Caribou Pass Trail is a 6.3 mile lightly trafficked out and back trail located near Tabernash, Colorado that features a river and is rated as moderate. The trail is primarily used for hiking and walking and is best used from June until November. Dogs are also able to use this trail but must be kept on leash.
dogs on leash
hiking
walking
river
views
wild flowers
Directions from Granby: Travel southeast on Highway 40 approximately 14 miles to County Road 84. Travel northeast for 6 miles to Forest Road 129, then east 6 miles to the Junco Lake Trailhead.
not crowded, amazing views.
This trail was great. I would recommend a vehicle with a high ground clearance as the camp road to the trailhead parking lot is a bit rough. I made it without incident in a Mazda 3 but moving very slowly. I trekked up to Lake Dorothy starting at this trailhead. Once you get to the fork in the trail where left is Caribou Pass and right is Columbine Lake, that's where the real climb begins. I would definitely consider this to be a very lightly trafficked trail. I was joined by only two other people on the way up. And one of those was a National Forest Ranger. I started out at around 8:00am. There were an unbelievable amount of birds around once the Sun was fully in the sky. When you reach the top and are overlooking Caribou Lake I would recommend continuing on and to the right around to Lake Dorothy. The trail is a little sketchy from there on but not impassable on a good clear day. Which it was when I had done this and the views were outstanding! Also when I went this time of year, in early September, there were a lot of hunters in the woods. Not a big deal, as long as gunfire doesn't bother you. Lots of amazing camping available, just need to purchase a backcountry pass at the Ranger station for $5 and I'm pretty sure that covers your parking as well. Not too bad IMO.
My wife and I did this trail during our visit to Colorado last week and it was amazing. It was the perfect amount of a hiking challenge for two fit-ish people traveling to altitude from FL. Once we passed the Caribou Pass/Columbine Lake split, we didn't see a single person which was very nice. The scenery is was breathtaking and overall experience will never be forgotten. I highly recommend this trail.
One of my favorite views. Have backpacked from monarch lake to this (and looped back to monarch) and just recently did this hike from the junco lake trail head. The last mile got me winded, but man, it was worth it!
Cool trail! Going up the pass is super steep, but near the top there are some beautiful views before you get up to Dorothy Lake. Did this trail with a pack on, great workout.
We hiked to Junco Lake, which was breathtaking. The trail is a great workout with the most beautiful scenic views and lots of water. The downside? TONS of people. Granted, we did it the Saturday before a holiday weekend, so hopefully we just had terrible luck, but it felt like a Disneyland ride just walking among groups of people. There were a few ranger sightings and they were cleaning up the well maintained trails. This would be a gorgeous trail for a hot day, but definitely go early if you don't want to feel like a sheep being herded in! Overall we enjoyed being able to camp near the trailhead and walk in to a beautiful trail, it is worth it, but just be ready for a lot of people and a lot of leashed dogs!
Great and strenuous hike for the short distance. Weather was gorgeous and everything in bloom. However pass was covered by some snow towards the end to which my companions wanted to turn back (could have went up and around). I left the party briefly to summit the peak which offered stunning views and was about an additional 600-800 feet up.
One you make it to the pass a little after 4 miles near the pass - there are many great connecting hikes in the area if you would like to really add some mileage to this hike most likely making it an overnighter. Trails lead to nearby lakes down about 1,500 ft below, or connect all the way to Lake Dorothy and the Fourth of July trail.
After Arapaho pass headed on to Caribou pass. Almost made it to the end but got scared at the narrow ledge, sloping with 800 ft drop off which had some parts with scree and another with small patch of snow where you had to either go around over or under. My friend and I are both afraid of heights. If Ur ok with heights would be fine to continue on. We had trouble navigating around the scree and the small snow patch and decided to turn around and go to Lake Dorothy instead. Maybe next time. Pretty view of the lakes before you get to the pass.
Awesome hike. The lake is spectator at the top. Some steep spots for sure. Trail is very narrow with large drop offs about 1/2 mile before lake.