The guest ranch that formerly stood at the trailhead for most routes into the Never Summer Range was called Phantom Valley Ranch. Perhaps it was named for the ghosts of trappers, miners, and irrigation ditch diggers who all figured prominently in the history of this stretch of the Colorado River.
In 1984 and 1985 the National Park Service obliterated the old Phantom Valley Trailhead and the road leading to it, which was deemed a traffic hazard. The new Colorado River Trailhead was substituted on the other side of Trail Ridge Road from Timber Lake Trailhead, 9.6 miles north of the Grand Lake entrance to the national park and 10.7 miles southwest of Fall River Pass. From the new trailhead a trail follows the Colorado River for 0.6 mile to a split: Red Mountain Trail on the left and the Colorado River Trail to Lulu City and La Poudre Pass on the right.
