点评:I've seen a lot of lakes and perhaps I'm missing something, but I don't really get the hype about this one. It was a nice little trail, but nothing super special nor super scenic for me. It was also buggy, which one of my kids especially did not like. We sprayed ourselves down in parking lot, but they were still a bit bothersome. I wish I had the time and energy for Emerald Lake, but we were only visiting RMNP briefly late afternoon following hiking and site seeing in SD on our way to Denver, so we decided to fit this and Sprague Lake in for a brief sampling of RMNP. I would have been super disappointed if we did the longer Emerald Lake one and it too wasn't super impressive. We've seen beautiful bright blue mountain water so a lake in and of itself isn't that interesting. Sylvan Lake in Custer was significantly more scenic for us than Bear Lake.
We were able to get 4p reservations for a Sunday in July by reserving the night before online around 7p. We arrived around 5, ignored the no parking available sign in the Bear Lake main parking (following advice of a review I read), bypassing the shuttle lot and did just fine getting parking and even near the front by the trailhead. I'd say there were maybe up to 10 spots left then. By the time we left shortly after 6, cars (likely without reservations) were piling up and I bet many had to turn back around to get the shuttle instead. I would say due to the trail being relatively flat and easy, it might be a good starter trail to acclimate to the elevation. I did find myself a bit off and slightly out of breath for a short period as I think that might have been the highest "hiking" we had done by roughly 1k feet. We take Advil prior to high elevation hikes. By the time we left there and reached Sprague Lake, I did not experience any altitude issues and was walking fast with no issues.
翻译:我见过很多湖泊,也许我忽略了什么,但我真不明白为什么会有人这么吹捧这个湖。这条小路很不错,但对我来说没什么特别之处,风景也没什么特别。路上还有车,我的一个孩子特别不喜欢。我们在停车场喷了车,但车还是有点烦。真希望我有时间和精力去翡翠湖,但我们在去丹佛的路上,在圣地亚哥徒步观光后,下午晚些时候只会在落基山国家公园短暂停留,所以我们决定把翡翠湖和斯普拉格湖也算进去,对落基山国家公园做个简单的体验。如果我们只去翡翠湖,时间更长,那肯定非常失望,而且它也没什么特别令人印象深刻的。我们已经看过美丽的湛蓝山水,所以湖泊本身并没有那么吸引人。对我们来说,卡斯特的西尔万湖比熊湖风景好得多。
我们提前一天晚上7点左右在网上预订,7月份一个周日下午4点就能订到票。我们大约下午5点到达,无视了熊湖主停车场的“禁止停车”标志(这是我读到的一篇评论的建议),绕过了班车停车场,顺利找到了停车位,甚至在靠近步道入口的入口处也找到了。我估计当时大概还剩下10个车位。6点刚过我们离开时,车(很可能没有预订)已经排起了长龙,我猜很多人不得不掉头去乘坐班车。我想,由于这条路相对平坦,容易上坡,它或许是一条不错的入门路线,可以帮助我适应海拔高度。我确实感觉自己有点虚弱,并且有一段时间有点喘不过气来,因为我觉得这可能是我们迄今为止“徒步”的最高高度,大约高出1000英尺。在高海拔徒步之前,我们会服用艾德维尔(Advil)。当我们离开那里到达斯普拉格湖时,我没有感到任何海拔不适,而且走得很快,没有任何问题。