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Lookout Mountain, Man and Dog

Last updated on 2024-11-03

Ezra doesn’t ride bicycle, so I clipped his rope to my belt, and he took me for a walk on Lookout Mountain, the best little fun-size mountain I’ve ever hiked/biked/run. We parked in Sandstone and started at the gravel access road off Pony Express Lane (which visitors this week may never find, since the regular entrance to Sandstone off Colorado Boulevard is blocked and torn up and the contractor putting up the new house at the end of the pavement has knocked down the trailhead signs). 

Ezra is perhaps a bad influence on my hiking. He charges doggedly ahead, craving constant motion even up that steep switchback at the start on the southeast slope, complaining with his impatient chirping whine only when I stop to check directions or enjoy the view. He doesn’t want to take pictures; he just wants to go.

Just below the peak on the shady north face.
On the edge of the Black Hills, facing the high open plains north toward Belle Fourche and beyond.
Looking toward the smoky sun and…
…Crow Peak.
What are we waiting for?
No fires in Lawrence County, but haze from fires out west lies heavily on Spearfish Canyon.
I’ve always liked this view from the west side of Lookout Mountain, the streets of Spearfish pointing toward Crow Peak. When you stand in town—walkable Spearfish, the old core with the schools and Spearfish Creek, not the foot-unfriendly car-sprawl east along I-90—the peaks are always there, Crow Peak west, Spearfish Mountain south, Lookout Mountain close and high east, to let you know where you are.
Lookout Mountain, the summit.
I told Ezra the trail to the top is a little too steep for pups. He did not complain, just kept trotting along the Mesa loop.

Below is Ezra leading me down the last minute of the trail. Good dog.