Longs Peak- The Rest of the Story

July 19, 2011 Longs Peak Continued J           16 miles round trip        111.9  Total Miles

“From the Keyhole locate the first of a series of red and yellow ‘bull’s eye’ markings indicating the best route to and from the summit.  Travel across a series of very narrow ledges along a cliff edge.  Carefully climb a constricted slot-like section with two iron bars drilled into the rock.  Continue upward toward the high point along the Ledges section. Then follow a gradually descending traverse to the base of the Trough.  Take note of the Ledges/Trough junctions, as some climbers have had difficulty locating this point while on decent.” RMNP Long Peak brochure

Kathi and I move down the ledges about 100 feet.  Believe me the first 100 feet should thin the crowd out considerably!  There is a “skinny mans delight”, “fat mans misery” right off the bat!  If you go one way your hinder is hanging off very ‘exposed’ and if you go the other way you need to be pretty skinny.  I fell into the group that had to ‘expose’ myself to the edge of the cliff rather than slip through between the mountain and this large rock.  This is the part where exposure means very close to the edge of the cliff rather than put a warmer jacket and mittens on because it is cold outside.  100 feet seems like a long way.  Kathi and I met and confer.  The wind has stopped.  I decide if I can make it past that last rock, how much worst could it be…  Certainly, by now I should know in life … there are always more challenges.

The ledges description really sums it up.  If you slipped and fell from here you would tumble.  Tumble downward at a pretty steep angle such as a double black diamond on a ski hill for about 200 feet.  Problem is there are large chunky rocks down there that will do great damage to your body.  There is a good amount of incentive to pay attention to every hand hold and foot placement.  Kathi is moving and grooving ahead of me and nice enough to stop and offer words of encouragement or helpful pointers along the way.  I am busy staying in the moment and when I need a break I only stop where I feel I have room to pause and take in the beauty of the moment.  I am able to look down into Glacier Basin and see where we were last year when we got chased out by a whopper of a storm.  This leads my brain to think I better look across the sky and do some weather forcasting…  Looks like low level clouds are starting to settle in the valleys.  I wonder to myself what that really means… I ask Kathi if she is keeping an eye on the weather.  She says she is, I will just have to let her keep an eye on the weather because I need mine to see where I should put my hands and feet on every move. 

Weather moving in...

This might be a good time to mention that we meet the two young 20 year old whippier snappers who passed us on the boulder field earlier.  Clearly they will have been to the top and back down before it is time for brunch!

We make it through the ledges and get to the trough.

“Continue up to the broad gulley called the Trough.  This section is full of loose rock.  Be careful of other climbers and rock fall.  At the top of the Trough, you will come to a short steep section to the start of the Narrows.” RMNP Long Peak brochure

Let’s just call the Trough a steep wide gully filled with loose gravel, sand, scree, talus, large rocks the size of basketballs, and some attached rocks.  Since you are now an experienced climber, (remember you just finished the ledges and survived so that moves you up to ‘experienced’) you get to evaluate every rock and test whether you want to place your entire weight upon it to take the next step up.  While Kathi and I are busy testing, stepping and moving up the trough the clouds are busy seeping up into our immediate trough and up to the ledges.  Kathi says she is keeping and eye on it.  I don’t know it looks pretty foggy to me.  The sky above is bright blue.  Where is that personal weather forecaster number when you need it?

We have one other person going up and five people coming down.  We all share the trough.  Of  the five coming down, one is a Father son combo, both have helmets.  The Father had the wits scared out of him on the homestretch.  The next set of three must be a father son combo who hired a professional guide to take them up to the peak.  The guide is belaying the father and son down through the hard parts.  I asked the guide if he wanted to belay me through the tough parts.  He said he was busy right now taking a group down.  I asked the father/ son if they wanted to go back up with me.  They said very quickly, NO.  The guide said I would have a few more challenges along the way.  Hmmm what does he mean by that.

The ledges.

Trough





We arrive at the top of the trough to find the guy in front of us sitting down at the base of a large boulder.  He said that could not get up either side of the boulder.   RMNP has a name for this boulder they call it the “bottle neck”, as it causes a back up of people trying to figure out how to get up and over… but I call it “The Boulder of Denial”.  You can either go up the slippery side to the right which all of the foot and hand holds are about 1/8 inch deep. Or you can go up and around to the left side which has some very amazing tricky hand and feet movement that are necessary to scale the “Boulder of Denial”.  The guy who was sitting there had tried both and could not seem to manage it.  Kathi had asked the ranger below which way he went around the rock and he said he always went to the right.  Within four seconds Kathi had managed to use the 1/8^th inch grooves and pulled herself up to the top side of the boulder.  The guy who was sitting there was now standing with me with the same gaping mouth face.  As if on cue we both said “how did you do that?” 

Kathi of course said you just use those grooves to hoist yourself up.  Oh sure, just do that!  The guy and I look at each other, the guy and I can see that those grooves are not deep enough for a boot and yet Kathi is up on top and we are on the bottom.  The guy tries to help me up, I get about five feet off of the ground and then slip FAST back down the five feet.  Denied!  I go and examine the left side.  Meanwhile the guy somehow manages to follow Kathi’s instructions and is now also standing on top of the “The Boulder of Denial”.  The guy continues on and Kathi comes to the left side of the boulder to offer helpful hints.  This side seems worse as I feel like I am going to fall and falling from here would leave a very lasting impression.  At this point I am ready to have Kathi go on without me and I would meet up with her later. (This thought causes me great angst as I had to re-do a couple of hikes in the past as they were out of my league at that time. I have no great desire to re-do this hike/climb). I am perched on top of some ledge with my rear end “exposed” and I am trying to pull myself together.  Really why couldn’t some ranger come up with a rock chisel and make those grooves deeper.  Seriously, they put bridges over the rushing water to help people across, why not three or four groove improvements.  I manage to get myself back down to a safer spot.  I say a prayer and ask God for calm clear thinking.  Kathi comes down the “The Boulder of Denial”, gives me a boost, and just like that I am on top of that “The Boulder of Denial”.  Kathi’s is up right behind me.  Her thoughts are, “great, let’s get moving”, my thoughts turn to, “how in the world are we going to get down that?”  Can you tell by now that I enjoy hiking and climbing is just not my thing? 

By the time we get past the “The Boulder of Denial”the fog has lifted, the sun is shining.

The Narrows crosses a sheer vertical rock face on a narrow ledge.  A series of boulders and hand holds will assist you on this constricted ledge.  Continue to the base of the Homestretch. RMNP Long Peak brochure

Up the Home Stretch

The Ranger said this is as wide as a sidewalk with a 1,000 foot down edge.  Hah, this seemed more like two rows of tile down a long hallway.  There are some very nice hand holds, I know because I used every one of them!  I certainly would not have been too happy if I would have had to past any one!  The Narrows are correctly named narrow.  I will let the pictures speak as words can not describe what it is.

“The homestretch is a polished granite slab that guards the summit.  This section requires scrambling with your hands and feet.  This section can have ice and snow throughout the summer.  Although many options exit, the bull’s eye will generally provide you with the best route to the summit.” RMNP Long Peak brochure

This is a 45 degree slab of up.  You are on all fours climbing up through tiny slots that if you are lucky you can stick a boot into, but most times just try to wedge your boot toe in, step up, and reach for the next hand hold.  There is some water running down it at spots, but it seems you can avoid it on the way up.  Of course Kathi is thinking about summiting, and I am thinking about how in the world are going to get down this?

We make the summit some 8 hours and 6 minutes after starting.  It is flat, rocky, high, sunny and calm.  We sign in at the register and shoot some pictures.  We have lunch and talk with the guy we have been following.  He asks us if we saw the lightening this morning.  We said we decided it was a camera.  He said that there was lightening way off to the east and he could see the storm was off towards Denver.  We laugh and tell him we thought it was a camera flash…

Now for the happy news…  We are only half way done with this hike.

When going to the shoot to enter the slippery face of the home stretch we had to wait for three young people to finish their accent.  First guy was wearing Chaco sandals, second guy was wearing crocs, and the girl with them was wearing low cut walking shoes.  Really, I said to them that when they get older like me they are going to wish they made different choices in foot wear J  The Chaco guy said he had heard this was a rough trail, so he did wear socks, other wise he would not have…  It is hard to argue with that kind of reasoning.  Kathi and I head on down to the home stretch to begin the second half of the hike.

I will describe the trip back to the Keyhole as I was moving down on all fives most of the time.  Just like a crab walks, only you sit and drag your butt.  There were some very interesting moves to get back, but we made it back to the bottom of the boulder field in 11 hours and 58 minutes.  Our hands are very raw from all of the holding on, our minds are tired from the intense attention to task, knees are achy, and toes say enough.  We are only to the Boulder Field down by the pit toilet and we stop to see if we have phone service.  We do!  We call Polly and tell her all is well, and we have made it up and back.  She is surprised that we called so soon.  She does not know that we have almost 6 miles to go before we are back to the truck.  But these six miles are only hiking and not dangerous.  Who would have ever thought there would be cell service up here.  We can hardly get cell service in town.

15 hours and 17 minutes back to the truck.

We are exhausted and happy about summiting.  I know there is no good reason to ever go back up to the top of Long’s Peak.

I bet there are other 14,000 foot mountains that I should go to before ever repeating this one!!! In fact I think there are 50 some 14er’s in CO to give a try first!

This is in case you do not know where the exit off of the top is...

Looking across the distance, clouds are low.

On the Summit you see this!

Signing in as a Summiteer!

Now, any ideas on how to get down?  Going down from the Homestretch to the Narrows.

These are the narrows which the Ranger said were as wide as the sidewalk. I think balance beam is more like it!

Summit



Can you see the face shape in the vertical rock?  Look center right at the top of the vertical lines.



There are not many people who can say they made it to the top of Long’s, but Kathi and I are in the club.

Down off of the Boulder Field replenishing our water supply

We were just up at the top of that!

Longs Peak

July 19, 2011 Longs Peak        16 miles round trip        111.9  Total Miles

After sitting in the car at the Beaver Creek Ranger station Penny using the free WIFI and her computer to search for a forecast and Kathi in talking with the Ranger trying to find the best forecast for Tuesday’s weather; we find a great internet weather source go to http://www.noaa.gov/ You can almost pin point the location and get weather conditions and forecast for a very specific spot.  Kathi even came up with a way to talk with a weather forecaster at the National Weather forecaster’s station out of Boulder CO.  He pretty much gave Kathi the same report that we were picking up on Noaa.  40% chance of rain. (Since it is Monsoon season, the forecast has been forty percent chance of rain everyday since we got to CO.  And it has rained everyday we have been here at some point during the day.  So it is my belief that forecast should read:  100% chance of rain, and it will start sometime around ...) 

Tuesday’s forecast was:  Winds 6-10 miles per hour, mostly cloudy, and wind gusts possible.  Wednesday’s forecast looked about the same but the winds were 10-18 mostly sunny…  What should we pick…?  I reminded Kathi that when the winds are 15 miles per hours, I choose not to ride into it!  I bet climbing on the ledges will not be fun.

We decide to give Longs a shot on Tuesday. 

We go home and start preparing our packs.  We set out all of the food and divvy up the weight equally.  We fill our water camelbacks 3/4^th full and pack the water purifier and additional small packs of powder Gatorade.  Gloves, ear headbands, fleece, rain gear, map, gps, compass, first aide kit, ice /snow stabilizers (things you put on your boots almost like crampons but less severe and lighter).  We think our packs are lighter due to taking less water and off setting with a water purifier. 

When going up to Longs Peak, the park suggests that you let a family member or friend know your time frame, route, and return time and emergency number.  We decide to call Penny's sister Polly.  We burden her with the info and she takes notes.  Her lasting words were, "I'll pray for you."   We take a 20 minute soak and bubble in the hot tub and off to bed by 8 pm.  While crawling into bed I remember there is a time difference between Minnesota and Colorado!  I had not taken that into consideration when telling Polly if we had not called her back by 6:30 then she should call the emergency number.  Back to the cell phone to take care of that miscalculation.  I would sure hate to have her getting nervous and make that emergency call!  When I call her back I make a time correction and add an additional hour just for comfort.

We wake up at 10 pm to thunder and lightening.   This causes some disappointment, but it is not time to make the go or no go decision yet.  Go back to sleep.

The alarm goes off at 12:45 am.  (I know our nieces and nephews are most likely just going to bed at this hour, but seriously this is usually the time I get up and make a trip to the bathroom before heading back to dreamland.)We get  out of bed and are greeted with a starry, starry night with a three quarter moon beaming down.  Don’t know where the storm blew over too, but this looks like a great start to a hiking in the dark adventure.  We are out of the house by 1:30 am and registering at the trailhead by 2 am.  No other cars on the road at this time but look out for the elk as they like to play on the road when there are no other cars around.  We found four elk having a play session.  They did not have their lights on, good thing we were going slowly!

Kathi looks like she is wide awake!

@2 in the morning I look like I am sleeping!

Signing in, we see that two groups of hikers left for the summit at 1:15 am. And two groups left at 1:55 am., we signed in at 2am.  Turning on our headlamps we hit the trail. 

Kathi has a new headlamp this year that we picked up at REI just days before our trip.  It is like having your high beams on your car.  It is so bright I think we could both hike by it.  Lucky for Kathi she needed to use her old headlight to see something in Hattie’s ear about three days before leaving for CO.  It seemed like it had a short or something.  As a nice little advertisement for REI, they have a 100% return policy for whatever reason.  So Kathi returned the light and upgraded to a new beacon in the night.  Now that I think about it, REI must be really happy that Kathi and I go hiking every year as we seem to find all sorts of new things we need to improve our hiking experience! 

Our first land mark is at 1.5 miles, Goblin Forrest camp ground.  Ooohh… scary.  The pine trees in this area are very spooky looking and in the darkness lighted by two headlamps can look very ghoulish.  We stop and take some fun pictures. 

Scary

What was that I just heard?

Nice warning...

Next landmark is at the 2 mile mark.  It is the National Park’s kind reminder that being above tree line during a lightening event is a bad idea.  So they posted some helpful hints.  Leaving the forest at this point always seems to me like you are cruising through a forest and suddenly you are walking on the moon.  All of the shorter and shorter pine trees called krumhotz are on this trail.  These are regular pine trees but due to the severe winter conditions they grow short and are usually very wind blown looking with all of their branches on one side like a flag blowing in the wind.  Sorry I got side tracked there, we are now 2 miles into the hike and stepping out on to the Alpine tundra.  In the glow of two headlamps it looks like the moon; add in the light from a three quarter moon and the landscape was very other worldly.

Kathi and I are making good time.  We can see the headlamps from the groups in front of us.  Occasionally we can get a glimpse of what seems to be either a really bright flash from a camera or the flash of lightening up over Granite Pass.  We have a hard time believing that it could be lightening as the skies above us are mostly clear, some clouds, but the starry night appears to say all is good.  We keep on going just assuming it is a camera flash…Our words are few but we talk about how much further we are this year compared to last year.  The one hour earlier start was a good start time for us.  We are up over Granite Pass and up the shoulder of Lady Washington before the sun rise.  The skies continue to look good, I bet the flash we saw several times saw was just a camera.  We get to the Boulder Field in 4 hours.  Kathi heads to the pit toilet and I get out the water purifier and capture 24 ounces of fresh Longs Peak mountain water for each of us.  We also have put on our rain coats as there is a strong cold breeze blowing down the Boulder Field with occasional gusts. I think this is a bit more than forecasted.  Kathi thinks out loud that maybe since we had that surprise thunderstorm at 10pm the weather pattern has changed and we might be having Wednesday weather rather than Tuesday’s…Ahhh that does not give me any boost of confidence.  Wednesday’s forecast included wind gusts up to 24 miles per hour!

Sunrise

Sun shining on Longs Peak

It takes 56 minutes to boulder hop to the top of the boulder pile and be sitting at the Keyhole.  These boulders are the size of cars and trucks.  There is no laid out trail everyone just has to find their own way.  As Kathi and I are picking and choosing our path, two guys wearing shorts and low cut shoes just fly by us on their route up the Boulder Field.  I can see with my eyes that they are on the same type of rocks as we are, but my mind says there must be some easier route over there.  Perhaps the truth is they are 20 something and practice the extreme sport of trail running.  As Kathi and I enjoy life in the slow lane of boulder hopping, we watch the fast lane two-some go up Longs Peak on some route off to the left.  Not sure what that route is, but it is not where we are going. 

Up at the top of the Keyhole Kathi and I are facing a good strong “breeze”.  Ok, let’s just call it wind.  We know that there are three reasons to turn back now:  wind strong enough to blow you down, a storm coming, or wet rocks.  If you are considering turning back because of the wind you should go down the ledges some 100 feet and see if the wind is within your capabilities.

Last year we made it to the second bull’s eye before turning back as there was a storm coming.  This year we move down the ledges some 100 feet to evaluate the wind.  Is this something that we really want to do or should try to do?

Moon over the keyhole

Boulder scramble up to Keyhole.

Can you see the little hut to the left of the keyhole?

Sitting at the top this is the view over into Glacier Basin and beyond.

Breezy

Tune in tomorrow to find out what happens next!



Let's just go 110 feet down here and see...



Mount Ida walking the Continental Divide

July 18, 2011

            Mount Ida from the Alpine visitor Center   Elevation 11780  Hike 8 miles

 Total miles 95.9

Lucky me, I brought my computer along today on our trip.  We swung into the Beaver Meadows Ranger station so we could pop up the internet and see what we could find out as far as weather over at Longs.  We could get internet but not a report that we were looking for.  When at the Longs Ranger Station on Saturday we had looked at some 'special' forecast website specific to Longs Peak.  Of course we feel we are Internet savey enough to be able to search and locate this on the Web...  After fifteen minutes of savey we are still looking and thinking we should just come back later in the day when some one can just give us the web address or a number to call.

We continued our drive up above tree line on our way up to the Alpine Visitor center. This little trip took awhile as we were following some rookie mountain drivers.  Even Penny was thinking they were going slow and certainly could pull over on one of the pull outs to let the back up of cars pass. They must have been scared of doing that also.

We finally made it to the top where the Alpine Visitor station is located.  Here we found a Ranger who went in and looked up the phone number to the Longs Peak Ranger station so we should call for the weather forecast in that part of the park.  (Of course there is no cell phone service up by the Alpine Ranger station so we write the number down for later.)  Believe it or not, when you are in the mountains, the weather forecasts vary from one part of the park to another.  We had this secret Longs Ranger Station phone number  last year, but did not bring it along this year, nor did we write it down when we were at the Longs station two days ago.  These are things that Penny usually has written down in her little hiking traveling notebook.  Well, we could not find it, but once we had the number we wrote it in a couple of places in the book.

This is actually a small pond not very deep, but still has some ice on the left side.  Mt. Ida in the back.

At 11,800 feet we can see down through the valley.

Alpine Phacelia

On our drive up we saw three big herds of elk.  Looked like lots of doe and juniors.  We were thinking that we might see some elk today while out hiking on the trail, but no such luck.  We hiked down about 2.8 miles down towards Meeker trail. We meet three people coming up the trail all out of breath.  They had started from the bottom of Meeker Trail.  They were from Georgia and were looking for the Mt Ida trail.  Sorry to tell you but you missed the trail junction by about 1.5 miles.  They said they had come up through some pretty nasty snowy trails and were lucky not to be lost.  Well, you are not really lost, but you still missed the trail junction...  They still wanted to go to Mt Ida, so we set off blazing a trail up and then started wrapping around the mountain to the right side.  The three from Georgia had no sense of what to do when trying to find your way back.

Even through Kathi and I had two GPS, we still were a bit shaky on using the GOTO function.  So we used the old fashion way to find our way back, we built cairns.  As Kathi and I hiked up and out over to the right shoulder of the mountain we laid the return trail, the Georgia three some just kept hiking away.  I hope they know how to get back.  I guess they had a destination in mind and did not concern themselves with the return details…  The older guy just said we will just hike back towards “that” mountain…  Well you lose sight of “that” mountain as soon as you go around the bend…  And when faced with many mountains in a row, finding “that” mountain is sort of difficult!  Good luck with that!  Kathi and I went up until we had hiked about four miles.  We could see Mt Ida in the distance and we could see the trail that was not in the snow.  There just was no reason to tromp out the rest of the way.  We are up on the Continental Divide and from where we are you can see a long way!  Spending most of the day above 11,000 feet was helping thin out our blood.

Building a cairn

Just follow the cairns back.

On the return trip we just followed the little cairn guys we had built.  I also did some action research with the gps and learned on the fly so to speak how these little babies can show you how to get back...  Now I understand the goto waypoint and the screen with the map view.  Very nice.  I will be able to use that with more confidence now.  But there still is no substitute for common sense and old practice of cairns. 

We made it back to the Alpine station and went in a talked with the ranger up there.  We wanted to know if the Ranger Station could call Longs for us.  No, he was not able to do that. 

Elk herd right along along the road.

Ok, we have the number and can call when we have phone service on our cell phones.  After that we went over and looked through the gift shop.  As always, there are always crying kids in there do to the altitude which is 11,800.  It just makes them cranky.  On the way to the car we saw two guys with mongo lenses on camera and telescope.  They had their sights set on a small group of big bull Elk just up over the rise.  Talk about some nice racks!!!  They let us look through the telescope and get several ganders at the bulls, nice.  I believe they were of the 7x 7 size.

On the drive down we were stopped on the road by a stop/go flagman.  We sat for about 15 minutes before a lead truck brought a group of 70 cars past us.  A road crew was putting down fresh oil and then a cover of crushed tiny rock.  I bet all of the bike riders who went up to the top are REALLY going to be surprised and very sad when their trip down will now take on a whole new meaning of challenging.  I would not like to ride down that steep grade and then add to it loose tiny gravel.  I have a personal memory about falling on the downhill portion of a gravel road when racing my sister home.  Let’s just say loosing a front wheel while going downhill on a gravel road is a very lasting memory. Since my downhill in no way measures up to this downhill I am only guessing the best way down is to hitch hike…

We drive down to the Beaver Pond ranger station and Kathi goes into the ranger station while I sit in the car and look on the computer.  We are trying to get find that weather report for tomorrow, along with the next two days.  Trying to decide when we should take a crack at Longs…

Flattop Mt. and Hallets Peak

July 17, 2011  Flat Top Mountain up to Hallett’s Peak   Hiked 10 miles Total miles 87.9

3238 elevation gain Up to 12,713

We woke to blue skies today after going to bed with rain and thunder.  Off to Flattop Mountain today.  My notes from last year say that we made it in 2 hours and 50 minutes.  We keep that in mind and talk about when we did this hike last year what we had done before to work up to it…  We decide that we had done one less hike before trying Flattop .  We certainly have been trying to get up as high as we can in elevation that is possible to hike without being closed due to snow.  Since there is lots of snow here many of the hikes are affected by it.  In fact the Old Fall River road has yet to be plowed as the snow is still to deep there.

Yesterday on our drive to Estes from Snowmass we stopped in at the Indian Peaks area to see what information we could find.  We found a happy volunteer who is retired from being a fireman in the Chicago area.  She thought our ‘accents’ sounded familiar…She said she loves living in Colorado and doing volunteer work for the National Forest Service.  Hmmm, there is something to think about.  Retirement...  Oh, that is right we have years left to work.

Back to the hike, the skies seem very hazy today even with the blue sky.  Kathi thinks it is from the rain last night.  Well whatever it is the haze makes for pour vista pictures.  We pass some group of four kids somewhere in their teens and early twenties along with four adults.  Of the four adults one guy was a very cool hiker!  He had on his John Deere cap!  Got to love that!!  The other guy we think was a bit of a trail hog as Kathi and I wanted to pass him and he was not pulling over.  Kathi thinks he was having a testosterone moment and thinking his manhood was in jeopardy if he let two forty something women pass him.  His lack of physical fitness soon caught up with him and he was sucking some pretty serious air and had to stop and take a breather.  No matter who they are, they all are so easy to pass when they are out of shape!  Ohh that includes me too J

We do have to cross several spots of snow that has managed to hide in the trees.  The trail was easy to follow so it was not much of a hindrance.  The last pitch from the horse hitching rack up to the top of was very large snow patch.  The snow was very deep, but we were up there early enough so we did not sink in and were able to walk right up the snow up to the top.  This year we top out at 2 hours and 30 minutes. Faster than last year!  Kathi thinks it is because we stopped and chatted last year…We put on a long sleeve and press on towards Halletts Peak.

Kathi standing with a full grown pine that has been stunted by the cold and strong wind.  Called Krumholtz.

Hallets Peak seems like it should take much longer to get to the top as it seems to just stick way up in the air from where you are on top of Flattop.  It only take 25 minutes to rock pick our way up to the top.  We take a few pictures and see a dark cloud heading towards Longs Peak.  We ponder for about 2 seconds whether to eat lunch at the top or back down on the top of Flattop.  Just like that we know we will be heading down.  Thunder rumbles from yonder Longs Peak way.  We head down.  Within three minutes we are going down as fast as we can, the thunder just got fast and furious.   Kathi and I are running as fast as we can across the rocky terrain.    I just hate it when I am out of breath and going down hill.  It can only mean trouble is close. We are not alone as there are two others with us.  If you remember back to last year there are three things that attract lightening; tallest, sharpest, and biggest.  Once again I am trying to be the skinniest, shortest, tiniest thing out there.

We get to the bottom of the large snow field only to find the four young adults and four adults just below the snow field.  Of course the kids want to get to the top and the four adults are trying to yell and wave them back.  Ding-a-ling kids…  Keep this in mind: there is no summit that is more important than common sense!  I guess I will keep that forward in my mind also!

It rained and hailed all the way down.  The lighting and thunder seemed to just stay hovered over at Longs so at least we did not have to dodge any white bolts flying out of the sky.  

Storm brewing at Longs Peak

Turn and look the other way and the skies look great.

I think we should not stay on top of Hallets...

Fast track down...

It is getting ready to rain and hail.  We are fast tracking to get below tree line!

Hanging Lake and Travel Day to Estes Park

July 16, 2011  Hanging Lake  Hiked 3.2 miles   Total miles 77.9

Today is transfer day.  We drive from Snowmass to Estes Park.  We wish we had a few more days here, but we have reservations. 

Before we leave and put five hours of driving into this truck Penny checks the oil.  The truck is still binging every time we turn it on with the Change Oil reminder.  I think we are almost to the point of ignoring this bing.

On the drive up to Estes we pass through Glenwood Canyon.  If you ever want to be amazed, look that road up on the internet or better yet drive it.   The Interstate is tucked in and wrapped around the canyon walls right next to the river.  There are even long sections of tunnel that were blasted through the mountain.  And there is even a wonderful bike path that has its own run next to the river and road.  But, currently sections of the canyon bike trail are closed as the river has swelled out if its banks and over taken the trail.

Today we are headed just past Glenwood Springs up to the Hanging Lake trail.  Short, very steep, very pretty and be careful!  The trail is very busy.  Busy with people who should not be thinking they can hike in these conditions.  The trail goes up 1,000 feet in 1.5 miles.  The last push to the top is up and over a cliff wall.  But no worries the park system has installed a sturdy iron railing and blasted the rock into large but convenient steps.  If you are at all faint of a small cliff of 30 or so feet, then I suggest not going up all the way to this point, just stay down by the river and watch it flow by and hit the rapids.

This trail even has an offical resting hut.

Picture is taken from a board walk.  The water is very clear and we can see fish swimming in the lake.

The lake was small but a delightful hue of blue clear water.  There were several brown trout swimming about five feet from the edge.  But for those of you fisherman who pack a fishing rod up the trail, don’t throw it in this lake as it is off limits!

If you climbed an additional trail you were treated with a water falls that at the top flew straight out before falling some 60 feet.  The waterfall also featured two spots where the water spouted out of the rock wall.  If you were willing to get a bit damp you could also go behind the water fall.

If look carefully you can see secondary falls inside of the main fall.  You can also see a person walking behind the falls.

One thing I noticed is the people really smelled good!  I smell lots of perfume, aftershave and clean smelling soap smells.  I think I have been in the woods too long!  I tell Kathi and she said she was noticing the same thing. J  This brought a whole new meaning for good smells on this hike.  Usually it means spruce and firm smells….  We have been in the back woods too long J

The Hanging Lake trail is well worth the effort, but don’t go on the weekend unless you get an early start!  And for goodness sakes do not go if you think this is a site that is easy to get too.

Stretcher on one wheel. 

Interstate tunnels.  You can see a truck heading for the tunnel.  These are a mile and half long.

On the way down we met a woman who got her foot stuck in between two rocks and then lost her balance.  I do not need to say anything other than she was very calmly laying and waiting for help to arrive.  I said a prayer for her as I know her vacation plans are now very different then what they were before.  We waited for the emergency rescue team to pass, and then finished our hike.  The lady was going to be coming down the rocky trail in a stretcher balanced on one wheel along with four guys who had to fast hike up, and transport her down.

We had a very interesting drive over to Estes. We went by the way of the Peak to Peak road. 

We wanted to stop along the way at the Brainard Lake Trail system and see what kind of hiking we could expect.  We found we could do some good hiking here, but snow was still a big issue.  Bring equipment for snow.  Ok, we turn around on the paved 2 WD road and head on out.

Since this Peak to Peak drive also passed the Longs Peak trailhead and Ranger Station we felt we should stop in and check out the conditions of the trail up to the peak.  Just five weeks ago the trail was totally snowed in.  Certainly there has been a lot of melting going on. From what we could read on the limited trail conditions about Longs Peak on the July 4^th weekend Longs Peak was still rated winter conditions.  That means ice axe and crampons along with the knowledge of how to use them well.    

The parking at Longs Peak trailhead during the summer is usually a full lot with cars way down the road parked along the ditch.  We drive right up and have front row parking.  Hmm, it seems pretty quite here.  Ranger station is open and we meet with a ranger who was happy to tell us that today was the first day that the hiking rangers down graded Longs Peak to non technical.  We talked with the ranger for a long time to make sure that we understood what conditions were and when the best weather might create a window of opportunity.  We talked about the keyhole, the ledges, the trough, the bottleneck, the narrows, and the home stretch…We talked about what time to leave, what to bring, how much water to carry and shoes.  We laughed about what we see the younger generation wearing for hiking shoes; sandals, crocs and running tennis shoes. 

All in all, the ranger had good confidence in us that we could go up there and make it to the top.  Why we looked like we were in shape and had good hiking boots! We seemingly possessed the ability to ask the correct questions to seem like good candidates to do a class 3 climb.

We reviewed the weather forecast and, we think Wednesday might be the best choice.

Keep your fingers crossed.