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Made it to Black lake in late spring. This is also when I started documenting my hikes inside of Rocky Mountain National Park. Snow was well packed down most of the trail and snow shoes were not needed, although we brought them anyways.
You can start the hike from Glacier Gorge trailhead or Bear Lake trailhead. Bear lake trailhead will add about 1/2 mile to the entire hike. Most people continue on the well marked trail past Alberta Falls. Save yourself a mile or two by taking the less traveled, harder to follow winter trail, which runs along the fire trail for a little bit.
We stayed to the side of Mills Lake as the lake was not completely frozen. Hang to the east and go up, before the south end of Mills Lake. Pass Jewel Lake, took the well defined tracks all the way up to Black Lake.
Steep incline near Ribbon Falls, which was pretty much completely frozen.
Popular ice climbing area as we saw several groups of ice climbers making there way to climb near Black Lake the day we were there.
Hike failed to Black Lake on Rocky Mountain National Park re-opening day. Steep snow slopes with no packed trail made it extremely difficult to climb with just one ice axe. Decided to turn back short of Ribbon Falls.
Black Lake Hike Early August
Returned to hike Black Lake in early August of 2020. Trail was completely dry and much easier to follow then it was in the spring. This day we continued to all of the named lakes located in the upper shelf of the Glacier Gorge, Frozen Lake, Green Lake and Blue Lake.