All the reviews of Lone Eagle Peak say the same thing: its not difficult, but its long. You also need a permit from May-September 15th if you’re planning on camping. More on that later. It took us about 3 hours to get to the trail head from Colorado Springs and we planned to camp Saturday and come back Sunday. One note- if your looking for solitude in nature this is not the hike to do. There’s less people than on a 14er but we still saw a lot of people.
To get to the hike you drive around Monarch Reservoir and its absolutely beautiful. When we were up there the aspens were starting to change and fog was rolling off of the water. The road ends at the trail head so you don’t have to worry about missing it. Get there early so you don’t have to park super far down the road. There are also bathrooms at the trail head.
This hike is stunning from beginning to end. Lakes, valleys, waterfalls, jagged peaks. It has everything. The first 2.5-3 miles is pretty much flat and then the elevation gain starts. Even though its gains 2,335ft its spread out pretty well over 8 miles and never gets too bad in any spot.
We were awe struck the entire hike and even with stopping a lot and taking a bunch of pictures we got to the top in a little less than four hours. About .75 miles from the top we ran into a ranger. He told us that there probably no camping spots left at the top and if we couldn’t find a spot we would have to come back down and hike an hour up the Cascade trail to camp.
We sprinted the rest of the way, but no luck. We had read reviews, but didn’t realize that there were designated numbered camping sites. There’s only 16 spots and they fill up fast. We did this hike the first weekend that permits weren’t required. Maybe it was just naivety on our part, but we didn’t expect that many people. We thought it would be cold and no one would be there. No such luck.
After resting at the top we made the tough decision to head back down the same day. It was a long 8 miles and we got down in 3.5 hours. Since we had hauled up all of our backpacking stuff it made for a very long day. If we had just day packs it would have been even easier. I guess moral of the story…go during permit season with a camping permit, or plan for it to be a day trip. Overall though it was totally worth it and such a beautiful day.
