July 10th/11th

July 10th 2015 and June 11th 2015

Just getting in a quick word, I'll finish this tomorrow. Today wasn't particularly difficult, I just made it difficult.  I slept in a little while trying to talk myself out of climbing Mount Massive only to give up and do it.  It was cold and extremely windy, maybe 50+ mph, I could barely stand. I made it up in an hour and fifty minutes and kinda ran back down in a little over an hour. On the way up I raced one of those ultra trail runners, he beat me back down as I'm not a big fan of running down mountains.  The chipmunks stayed away from my stuff and I was packed up and out by 9 or 10, I don't remember.

The trail was well groomed like a walking path in a city park. Well close enough, there were a few mud holes and rocky sections. Trudging through I made it 20 something miles to Tennessee Pass and camped out by the parking lot. I have all these car noises zipping by now. I would have liked to camp further out but I ran out of water and was looking for some. Oh! There was a cooler with trail magic in it. Not for me it was all gone but how cool, you never see that kind of thing out here.

I'm in Breckenridge/Silverthorne now because I woke up at midnight and hiked another 20 something miles. I had to get to the post office in Breckenridge before 1 pm when they close. I don't remember much but I made it. All of the hotels in Breckenridge were booked so I took the free bus to Silverthorne and convinced Viper, Tragic and Trivia to stay another night. They are taking the Ley route and I'm going to do a modified version of the Grey's Torrey's route to bag some more 14ers. Hopefully I'll see them in a couple days at Grand Lakes.

And we're off!

July 9th

Woot woot.

All done...

Today was a butt kicker. I climbed and descended like a champ. For lunch I made it to Twin Lakes, I had a super tasty pulled pork sandwich and some weird curly fries covered in cheese. I exhibited great self control and packed up after I dried out my tent and charged my phone. Thank god for that last part or I wouldn't be able to type this... Blogging while listening to Mozart on my mini jambox. I also just had a 30 minute phone conversation with Katie while eating dinner. Which I might add was a tasty Mountain House meal some CT hiker left in the hiker box. Silly CT hikers, I crossed paths with about 20 today. I think they are all going the wrong direction, one of them told me he can spot CDT hikers by their tiny packs. I was honored to be included in this group as my pack can grow as I start carrying dumb luxury items.

The weather and my timing didn't work out for an ascent of Mt Elbert. So I'm camped out at the base of Mount Massive, it was a few miles further and should be a good 14er. I'll leave my tent up and hope the chipmunks keep their distance. They will if they know what's good for them. My awful smelling socks should help. As long as it clears up and stops raining I'll try to get up there. I really don't want to as my body is pretty tired but I can't turn down a good challenge. I keep thinking about this saying "do it now as it's the best shape you'll ever be in" and boom, I'm a sucker for side trips.

July 8th - journaling against time

July 8th 2015

Almost out of battery life. I had a hot date with a new battery recharger but she canceled on me for some reason. Due to the lack of sun I'm on my last 8% of life. I even planned on doing a video journal but I hiked until dark and am currently not carrying my stage lighting setup.

Let's make it quick....

Woke up
Realized it was raining
Slept in until 7
Hiked in frozen clouds with no views
Chose this difficult route for the views
Stayed up high on the divide
Heard voices
Fell and ripped my new pants
Met a couple bus loads of Younglife people
Watched them cut switchbacks
Watched them drink hot cocoa
Had their leader in a bear hat/suit stare me down and not offer cocoa
Kept walking
Now hate Younglife and will say inappropriate things about premarital relationships to the next group I meet
Kept walking
And walking
Ate early lunch in break in rain
Tried to dry out tent
Didnt work
More hiking
Crossed a few rivers
Met some CT hikers
Got service and left nice voice message for Katie
Kept hiking
Got rained on a few more times
Got hailed on
Hid under tree while it rained, hailed and lightninged
Hiked up a mountain
Couldn't take photosphere of sweet pass
Ran down mountain
Hiked more
Setup tent and ate mashed potatoes with beef jerky dumped in
More rain

Twin lakes tomorrow if I'm lucky. I think it's only 8-10 miles away.  I'm really worried I won't be able to climb Elbert, we'll see what the weather does. 

July 7th - back to the trail

July 7th 2015

Getting back on trail is bittersweet, I don't think that I've ever used that word in a sentence before. This morning around 5:30 am I said goodbye to my amazing wife Katie. Over the last few days she was in Colorado visiting me I desperately tried to get her to let me come home with her. She would sternly shoot me down and tell me I couldn't come home until I finished my hike. So here I am still on the flipping trail, by myself, alone, in the freaking mountains, getting rained on in a cloud, and wondering if that noise I just heard is a grizzly bear.  If she was here she would tell me to man up and quit being a wimp. Oh well, only two more months...

Hiking today was, well hiking. The weather is really lousy and is forecasted to be pretty bad for the next couple of days. I got hailed on, rained on and maybe even clouded on.  There were a few times I sat in my own despair shivering and soaking wet under some tree waiting for it to stop raining... It never did. I made camp early and am now just sitting here while a good downpour is tap dancing on my tent and thunder is laying down the beats for the tap dancing rain drops. I'm using new stakes too, hopefully they hold up.

On a non negative positive note my body is doing well and the area I'm hiking in is really pretty dope. I'm willing to bet if it wasn't all clouded there would be some amazing views. I don't know my mileage but I'm about 5 miles of actual divide hiking from Cottonwood pass. I'll have to check the maps to see if I can make it to Twin lakes tomorrow. Just checked, the five miles I wasn't able to do today will keep me 5 miles from Twin Lakes tomorrow, oh well no rush.

Early to bed to dream about sunny skies and rain free forecasts.

July 2nd

July 2nd 2015

We bailed on Salida, CO after 2 days and nights of city life.  The first night was spent in a hostel paying way too much for a cramped up 3 bunk room. Bigfoot was mad that there wasn't any soap or shampoo to use in the showers. The second night was spent in total luxury at the Hampton Inn. Viper had points from hotels.com, Shu, now I know why you always buy the room on disc golf trips. So Reststop and I paid the difference, the hotel was still way overpriced. We spent the day with Squral and Laughs (Holly) at various drinking establishments. The night wasn't much different, you would be surprised to know that my backpack isn't much heavier and carries 12 PBRs like a champ.

That leaves us a day and night 3. Viper and I lounged around the room until checkout while Reststop got out of dodge as quickly as possible - he knew if he stayed it would never make it out of town. Eventually we walked to the post office and Viper got his new shoes. I've never seen a grown man so excited. Sitting outside the post office we met a nice lady and told her about our hike. Afterwards we headed to a pizza joint for the lunch special, pizza and a beer for $4.  From there it was off to Safeway so Viper could resupply. Viper convinced me to come up to the pass with him and camp for free instead of paying $25 to stay at the hostel. I agreed and bought a pack of hotdogs for dinner. I knew we were going to be screwed because it was already raining and thundering in all directions.  Eating my pint of ice cream outside, the same lady from the post office ran into us and said hi. A moment later she came back from her car to ask us if we needed a ride, of course we did!  The ride didn't get us to the pass but it got us a couple miles out of town. From there we got another ride to the Monarch Ski Area, we hopped the guard rail on the other side of the road and bushwhacked down to the Monarch Park campground. Much to our surprise, the place was getting logged out and completely empty. There was a logging crew nearby and they eventually spotted us. We just waved and the guy drove by, it is yet to be determined if the cops will show up and tell us to leave. One of the bathrooms is still open and there is even some TP, so we got that going for us.  Oh, and it's raining and thundering all over the place.

I'm sitting here in my awesome new tent super excited! Katie and I spoke before I lost service and she's on her way! I told her to look at my stop and try to find me in the morning. She is planning on making it to Grand Junction tonight, which is 4 hours away. I plan on sitting by the road and waiting for her in the morning, true love.