To celebrate New Year’s Day of 2014, we went to RMNP for snowshoeing. It was our first snowshoeing trip. I was afraid I would not know how to walk on snowshoes, but as it turned out, it was much easier than I thought. Walking on two pairs of shoes was actually fun.

The trip was from Bear Lake to Emerald Lake.  We have been there many times in summer and fall but never had hiked there in winter. The view looked totally different and more beautiful compared to the views in the summer.  

When we arrived at the Dream Lake, it was snowing and windy; because the visibility was very poor for ideal photo shoot, we decided to continue the hike toward Emerald Lake.  

At about 4:10 pm, we were back at Dream Lake. The snow storm was getting worse and temperature was frigidly cold. While snowshoeing on the lake, I didn’t want to give up and kept looking back to see if Hallett Peak was visible. Suddenly the magic happened; I not only saw the top of that famous peak, but also saw the warmer sky. I set up my tripod and camera against the wind as quickly as I could and captured this image below. After a few shots, Hallett Peak disappeared again. The color version of this image is in my Colorado gallery and it won “Photo of the Day” contest on earthshots.com: http://www.earthshots.org/2014/01/snow-storm-at-dream-lake-by-mei-xu/

Snow Storm at Dream Lake (BW)