Cheesman Lake, Saturday hike

"With easy access from the front range, Cheesman Lake, also known as Cheesman Reservoir is a popular manmade body of water near Deckers, Colorado. It is found along the South Platte River in southwestern Jefferson County and is approximately a 1 hour and 30 minute drive southwest from Denver." When read this passage I knew, there is my destination for my Saturday hike.

 

It took a while to get there. The last stretch of the road is unpaved and dusty, but if you can get there early enough, it is not that bad. Just don't make a mistake I made - don't park your car at the parking about a mile before the lake with a stupid idea of reaching the water body on feet. Yeah... it is a relatively short walk but as I mentioned, the road is dusty... I mean DUSTY ;) In fact all my initially black clothes were desert tan when I got back to the car ;)

Cheesman Reservoir shares its namesake with Denver’s Cheesman Park. The sites are named for Walter S. Cheesman, who was a Denver resident and president of the Colorado Humane Society with strong stakes in the water, real estate, railroad, and finance industries.

In 1905, the Cheesman Dam was built at a towering 211 feet (64 meters). At the time, it was the largest dam of its kind in the entire world. In 1918, the dam was purchased by the Denver Water Board as the Cheesman Reservoir was used to supply water to the growing capital city (and currently it stores tap water for Denver). Fast forward to 1973, and the Cheesman Dam officially became a National Historic Civil Engineering Landmark.

Once near the lake I hiked the Goose Creek trail (almost) that is running up and down on the east side of the lake. The air there was cool and fresh... The views were just amazing - I could see the lake most of the hike. I didn't hike all the way down to the creek.. I stopped just before the trail started descending, had my breakfast and turned back.

 

It's hard to consider this hike as a difficult one, but I made it long - 6.6 miles (including more than 2 miles walking on a dusty road). Over 1600 feet of elevation gain. Not really difficult, more like moderate but it takes a while. BTW, back home I looked at the Google map again and realized the "lake" I saw was only about a quarter of the whole lake, which extends to the south far beyond what one can see from the trail. The length of the coast line is over 18 miles! But it looks much smaller when you are there.

Click here to see the trail on Google maps.

Pictures were taken on October 22, 2022.