Recreation Region: Flat Tops Area

Flat Tops Wilderness - Routt

Wilderness pertains to protected areas of land that surround the Forest. Wilderness allows foot traffic only and prohibits motorized and mechanical access, has no roads or structures, does not allow bicycles, chainsaws, or facilities.

Wilderness provides a range of benefits and sanctuary for us all- clean air and water, carbon sequestration, habitat and refuge for native fish and wildlife, erosion control and soil renewal, opportunities for outdoor recreation, solitude and adventure.

The United States Congress designated the Flat Tops Wilderness in 1975 and it now has a total of 235,214 acres. All of this wilderness is located in Colorado and is managed by the White River and Routt National Forests.

In 1919, Arthur Carhart, a Forest Service landscape architect, realized the uniqueness of Wilderness when he stood on the shoreline of Trappers Lake. Carhart’s task was to survey the area to build a recreational housing development of summer cottages. However, what Carhart saw and experienced at Trappers Lake compelled him to strongly recommend to his supervisors that the area remain undeveloped. Flat Tops, also known as the “Cradle of Wilderness,” is where the idea of wilderness and the protection act put into place by congress was first applied to public land.

It’s no wonder Carhart found the area so entrancing: behind Trappers Lake loom steep volcanic cliffs and beyond them a vast subalpine terrain yields to alpine tundra. The Flat Tops are part of the White River Plateau with an average elevation of about 10,000 feet. Approximately 100 miles of fishable streams are in the Wilderness.

The valleys and relatively gentle land above the cliffs offer over 160 miles of trails. Thousands of recreationists in search of hiking, backpacking, back country camping, horseback riding, hunting and fishing visit each year. The land is ideal for stock-users and traveling cross-country. Elk, deer and moose visit the Wilderness in the summer.

A skeletal forest of dead spruce and fir stretches across the higher slopes below the tundra, the eerie legacy of a 1940s bark beetle epidemic.

In 2002 more than 17,000 acres burned around Trappers Lake and over 5,500 acres in the vicinity of Lost Lakes in the East Fork of the Williams Fork drainage amounting to almost 10% of the Flat Tops Wilderness.

Trail access into the Wilderness area can be found at the following Trailheads:

Protect this special place for the future by always using Leave No Trace techniques and following all special Wilderness restrictions.