in a warm place when my son is cold on the street?”

Another family, cast out into the night

It was March when David Jaimez, his pregnant wife and their two daughters were evicted from their Aurora apartment. Desperate for help, they dragged their possessions into Thursday evening Bible study at Jesus on Colfax, a church and food pantry inside an old motel. Its namesake and location, Colfax Avenue, has long been a destination for the drug-addicted, homeless veterans and new immigrants.

When the Jaimez family arrived, the prayers paused. The manager addressed the family in elementary Spanish, supplementing with Google Translate on her phone.

After arriving from Venezuela in August and staying in a Denver-sponsored hotel room, they’d moved into an apartment in Aurora. Housing is cheaper in that eastern suburb, but they never found enough work to pay their rent. “I owe $8,000,” Jaimez said, his eyes wide. “Supposedly there’s work here. I don’t believe it.”

Jaimez and his wife are eligible to apply for asylum or for “ Temporary Protected Status ” and, with that, work permits. But doing so would require an attorney or advisor, months of waiting and $500 in fees each.

At the prayer group, Jaimez’s daughters drank sodas and ate tangerines from one participant, a middle-aged woman and Aurora native. She stroked the ponytail of the family’s 8-year-old daughter as the young girl smiled.

When the leader couldn’t find anywhere for the family to stay, they headed out into the evening, pushing their year-old daughter in her stroller and lugging a suitcase behind them. After they left, the middle-aged woman leaned forward in her folding chair and said: “It’s kind of crazy that our city lets them in but does not help our veterans.” Nearby, a man nodded in agreement.

That night, Jaimez and his family found an encampment for migrants run by a Denver nonprofit called All Souls and moved into tent number 28. Volunteers and staff brought in water, meals and other resources. Weeks later, the family was on the move again: Camping without a permit is illegal in Denver, and the city closed down the encampment. All Souls re-established it in six different locations but closed it permanently in May.

At its peak, nearly 100 people were living in the encampment. About half had been evicted from apartments hastily arranged before their shelter time expired, said founder Candice Marley. Twenty-two residents were children and five women were pregnant, including Jaimez’s wife. Marley is trying to get a permit for another encampment, but the permit would only allow people over 18.

“Even though there are lots of kids living on the street, they don’t want them all together in a camp,” Marley said. “That’s not a good public image for them.”

A city’s efforts, not enough

Denver officials say they won’t tolerate children sleeping on the street. “Did you really walk from Venezuela to be homeless in the U.S.? I don’t think so,” said Jon Ewing, spokesman for Denver’s health and human services department. “We can do better than that.”

Still, Denver struggled to keep up with the rush of migrants, many arriving on buses chartered by Texas to draw attention to the impact of immigration. All told, Denver officials say they have helped some 42,700 migrants since last year, either by giving them shelter or a bus fare to another city.

Initially, the city offered migrants with families six weeks in a hotel. But in May, on pace to spend $180 million this year helping newcomers, the city scaled back its offer to future migrants while deepening its investment in people already getting help.

Denver paid for longer shelter stays for 800 migrants already in hotels and offered them English classes and help applying for asylum and work permits. But any migrants arriving since May have received only three days in a hotel. After that, some have found transportation to other cities, scrounged for a place to sleep or wandered into nearby towns like Aurora.

Today, fewer migrants are coming to the Denver area, but Marley still receives dozens of outreaches per week from social service agencies looking to help homeless migrants. “It’s so frustrating that we can’t help them,” she said. “That leaves families camping on their own, unsupported, living in their cars. Kids can’t get into school. There’s no stability.”

After the encampment closed, Jaimez and his family moved into a hotel. He paid by holding a cardboard sign at an intersection and begging for money. Their daughter only attended school for one month last year, since they never felt confident that they were settled anywhere more than a few weeks. The family recently moved to a farm outside of the Denver area, where they’ve been told they can live in exchange for working.

On the front lines of begging

When Herrera started feeling labor pains in early December, she was sitting on the grass, resting after a long day asking strangers for money. She waited until she couldn’t bear the pain anymore and could feel the baby getting close. She called an ambulance.

The paramedics didn’t speak Spanish but called an interpreter. They told Herrera they had to take her to the closest hospital, instead of the one in Denver, since her contractions were so close together.

Her son was born healthy at 7 pounds, 8 ounces. She brought him to the tent the next day. A few days later the whole family, including the baby, had contracted chicken pox. “The baby was in a bad state,” said Emily Rodriguez, a close friend living with her family in a tent next to Herrera’s.

Herrera took him to the hospital, then returned to the tent before being offered a way out. An Aurora woman originally from Mexico invited the family to live with her — at first, for free. After a couple weeks, the family moved to a small room in the garage for $800 a month.

To earn rent and pay expenses, Herrera and Rodriguez have cleaned homes, painted houses and shoveled snow while their children waited in a car by themselves. Finding regular work and actually getting paid for it has been difficult. While their husbands can get semi-regular work in construction, the women’s most consistent income comes from something else: standing outside with their children and begging.

Herrera and her husband recently became eligible to apply for work permits and legal residency for Venezuelans who arrived in the United States last year. But it will cost $800 each for a lawyer to file the paperwork, along with hundreds of dollars in government fees. They don’t have the money.

One spring weekday, Herrera and Rodriguez stand by the shopping carts at the entrance to a Mexican grocery store. While their sons crawl along a chain of red shopping carts stacked together and baby Milan sleeps in his stroller, they try to make eye contact with shoppers.

Some ignore them. Others stuff bills in their hands. On a good day, each earns about $50.

It comes easier for Rodriguez, who’s naturally boisterous. “One day a man came up and gave me this iPhone. It’s new,” she says, waving the device in the air.

“Check out this body,” she says as she spins around, laughing and showing off her ample bottom. “I think he likes me.”

Herrera grimaces. She won’t flirt like her friend does. She picks up Milan and notices his diaper is soaked, then returns him to the stroller. She has run out of diapers.

Milan was sick, but Herrera has been afraid to take him to the doctor. Despite what the hospital had said when she was pregnant, she was never signed up for emergency Medicaid. She says she owes $18,000 for the ambulance ride and delivery of her baby. Now, she avoids going to the doctor or taking her children because she’s afraid her large debt will jeopardize her chances of staying in the U.S. “I’m afraid they’re going to deport me,” she says.

But some days, when she’s feeling overwhelmed, she wants to be deported — as long as she can take her children along. Like the day in May when the security guard at the Mexican grocery store chased off the women and told them they couldn’t beg there anymore. “He insulted us and called us awful names,” Rodriguez says.

The two women now hold cardboard signs along a busy street in Denver and then knock on the doors of private homes, never returning to the same address. They type up their request for clothes, food or money on their phones and translate it to English using Google. They hand their phones to whoever answers the door.

The American Dream, still out of reach

In the garage where Herrera and her family live, the walls are lined with stuffed animals people have given her and her son. Baby Milan, on the floor, pushes himself up to look around. Dylan sleeps in bed.

Herrera recently sent $500 to her sister to make the months-long trip from Venezuela to Aurora with Herrera’s 8-year-old daughter. “I’ll have my family back together,” she says. And she believes her sister will be able to watch her kids so Herrera can look for work.

“I don’t feel equipped to handle all of this on my own,” she says.

The problem is, Herrera hasn’t told her family back in Venezuela how she spends her time. “They think I’m fixing up homes and selling chocolate and flowers,” she says. “I’m living a lie.”

When her daughter calls in the middle of the day, she’s sure not to answer and only picks up after 6 p.m. “They think I’m doing so well, they expect me to send money,” she says. And Herrera has complied, sending $100 a week to help her sister pay rent and buy food for her daughter.

Finally, her sister and daughter are waiting across the border in Mexico. When we come to the U.S., her sister asks, could we fly to Denver? The tickets are $600.

She has to come clean. She doesn’t have the money. She lives day to day. The American Dream hasn’t happened for Ivanni Herrera — at least, not yet. Life is far more difficult than she has let on.

She texts back:

No.

___

The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s standards for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

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Roger Hill has fought for more than a decade to reclaim public access to these rivers where ill-informed or intentionally errant landowners have attempted to block access. He calls his act of fishing on stretches where public waterways flow through private property marked with no trespassing signs “civil disobedience.” Just this week, the 83-year-old resolved to continue his fight, and asked others to join the movement.

We echo his call for action but want to be clear that we are not calling for civil disobedience because the law is on Hills’ side.

Law enforcement officers should know that they cannot enforce trespassing laws on public property – in this case, rivers that are floatable even as they pass through private land. Homeowners who call a local sheriff on fishermen and rafters should be met with laughter.

Collectively ignoring these false claims on publicly owned waterways is the only path forward, after years of ignored pleas for change. Lawmakers have refused to address the issue for years and the Colorado Supreme Court has avoided ruling on cases. Every year of inaction by the Capitol and the courts, landowners are emboldened to claim more of our natural resources from the public.

However, that doesn’t mean the “Right to Wade” movement is not without risk.

Smart landowners simply post no-trespassing signs along the water’s edge hoping to discourage people ignorant of the law from using the river along their property. Aggressive landowners have taken to stringing wires across the river with “Keep Out” signs. Crazy landowners might assault people, brandish and even fire weapons, or commit other crimes in an effort to retain their squatter’s claim on a public resource.

Coloradans naturally respect private property rights but we’d remind recreation enthusiasts: to stay on the river, keep noise levels down, and not to litter, clean fish or go to the bathroom on the adjacent banks.

These rivers have not been purchased with the transfer of a land title or even the transfer of water rights. If a landowner holds some right to take some water from the Colorado River, that does not mean they own the entire river while it’s on their property. Common sense tells us this, as does the public trust doctrine.

Water use rights – irrigation, drinking, etc. — are secured by their own laws as spelled out in the Colorado Constitution in Article XVI. Nobody is trying to change those laws or change anyone’s rightful claim to use the water.

As Coloradans begin reclaiming their property, lawmakers can learn a lot by reading the excellent laws in Montana that cement the right to access waterways that flow through private lands. A new Colorado law rumored to be drafted for the 2025 legislative session should include these five key provisions modeled after the law in Montana:

1. Define “navigable” waters broadly to include waters that historically were used for log floating, fur trading, and mining and in the modern day can be used for recreational activities like rafting, kayaking, guided fishing or floating.

2. Landowners do not have to grant any easement for access to the waters, but cannot restrict access to the water from other public or private land.

3. A right to portage around barriers in water in the least intrusive manner possible without damaging property.

4.  A right to use the streambed as defined by the high-water mark of the river.

5. And finally, indemnity for landowners from any claim of harm that may come to people using the river or river bank or injured while accessing private property in an emergency.

Anything less than this would be a disservice to Coloradans.

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Because of their love for the area and their impact on Glacier Basin – to improve the fishing in the area for his guests, Abner dammed the creek to create the lake – the lake now bears their surname. And because of the busy Sprague Lake Lodge they operated from 1910 to 1940, there are many trails to explore in the vicinity, which became Rocky Mountain National Park in 1915.

One of those trails is the Glacier Creek Trail.

This trail isn’t so much a single trail but a network of paths through the forests surrounding Sprague Lake. Adventurous hikers may want to take the long way around, starting at Sprague Lake, Glacier Basin Campground (if camping) or the Storm Pass Trailhead.

Shorter hikes can be done as a loop around Sprague Lake, up onto the moraine above the lake and down into the forest, taking the turn off to the right rather than heading to Storm Pass Trailhead.

A really wonderful option for a full-day hike is to start at Sprague Lake, pick up the Glacier Creek Trail at the east end of the lake, follow it east into the forest and then turn right to follow it back west again towards Bear Lake.

The network of trails parallel Bear Lake Corridor, navigating past many meadows in this valley, and up to Bear Lake. At Bear Lake, follow the eastern side of the lake to pick up the Bear Lake – Bierstadt Lake Trail, following it to Bierstadt Lake and then down to the Bierstadt Lake Trailhead. From this point, cross the road to the Storm Pass Trailhead and pick the Glacier Creek Trail back up on the forest and head east to Sprague Lake.

At about 8 miles, this loop provides some astonishing views plus many opportunities to see wildlife, like mule deer, snowshoe hare, elk, pine squirrels, northern flickers, Stellar’s jays, dark-eye juncos and many other species of forest-loving birds.

For a shorter trek, take the two-mile loop that starts at the east end of Sprague Lake. Near the bridge, the trail heads down into the forest, snaking through ponderosa pine and past a lush green meadow.

At about a half mile, the trail reaches a junction, where hikers turn right. Follow this trail as it begins to climb up the moraine. In about 500 feet, the trail reaches the Glacier Creek Trail, which runs northeast and southwest. Turn right at this junction to head towards Boulder Brook and Bear Lake.

Follow the trail, which is now the Glacier Creek Trail, for 1.1 miles as it stays along a level path on the moraine through thick forest and above meadows.

At slightly more than one mile, the trail reaches another junction, connecting with the Storm Pass Trail. Make a right at this junction.

Interestingly, the trail crosses the Alva B. Adams Tunnel at this point. This 13-mile cement-lined tunnel passes underneath Rocky Mountain National Park to deliver water from Lake Granby to East Portal on the west side of Estes Park. There are no markers or indicators of what lies beneath the ground but using the COTrex app will show you the path of the tunnel below the trail.

In 0.3 miles, the trail reaches a four-way junction, with connections to Glacier Creek, Storm Pass, Bear Lake, Bierstadt Lake and Glacier Gorge trails. Take a right and follow the trail through the thinner forest.

At 0.2 miles, the trail reaches the Sprague Lake parking lot on the west end of Sprague Lake.

This section of RMNP requires a timed entry reservation from 5 a.m. to 6 p.m. until October 20. The hiker shuttle bus takes hikers into the Bear Lake Corridor but does not stop at Sprague Lake. A park pass is also required to enter Rocky Mountain National Park.

For more information about timed entry or hiking in RMNP, visit https://www.nps.gov/romo/index.htm.

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But when they woke up, they saw a plume of smoke rising into the sky. Darren Wilson had anticipated something like this, even before their trip began.

“It was in the back of my mind — I hope we don’t hike into somewhere and get trapped by a fire,” recalled Wilson, a Hamilton, Montana, resident.

They were hiking through the Anaconda Pintler Wilderness and knew it was under strict restrictions: No building campfires, no fire allowed anywhere, no exceptions. The summer had been dry and hot, and wildfires had been erupting throughout Montana.

But as the group continued hiking toward Hidden Lake, they realized the trail of smoke ahead might be the early stage of a wildfire.

The hikers weren’t trapped, but 200 yards from Hidden Lake they came upon scorched earth surrounding a tree split down the middle, most likely from a lightning strike. Its bark was blackened and glowing, and beneath the tree the charred ground smoldered. The smoke they’d seen was seeping from beneath hot charcoal and dry wood.

“You could tell the tree torched and burned while it was standing and then cracked and fell on the ground,” said Darren’s wife, Chelsie, an x-ray technologist with previous experience in wildland firefighting.

“I think everyone had different feelings,” she said. “Those who had never seen forest fires before were panicking.”

The group put Chelsie Wilson in charge, and she laid out a two-step process: Some people would run to Hidden Lake to fill every water bottle and hydration pack. Everyone else would use the water to turn the smoldering dirt into mud.

Chelsie Wilson and Brittney Erickson, one of her fellow hikers, poured water on dirt, using the wet earth to put out the fire bit by bit. Chelsie kicked a burning stump into the ground. The team smothered it. She instructed and delegated jobs, describing the team as willing, communicative and diligent.

“It was really scary at first,” Chelsie said, “and then it became fun.” After two hours, she gave her team the all-clear. They had transformed the patch of smoldering char into a wet pile of dirt and debris.

On a hike later the same day, the group climbed West Pintler Peak only to spot another fire, this one on the horizon some 10 miles away. They called in the sighting from a ridge with cell service and heard a plane fly low overhead the next day. Weeks later, they said they think that was the first alert to the Johnson Fire, a 270-acre blaze southwest of West Pintler Peak.

If there was a theme to the hikers’ trip it was definitely fire, because while camping near the bank of Oreamnos Lake, they spotted wispy smoke billowing from the opposite shoreline.

“We start yelling across the lake, top of our lungs,” Darren Wilson said. “‘Is there anybody there? Do you have a fire?’” Hearing no response, they initiated a then-familiar course of action. Gathering every container of water they possessed, the group rushed toward the smoke’s source.

“Like children of the corn, we come out of the trees,” Wilson said, only to find three men huddled around a prohibited campfire. The hikers explained that they’d put out a smoldering wildfire, spotted another and were worried about a third — the campfire they were now looking at.

“The guys were not very impressed with us, though,” Chelsie Wilson said, as the men reluctantly extinguished their fire. “They didn’t like our story at all.” Still, they’d agreed to douse the fire and the hikers withdrew, hoping this was the end of fires popping up on their trekhike.

“It’s a real possibility,” Darren Wilson said. “You could be caught behind the wrong side of a fire.”

Zeke Lloyd is a contributor to Writers on the Range, writersontherange.org, an independent nonprofit dedicated to spurring lively conversation about the West. He lives in Helena, Montana and writes for the Montana Free Press.

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Around 11:30 a.m. Monday, Boulder County sheriff’s officials received a call about a man who had failed to return from his camping trip in Indian Peaks Wilderness, according to a Wednesday news release from the sheriff’s office.

Sheriff’s officials said the camper — an unidentified 36-year-old man — was supposed to return from his camping trip on Monday. When he didn’t check in or show up, family members reported him missing.

The missing man’s car was found in the parking lot of Brainard Lake, prompting Boulder County Sheriff’s Office Emergency Services to initiate a search, sheriff’s officials said Wednesday.

Based on reports from the family about the hiker’s plans and using information from the man’s Garmin GPS device, search and rescue crews — including ground searchers, dog teams and a helicopter — combed the surrounding area.

Around 5:30 p.m. Monday, search teams found a dead body near Lake Isabelle — at the base of Shoshoni Peak — who is believed to be the missing camper, sheriff’s officials said.

“Due to the remote location and technical terrain, it was unsafe to conduct the recovery operation that night,” sheriff’s officials stated Thursday.

Rescuers from the Rocky Mountain Rescue Group and a helicopter from the Colorado Department of Fire Prevention and Control returned Tuesday to recover the man’s body and took him to the Boulder County Coroner’s Office, according to sheriff’s officials.

The coroner’s office will identify the man and release the cause and manner of death at a later date. Sheriff’s officials said they don’t currently believe his death was suspicious.

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The first step in the transformation process comes Labor Day weekend with a “renovation sale” intended to liquidate inventory and make space for Black Diamond to move in. The store will be closed in November and December for renovation, with the goal of reopening the first week of January. It will be Black Diamond’s first “partner-run” mountain gear shop in North America.

When the renovation is completed, Black Diamond will occupy the main floor. The store’s traditional sales of used gear, factory closeouts, brand discounts and consignment sales will be housed on the lower floor with expanded inventory. Wilderness Exchange will manage and staff the Black Diamond operation.

“We’re going to be a store within a store,” said Don Bushey, who founded Wilderness Exchange in 2000. “They (Black Diamond) are trying to tap into our expertise at running a local mountain gear shop in Denver because we’ve been doing it for so long, but they also want to make themselves more relevant to the Rockies, the Colorado customer. We’re transforming the climbing/backcountry ski shop into an extension of the Black Diamond brand. We’re building it out like a branded mountain gear shop.”

Bushey noted that many brand shops sell branded gear focused on apparel, but they aren’t full-service mountain gear shops. Black Diamond and Bushey want the new venture at Wilderness Exchange to be that sort of shop, carrying skis, climbing gear and other equipment necessary for backcountry adventure.

“When you think about a brand store on Pearl Street in Boulder, there’s Patagonia, Arc’teryx, prAna, La Sportiva, Black Diamond, and they’re all using their brand store to tell that brand’s story,” Bushey said in an interview. “None of these are what I think of as a mountain shop. They attract brand super fans. They shop there, but if you were going to do an overnight trip and climb a peak, you’re not going to be able to complete your kit. That’s why you go to mountain shops, where a climber or skier can get outfitted.”

The Black Diamond store at Wilderness Exchange will sell ski mountaineering gear, trekking poles, climbing gear and other mountaineering equipment.

“We are thrilled to be partnering with Don Bushey to bring together the best of Wilderness Exchange and Black Diamond in a modern format that is true to the rich heritage of both brands,” said Neil Fiske, brand president for Black Diamond Equipment, in a news release. “Don has long been a pioneer in the industry, and we believe this next evolution of retail will prove as innovative and groundbreaking as his original concept.”

Bushey said the vision is to make the Black Diamond space into a complete, full-service mountain shop.

“There will be a Black Diamond climbing shoe next to a La Sportiva climbing shoe,” Bushey said. “There will be some complementary brands, sleeping bags for instance. Black Diamond doesn’t manufacture sleeping bags, but you need a sleeping bag if you’re going into the mountains on a climbing trip.”

During the two-month renovation closure, Wilderness Exchange will remain open for online sales and next-day pickup.

Wilderness Exchange is located half a block from the REI Flagship store in the Platte Street shopping district.

“The more outdoor businesses on Platte Street, the better we all do,” Bushey said. “We’re hoping this ushers in even more brand stores and interest in our street. This has been an outdoor shopping mecca for Denver, and I think this is going to strengthen that for everybody.”

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Planners at the Arapaho and Roosevelt National Forests are studying ways to add campsites. They’re also considering ways to make selecting and reserving them a little less onerous.

The Arapaho and Roosevelt forests, which are jointly administered, stretch along the Continental Divide from just south of Interstate 70 to the Wyoming border. They include Clear Creek, Gilpin, Grand, Boulder and Larimer counties. They have 59 total campgrounds with 1,400 campsites.

“I don’t think we’re ever going to meet all the demand for people who want to camp on the Front Range,” conceded forest spokesman Reid Armstrong. “We have a limited amount of land, and we want to protect it. We want to preserve it for future generations.”

Still, public officials feel your pain, and some are exploring creative solutions.

“We have more than five million people along the Front Range, many of whom live in Colorado because they love the outdoors and the access to camping opportunities,” Armstrong said. “In addition, this is a destination for a lot of people. A lot of our camping opportunities are serving people who come from across the country, and even internationally, to visit Rocky Mountain National Park and other well-known sites in Colorado.”

Addressing the supply side of the problem can be difficult because of budgetary and environmental constraints. There are no plans to build new campgrounds in Rocky Mountain National Park, for instance, which attracts more than four million visitors annually, in part because it has a deferred maintenance backlog in excess of $200 million, said park spokeswoman Kyle Patterson.

Nor are there plans to add campgrounds in the White River National Forest, which stretches across the central Colorado high country from Summit County to Glenwood Springs and beyond. White River is the busiest national forest in the nation.

But over the past three years, Colorado Parks and Wildlife has added 181 campsites statewide, bringing its inventory to 4,403. This year, about 40 new sites will open soon at Boyd Lake State Park near Loveland. CPW spokeswoman Bridget O’Rourke said revenue from Keep Colorado Wild passes, which are sold through motor vehicle registration renewals, will help cover the cost.

Arapaho and Roosevelt officials also are thinking about more equitable ways to roll out reservations. Under the current system, campground reservations become available six months in advance, meaning people begin grabbing them for the summer in January and February. But many people don’t get vacation approval from their employers that early in the year, and by the time they’re ready to book reservations, popular campgrounds are fully booked.

“We recognize that many people are booking up all the campgrounds in January, and they don’t necessarily know when they’re going to go, so maybe they’re canceling at the last minute — or they’re eating the (no-show) cost,” Armstrong said. “We want to make the opportunities more equitable for people who work in careers where they don’t necessarily know they’re going to have that particular week off until they get closer to it, and they want to be able to make reservations more last-minute. We’re looking at how we can design more of a rolling reservation system that maybe issues some opportunities in January, and then more as we get closer to the actual date.”

Forest officials are also brainstorming with other public land agencies in the Front Range including Rocky Mountain National Park, CPW and county land managers, through their partnership in a coalition called NoCo Places, to find ways of making the process less confusing. NoCo Places was created specifically to address the impact of Front Range population growth on public lands and the visitor experience.

Under the current system, camping reservations for Rocky Mountain National Park and national forests are made through recreation.gov. Colorado Parks and Wildlife has its own site for camping reservations. Each agency has web pages and maps for locating their offerings with thumbnail descriptions.

“When people look for campgrounds, they know they want to go camping along the Front Range but they don’t necessarily understand all the different agencies and the different camping opportunities,” Armstrong said. “Right now they have to search up camping on state lands on one site and reservations for the forest service on another site. Counties may have opportunities on a different site entirely. So, something we’re talking about is, is there a way for us to create one portal across all public lands where people can find camping opportunities in the northern Front Range of Colorado?”

NoCo Places already has an interactive map that highlights selected public lands attractions in northern Colorado with information about those areas and links to the official information pages of the agencies that manage them.

Arapaho and Roosevelt will add a handful of sites to its camping options in the next two years or so. The Jack’s Gulch campground in the high country west of Fort Collins was heavily damaged in the Cameron Peak of 2020. It is being redesigned for a rebuild, and forest officials are hopeful they can reopen it in 2026. It would have 90 campsites.

West of Empire near Berthoud Falls, the small Mizpah Campground has been closed for more than a decade because of damage to an access road. Forest officials are hopeful Mizpah can reopen in 2026, but it would only add 10 sites.

One creative solution forest officials are considering is converting “under-utilized” picnic areas into campgrounds.

“They already have a lot of the stuff we need,” Armstrong said. “They have the picnic (table), they have the grill. What would it take to convert these places to new campsites? In some cases that might require a little bit of environmental assessment. I don’t have numbers for how many that will add, but there are some great opportunities across the forests to convert some of those sites.”

Armstrong said none of the solutions under consideration are likely to be implemented next summer. They could take from two to five years.

“We do want to create that diverse opportunity and try to have the most balanced approach we can to help people book reservations and get access to these places,” Armstrong said. “We also hope people will look elsewhere to discover camping in other parts of the state that maybe aren’t as well known.”

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But don’t be fooled — this area is as full of outdoor recreation opportunities as anywhere else in Colorado. Plus, it’s within an easy drive of the Front Range. Other highlights:

• A battle occurred here in 1779 that sealed the fate of a great Comanche chief.
• Home of America’s first national forest campground, it’s where America fell in love with camping.
• Few people outside of Pueblo know about this mountain range, so opportunities for solitude abound.

Use this guide to explore the Wet Mountains this summer.

Take a hike

“Smaller in stature than their sister mountain range, the [Sangre de Cristos], the ‘Wets,’ in local shorthand, aren’t short on wonderful hiking and outdoor adventures, plus many treks provide amazing 360-degree views,” wrote Herb Kober, author of the Hiking Guide for the Sangre de Cristo and Wet Mountains.

There isn’t even a National Geographic Trails Illustrated — the gold standard of hiking maps — for the range. So, the nonprofit Trails for All published that book a few years ago.

“The Wet Mountains are thought to be named for the amount of moisture and heavy snow that happens in winter compared to the arid plains to the east. At about 12 miles across from east to west, the Wets basically run north to south an estimated 40 miles from U.S. 50 to Walsenburg, topping out at 12,346 feet.”

That high point is Greenhorn Mountain, named for the Comanche chief Cuerno Verde, who wore a green horn on his head and dared to defy the Spanish in the 1770s, raiding settlements and stealing horses. They caught up with him somewhere in the vicinity and killed the chief.

That peak offers the most scenic hiking in the region.

“You can walk around Greenhorn, with the most spectacular views of the Wet Mountain Valley on one side, and you go around to the other side, where you have spectacular views of Pueblo and Pikes Peak,” said Deb Adams, chairwoman of the Custer County Tourism Board.

The easy way to hike it is from the end of Forest Service Road 396, a 5.5-mile round-trip stroll through the tundra.

The hard way is the Bartlett Trail, which starts in the town of Rye and climbs a lung-busting 3,880 feet to the summit through all of the high country’s ecosystems.

“That’s the beauty of the Wet Mountains, that there are easy to moderate hikes and also more challenging hikes, whatever a person is looking for,” Adams said.

The area around the peak is the only designated wilderness, so you’ll likely share the trail with motorized vehicles elsewhere.

Camping

It’s hard to believe now, but there was a time when people never spent the night in the woods.

In 1919, the U.S. Forest Service tried an experiment, building a campground here.

A newly motorized public embraced the idea, and the Squirrel Creek Campground became the prototype for thousands of others.

A flood washed it away in 1947, but you can still experience camping before the age of RVs at the nearby Davenport Campground, a tent-only spot built to resemble the old camping experience.

You can hike a few miles down the creek to the remains of the first campground.

By far, the most popular camping spot is Lake Isabel. The 40-acre lake, built for recreation, lies in a valley ringed by pines and rolling mountains.

It’s a great spot for (non-motorized) boating, fishing, or just getting away from the summer heat of the Front Range.

There are three campgrounds: La Vista, on the lake’s east side; Southside, along a pleasant creek; and St. Charles, a mile from the lake.

You can also book the Lake Isabel Cabin, a historic ranger station, for $75 per night.

Make reservations at www.recreation.gov.

Dispersed camping is abundant in the national forest; just be sure to pick a spot at least 100 feet from water and be prepared to pack out your trash.

Bishop’s Castle

In 1972, Jim Bishop was building a cabin on land he bought in the mountains.

After encasing a cistern in stone, so many people remarked that it looked like a castle that Bishop began adding on. And adding on.

Today, it’s one of Colorado’s most popular, if strange, roadside attractions.

Towering over the pine trees, it is a monument to one man’s ambition to build something lasting. Admission is free to tour the castle, though donations are accepted. You can find more information at www.bishopcastle.org.

Frontier Pathways Scenic Byway

Not everyone wants to enjoy the mountains on a trail or at a campsite.

You also can see it from your car on the Frontier Pathways, a driving loop between Pueblo and Colorado City.

Colorado 96 winds from the prairie uphill to Hardscrabble Pass, a great place to see bighorn sheep.

At McKenzie Junction, turn south on Colorado 165, passing by many of the area’s attractions, including Bishop’s Castle and Lake San Isabel, before leaving the mountains and rejoining Interstate 25 at Colorado City.

If you have extra time, stay on Colorado 96 at McKenzie Junction and drive into the quaint town of Westcliffe for lunch.

The view of the mighty Sangre de Cristo Mountains coming down is one of Colorado’s most stunning roadside views.

“Driving on 96 for the first time, I must have said ‘wow’ at least a dozen times because of the view you get of the Sangre de Cristos,” Adams said.

Find more about the scenic drive at www.frontierpathways.com.

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U.S. District Judge Daniel Domenico issued a preliminary injunction late last week that stops the Douglas County town from using its land use regulations to bar the Rock Church from using an RV and a camping trailer parked behind its main building to provide shelter to those who need it.

“The church stresses that by preventing it from allowing the homeless to live on its property, the town is precluding the church from exercising its religious beliefs regardless of whether it might be possible to provide for the needy in some other way,” Domenico wrote in his 18-page ruling.

The Rock’s lead pastor, Mike Polhemus, did not return requests for comment. Castle Rock town spokeswoman Melissa Hoelting said the town had nothing to say publicly “until we’ve had the opportunity to review the order and discuss options.”

The church sued Castle Rock earlier this year, claiming the town was violating the Religious Land Use and Institutional Persons Act, a 2000 law that protects “individuals, houses of worship, and other religious institutions from discrimination in zoning and landmarking laws,” as described by the U.S. Department of Justice. The town contended that the vehicles being used as temporary shelters in the church’s parking lot violated its zoning regulations.

“A substantial burden on a church’s mission caused by application of a zoning law may violate RLUIPA,” the Rock Church said in its suit.

The most recently available point-in-time survey of homeless individuals in metro Denver found that 72 people were without a home in Douglas County on Jan. 30, 2023. Three of five respondents were experiencing homelessness for the first time, according to the Metro Denver Homeless Initiative.

That compares to the more than 9,000 people the survey found to be without a home throughout the entire seven-county metro area. Safe parking programs, where people who live out of their vehicles can park in church parking lots overnight, have sprouted in Denver and its suburbs in recent years.

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A lot of people seem to have a clearly formed opinion of Donald J. Trump.

A lot of the negative opinions are due to a dislike of his style and personality, not necessarily his results when he was president. But we know how he will govern; he was there for four years.

He, however, is not Hitler and does not deserve to be compared to that nut case. He does not deserve to die for his ideas, many of which I agree with, as do 75 million Americans.

He obviously has put his life on the line when he does not need to. He doesn’t need the status. He doesn’t need the limo; he has that. He doesn’t need a private plane; he has that. He doesn’t need the money.

His accomplishments include low unemployment numbers for all ethnic groups, a great economy, inflation at 1.5% when he left office (not the 9% Biden has mentioned), and the border was close to being closed.

I am not a big fan of some of his personality traits but the hate shown to him has been extreme and has been accumulating over the years. He has been made into such a monster by his opponents, and this type of hate-filled rhetoric has ended with this assassination attempt. I believe it was Divine intervention that saved him from being killed. God did that. Why? In today’s world, we need a strong leader, and he is that. I implore all people to put aside any precooked ideas of Trump and watch his speech Thursday night. If the man says he will do something, he does it. If he wants to pull the country together, he will do it.

I believe the hate for him comes from his not running as a Democrat when he first ran for president and that he cannot be controlled by the Democratic Party.

Steve Gehrke, Aurora

In the United States of America, we settle our differences at the ballot box. Political violence of any kind, including the attempt on former President Donald Trump, is totally unacceptable. Most of us would appreciate both Trump (especially) and President Joe  Biden turning down the temperature on political polarization by minimizing the personal attacks and emphasizing policy differences. This unfortunate election cycle would benefit from that.

John W. Thomas, Fort Collins

Trying to cool off in the high country

The predictions were right, and it was brutal this weekend. With rising temps in the morning, we took off to the mountains to camp. I find it’s usually considerably colder up higher and have often regretted not bringing my jacket, even in the middle of summer when camping. Saturday night, even at 10,000 feet, was still warm enough that I had to sleep outside of my sleeping bag.

With near-record temperatures becoming more regular, we need to ensure that we bring down our carbon emissions, which is why I wanted to let other readers know about the PROVE IT Act that has just been introduced to the House of Representatives. This would enact a border-carbon adjustment so that imported goods would have to incorporate their carbon emissions, so we don’t get continuously undercut by polluters from other countries.

Be sure to call your representative and let them know that you support the PROVE IT Act if you want to make your voice known that you want to help reign in these temperatures.

Bridger Zachary Cummings, Aurora

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