Florissant Fossil Beds: Petrified Forest Loop

Distance: 1 mile loop
Elevation: 8,400 ft
Elevation Gain: minimal
Bathroom at the Trailhead: Yes
Dogs: No, National Monument
Tags: #FindYourPark, #NPS100, #ColoradoSprings, #fossils, #naturewalk
Other hikes in area: Hornbook Wildlife Trail, Dome Rock 

Fossilized redwood stumps are the star of the Florissant Fossil Beds National Monument

Florissant Fossil Beds near Woodland Park, CO contains one of the richest finds of insect fossils in the world. It also has miles of trails to explore as well the fossilized giant sequoia stumps. Most trails also have stunning views of west side of Pikes Peak, Colorado Springs native 14er.

Starting out

This post profiles the short nature walk that starts right at the visitor's center and wanders out into the remains of a prehistoric lake bed, now a grass covered meadow.

Interpretive signs put the Eocene age in context with the other major  earth epochs. 

Mountain Bluebirds, hawks and Vultures, Mule Deer, and Pronghorn Antelope frolic the meadow, but the real stars are the sequoia stumps, some of which have been unearthed for your viewing pleasure. You can get up close and personal to at least one.

One stump is not fenced off, you can walk right up and touch it. It looks and feels like wood. 

The fossils formed because 33 million years ago a nearby volcanic field released a 2-story deep mud flow that covered the base of the trees. Eventually, the trees died at the level of the flow, but the stumps remained entombed in mud. Another mud flow dammed a river, forming a lake. Insects and plant leaves drifted to the bottom of the lake where they were preserved in volcanic ash.

Heading back across the meadow

To put this period in perspective, 33 million years ago was an age of mammals, the dinosaurs having long since gone the way...well...of the dinosaur. Before the ice ages that brought the Wooly Mammoth to what is now Colorado, this period contained large herbivorous proto-rhynoceri and other strange creatures.

Big Boy stump. A hotel used to exist in front of this stump and folks had to pay a fee to see you. Unlike today though you were allowed to climb on the stump and take chunks out of it. 

Trail Through Time

Distance: 1.5 mile loop
Elevation: 4,514 ft
Elevation Gain: 200 ft
Bathroom at Trailhead: Yes
Dogs: Off leash
Tags: #coloradooutdoors, #dinosaurs, #westernslope, #wildflowers, #lizards
Other Trails in the area: Rabbit Ear's Trail, Utah Juniper

Dinosaur bones are visible on the Trail Through Time

Wander in the footsteps of Camarasaurus and Diplodocus on the "Trail through Time" near Fruita, CO. This is short paleontological trail contains visible dinosaur bones and fossilized plants along with modern day lizards and flowering cacti. 

Heading up the hillside

The Dakota Formation

150 million years ago this area was a swamp filled with bus-sized sauropods. Now those swamps are entombed as the Dakota formation, a conglomerate layer of rocks and sand. The trail describes this formation and through a series of interpretive signs, describes the Jurassic landscape.

A lizard basks in the sun

Looking south over the Rabbit Valley. The trail can be seen several hundred feet below.  

Views of the desert abound from the trail, which switchbacks up a small hillside. To the south is the La Sal mountains, which rise sharply out of the desert floor. These mountains are the remains of a "bubble" of hot molten lava that intruded into the thick sediments of the Colorado plateau 29 million years ago. Over the millennia, the surrounding sediments have eroded away, leaving these 12K ft peaks. That is a lot of erosion!

You get to this trail off of I-70 at exit 2. It is a short one mile drive to the trailhead. Brown tourist signs mark the way. This is the same exit as the Rabbit's Ear Trail with its stunning views of the Colorado River.

Claret Cup Cactus and other plants bloom in spring on the Trail Through Time  

Don't linger too long on this trail, however, or you may just join the dinosuars...preserved in rock for all time.

Heading back down