Bjorn has already answered this question in the affirmative, and shown that such matrices do exist. I'd like to add a further comment here though - 'almost no' matrices satisfy the required property. That is, the collection of 2x2 matrices such that Tr(C^n) is dense in R has zero Lebesgue measure.

We know that Tr(C^n) = a^n + b^n where a,b are the roots of the characteristic polynomial of C. If a and b are both real then it is not possible for C to have the required property. The only possibility is where they are complex conjugates, a&nbsp;=&nbsp;r&nbsp;exp(i&theta;), b&nbsp;=&nbsp;r&nbsp;exp(-i&theta;) for r&nbsp;&gt;1. Then, Tr(C<sup>n</sup>)=2rcos(in&theta;). Suppose that &theta; is uniformly distributed over [-&pi;,&pi;], so that exp(in&theta;) is uniformly distributed on the unit circle for each n. For any positive K, |Tr(C^n)|&lt;K is equivalent to |cos(n&theta;)|&lt;r<sup>-n</sup>K/2. The set of values of exp(in&theta;) for which this holds forms a pair of arcs of length r<sup>&nbsp;-n</sup>K (to leading order). So,

$$\mathbb{P}(\vert{\rm Tr}(C^n)\vert\lt K)\approx r^{-n}K/\pi$$

to leading order. Summing over r, this is finite. Then, the [Borel-Cantelli lemma][1] says that, with probability one, |Tr(C<sup>n</sup>)|&lt;K only finitely often. So, with probability 1, |Tr(C<sup>n</sup>)| diverges to infinity.


  [1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Borel%E2%80%93Cantelli_lemma