Guanella Pass Campground

GUANELLA PASS CAMPGROUND
GEORGETOWN - COLORADO

When camping "out west' and picking a campground I have a list of things that I am looking for: Elevation, Pine Trees, Creeks/Streams/Rivers and spacious sites. At Guanella Pass I found everything I was looking for. When picking a campground these days its very easy to do lots of research at home as you can find a wealth of information online. It's amazing what is available to us these days. All of my research told me I was going to have an amazing setup and this campground did not disappoint.

Driving up the Guanella Pass road is mountain driving at its best. The drive up from Georgetown is steep with many switchbacks. The road is rather narrow however pulling my 25 foot trailer I had no issues maneuvering my way thru all those turns. Climbing higher and higher my eyes glanced between the road and my GPS. With every minute that passed my elevation climbed higher and higher until I finally saw the campground sign ahead.

At 10,900 Guanella Pass is Colorado mountain camping at its best. My experience here would be limited to one night so I would have to squeeze every minute out of this visit. I cant remember what the final number for my GPS was but I do believe that it was not 10,900 exactly. But then the campground is hilly throughout that your elevation will change from site to site. The campground resides on both sides of the road. I camped on the east side and that is where all the reservable sites are as well as the hike in tent area. This picture is taken from the highway looking north and what you see is the camp sites west of the road. In most campgrounds camping so close to the road would bring lots of noise from car traffic. Not on this visit for me. I was camping on a Thursday night and it was early June. I dont know the schedule of things for the rest of the summer but on this night the road was very quiet. Our site was right on the river too so hearing anything from the road was downright difficult to impossible.

What you'll notice when camping at Guanella is just how high the peaks are around you. When you take in and realize you are camping just shy of 11,000 feet the sheer size of the peaks around you settles in. I've done lots of camping in the 7,500 to 8,500 range and when you have peaks this close and high so near they are usually under 10,000ft. These were much higher than that. You'll notice that there isnt a huge canopy of trees over you either in this area. Most campsites were that way and for me that was okay because the one thing I wanted to see around me were the peaks.

This loop of the campground is looking southward towards the pass. You'll notice the snow on the peaks. There was actually snow in the campground on our visit. Not out in the open but deep inside the campsites, usually in the rear, and under the cover of trees. The snow melt off continued on during the day and provided a nice run off of water that flowed over and next to the road. Our night there the overnight low dropped to 30 degrees and provided a hard freeze as it got cold early. The run off froze solid and was running water again before we left around noon. There is so much sunshine and when you are this high up the power of that sun is amazing.

The campground curls around in loops. You can see in this picture our camper which is partially hiddden. The picnic table and fire ring are part of another site that you cant actually see from the site I stayed in. Mixing the sound of the creek and the elevation differences of each site you never feel like your neighbors press in on you which works great for those looking for some isolation.

The campsites were well taken care of and very clean. The campground host for this site had not arrived yet for the season as they were having transmission problems with their vehicle. The man I talked to told me that they would be watching this campground until they arrived. This area here is right next to the creek in the rear of the picture. Just the picture of perfection in my book when it comes to having a site so close to the creek.

Here is another view of the creek, picnic table and fire ring. My next visit to Colorado will include a stop here and it will be for more than one night!

This picture is taken from the rear of my campsite and heading in towards the hike in tent sites. The hike in sites are not much of a hike in. They are all accessible with a minimal walk. No carts or backpacking necessary.

As you walk up to the tent in sites these are the posts letting you know which campsite is which. Notice the reservation cards on each pole. These sites are busy and used a lot. If you could read the posts you'd see that they would all be full that night as it was Friday.

Another look down into one of the tent sites. Beautiful views of the creek again. If you dont want to tent in the campground another option available is to park along the road up from Georgetown and disperse camp. This forest takes their dispersed camping seriously as they have paved little pull outs all the way up to the pass for cars to park on. Campers then carry their gear in a short distance and pitch their tent. There are no toilets, running water, or garbage but the camping (with many sites along the creek) is as good as it gets if you like it quiet.

Yet another view of the campground and a campsite. A cleared out area for a picnic table and fire ring. Beautiful views of the mountains and notice how dense the tree cover is around you.

This is another campsite on the east side of the road and is more of a camper site than a tenting one. Being on the east side it is reservable.

The site where we stayed. Picnic table and fire ring in the rear. My 25 foot trailer and van fit nicely onto the pad. The creek runs adjacent to this just to the left.

Notice the snow in the rear of this campsite. The temperatures were very warm during the day and I can bet that snow was gone in a short few days ahead at most.

This campsite is also on the east side of the road and therefore reservable. I dont have many pictures of the west side and thats mainl due to time constraints. This site was away from the creek however you could easily hear the creek standing here.

This is the campground looking south towards the pass. The pass is a short drive to the top and provides plenty of hiking opportunities including a hike to the top of Mt Bierstadt which tops out just over 14,000. For those wanting to take their trailer over the pass and down the other side there are no restrictions doing so. There actually restrictions taking vehicles or combination of vehicles over 35 ft over Independence Pass near the Aspen / Twin Lakes area. Word of warning to those who do so here the road gets to be a mess of washboard as you get closer to Grant. I know they are in the middle of paving gravel and repaving areas at present and hope to have that part of the road completely topped over this year or the next. For me though this season the going was slow when I left here and drove down to Grant.