7 Summit Challenge

Back in August we registered to do the Seven Summit Challenge hosted by the City of Phoenix. I had talked about doing this for a couple of years, but never actually made it happen.

This was our hiking route - there were 3 different routes for the 7 Summits, and there was a 5-summit and 4-summit challenge as well. We decided to go big with all 7.

I woke up yesterday morning at 3:30am since we all met at my apartment to leave by 4:15am. This was our group at 4:55am right before starting the first trail - Dave, me, Gina, Brian, Christine, Kyle and Corina.

Lookout Mountain - Summit #1

On our way up Shaw Butte trail

Shaw Butte Summit...

...#2

Squaw Peak - Gina and I got our picture together on this one since it is "our" mountain (we do this one every Friday morning with our friend Amy).

Squaw Peak - Summit #3

Apache Wash - Apache Vista - Summit #4

Apache Wash - Ridgeback Overlook - Summit #5

Deem Hills - Ridgeline - Summit #6

Holbert Trail - Summit #7

We were feeling strong after 7 summits, 25 miles, 4,934 feet elevation gain and approximately 11 hours.

Downtown Phoenix behind us as we were descending South Mountain

Holbert Trail was the last hike for all of the PSC routes. After we finished the final summit, there was an after-party with live music, food trucks and churn ice cream.

We chose this food truck since they won the New Times Best of Phoenix in 2013.

This was our passport book for the day.

At the top of every summit we received a stamp.

My final time. Gina and Brian rocked it and were 27th and 28th overall with a time of 10:27:21. Dave beat me by 2 seconds and Kyle finished directly behind me.

My net time (not including driving was 8:06:27 and that was 41st out of 128 people who finished my route).

My parents were also along for the day - they were our drivers for the day as we had read that parking would be difficult at each trailhead (and from experience hiking some of these mountains without an event happening we knew that was a real possibility). But, parking was restricted to event participants so we never had a problem. I think they enjoyed their day ok though :)

All in all it was a fun day. We are all a little sore today but nothing unbearable. It was a fun bucket list item to complete and I would definitely do it again!