Beaver Meadows - Trail #44
Beginning Elevation: 8780
High Point: 10470
End Elevation: 10470
Difficulty: Moderate
Length, One Way: 3.4 miles
Seasons: Summer through Fall
USGS Quads: Harris Park
Other Maps: Arapaho National Forest, Trails Illustrated #104
Usage Level: Medium
Access: Trail is accessed via the Camp Rock Trailhead. The Beartrack Lakes Trail is found at the east end of the parking lot and the Beaver Meadows Trail at the west. The road in to the trailhead is in the Mount Blue Sky State Wildlife Area and is closed to motor vehicles and all entry except hunting and fishing after Labor Day, then closed to all entry from January 1 through June 14. Beginning July 1, 2020, entry to the State Wildlife Area requires a valid Colorado hunting or fishing license.
Access Trailheads: Camp Rock
Connecting Trails: Beartrack Lakes, Cub Creek, Resthouse
Description
The Beaver Meadows Trail climbs gradually from the Camp Rock Trailhead through open forest and grassy meadows, then up an old glacial moraine and on to Resthouse Meadows.
Within a mile of leaving the trailhead, the forest opens up into Beaver Meadows, with beaver ponds dotting the area. Two old camping shelters are seen to the north side of the trail on the edge of the meadow. Near the Wilderness boundary, you re-enter the forest and climb slowly up a glacial moraine to Resthouse Meadows, where the trail ends at its junction with the Cub Creek and Resthouse Trails.
TRAIL'S HISTORY
The Beaver Meadows Trail is part of the original trail system in the Upper Bear Creek Basin, probably built sometime around 1917.
In the early days, the trail was a part of the original trail to the summit of Mount Evans, now Mount Blue Sky. A short distance west up the current Cub Creek trail, the Forest Service built a log cabin in 1917 for the use of travelers on the way to the summit. This cabin is the “resthouse” for which Resthouse Meadows is named.
Below Beaver Meadows, the trail often seems more like an old road. During the 1,050 acre Resthouse Meadows Fire in 1962, bulldozers widened the trail into a road for firefighting equipment and personnel.
The two Adirondack style camping shelters were constructed in Beaver Meadows in 1917 as a part of the Mount Evans Recreation Area Plan. Fire camps for the 1962 Resthouse Fire and the 1968 Lincoln Lake Fire were located here.