Turtle Rock Trail at Vedauwoo, Medicine Bow Mountains, Wyoming

When we go camping, one of the things that I always look for in a campground is if there are hiking trails nearby.  Vedauwoo doesn't disappoint in that department!  The Turtle Rock Trail, which is the most popular in the area, encircles the large Turtle Rock formation, and there are numerous other trails within the area as well.  We opted to hike the Turtle Rock trail because there was a way to pick it up from the campground and because I thought it would take us to the top of the rock formation.  How wrong I was!  We actually came across some other hikers on the trail who asked us if that trail continued up the rocks and I said that we had hoped the same thing, but since we had both done half of the trail we realized it did not.  And after looking online after the hike, we realized that it was pretty obvious that it did not continue up the rocks when we were given a map by one of the park rangers.   Here is a great map of the trail and area.  We still had a great hike even though it didn't go as planned. Click here for my post on the Box Canyon trail which does continue up the rocks. 

Getting there:  Hike is off I-80 in Wyoming between Laramie and Cheyenne.  From the Denver Metro area take I-25 North into Cheyenne Wyoming, head west on I-80 and exit 329, follow the signs toward the campground and instead of turning right into the campground, continue straight toward the 'day use' recreation area and park near the turtle rock trail access, which can be found in several different places throughout the day use area.   (Latitude: 41.1608157   Longitude: -105.3685959)

Specs:  Hiking in the day use area costs $5 per car; there are pit toilets, picnic tables, running water, a rotunda with tables, grills, hiking trails and more.  The Turtle Rock trail is 3.2 miles around the formation and there are several other trail intersections that can make the hike longer; paper maps are available at the pay station near the park entrance that has all the hikes in the area.  The Box Canyon Trail is also popular and does hike up the rock formation, which will be in my next post.

The Hike:  Like every hike that our family does, it doesn't always go as planned.  We had assumed that we'd hike to the rock formation and then climb up the rocks; instead we hiked partway around Turtle Rock and after realizing the trail didn't head up the rock, we chose a trail intersection to hike toward Reynolds Hill.  Then we stopped because Magnolia got fussy so we ate some lunch in a beautiful field, enjoyed some family time and then hiked back to the campsite.  The hike and lunch took about 3 hours, and we got to see part of the Turtle Rock trail and part of the Reynolds Hill trail.  We did get to see a moose mama and baby along the trail and our little baby had a great time!  Here are some of the trip photos. 

 

One thing that I noticed right away at Vedauwoo, its near perfectly beautiful, but there are lots of dead trees everywhere.  At first I assumed it was because of the bark beetle that we have here in Colorado, but came across this sign at the trailhead.  

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Turtle Rock formation, the trail continues for 3.2 miles around this rock, it passes through the pine forests, aspen groves, other rock formations and more

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We were lucky enough to run across this moose mama and baby after hiking for about 40 minutes near the Reynolds Hill trail split.  She was very docile and watched us from afar, but I was still a little nervous because in Colorado you hear news stories of moose charging people and seriously hurting them. 

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Here is a great shot of the baby looking at the camera, but the mama had turned away.  I was surprised to see the mama moose was so dark, in Colorado when I've seen them, they are usually more brown similar to the baby.  We spent about 20 minutes watching the moose, they weren't always in good photo range unfortunately, but we were able to see them for quite a while from our position higher up on the rocks.  It was a really cool thing to witness and it reminded both Josh and I of our trip to California in 2007 when we came across a bear and her 2 cubs.   It was scary but we stayed away and everything was fine.  
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After the moose we continued up the trail where we came across some other hikers coming from the other direction who asked if this trail went up onto the rocks.  We both then discovered it did not and they continued hiking and so did we, but we decided to turn around to check out the Reynolds Hill area which was a trail intersection we had passed back where we saw the moose.  So we turned around and hiked back. 
Here's Josh carrying Magnolia in our Eddie Bauer carrier gifted to us from a friend.  He likes that carrier a lot, I don't fit into it quite as well as Josh does.  

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Josh and Belle at one of the stream cliffs along the trail.  

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Does anyone know the specific flower species or type of butterfly?  Please post a comment!

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This stream with its many rock waterfalls can be seen from the trail.  It was great for the dogs to cool off in.  

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The train continues through the aspen trees, the understory is filled with greenery and beautiful wildflowers. 

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Josh, Magnolia and Rock walking through the aspen grove. 

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 Belle at the trail intersection to go to Reynolds Hill (none of the sign shows the trail names, the paper map found at the park entrance is invaluable if you want to hike in the area)

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 Lots of sage along the trail, I love how beautiful it is, and the contrast with the blue sky is amazing.  

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We sat in the field and had lunch, I played with my new camera and took pictures of everything! 

 The trail toward Reynolds Hill continued and it looks like it hikes up a separate rock formation (Reynolds Rock) across the field shown in photo below. 

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Reynolds Rock formation. 

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After our lunch, we hiked back to the campground, all three of us completely beat (dogs too) and chilled in the campground for the rest of the evening, relaxing.  I really love Vedauwoo, and can't wait to come back again soon!

If you have any questions or comments please post them, also, if you'd like to join our mailing list to be notified when the next hike is updated then join here.  If you want to check out the Box Canyon Trail click here.