Our Attempt to Hike Mt. Elbert

Last Saturday Kellyn and I flew to Denver for the weekend to visit Kyle and with a goal to get to the peak of the highest mountain in the Rockies and also the high point of Colorado. This mountain is about a 2 hour drive west of Denver, so we drove up Saturday night to get an early start on Sunday morning. We stayed in Twin Lakes, CO which is a small mountain town.

Our hotel was the Twin Lakes Inn, and it was originally constructed in 1879 as a stage shop/hotel on the dirt path to Independence Pass and Aspen.

Ironically, we were staying in the Mt. Elbert Room.

Once we arrived on Saturday, we decided to take a walk down by the lake.

 Kyle was nuts to actually get in the water.

 Some of the leaves were starting to change...it was nice to see a little "fall."

This was the entire town.

They had a sheriff car parked by the side of the road...but it was just to get people to slow down. It worked for us as when we arrived I was making a u-turn and Kyle said to look out for the police car.

Having a little fun at the playground.

On Sunday morning we got up at 4am to get an early start on the mountain. We had been watching the weather all week, and it said partly cloudy for the morning, but then snow showers for the afternoon (at the peak). We figured it would take 6-8 hours round trip, so we wanted to be off the mountain by about noon or 1pm.

We made overnight oats for breakfast. They were so good and a perfect pre-hike breakfast.

Bundled up and ready to go. This was about 5:45am. It was 35 degrees when we started hiking, but a lot of these clothes came off within 10 minutes of getting going.

About a mile into the hike. You can slightly see the sunrise in the background.

Made it to the tree line. Notice the small amount of snow in the background. Also, that peak is the first false peak - it is not Elbert.

So far it was a pretty nice morning. It was probably around 8:30am here.

From the trailhead, it was about a 4,700 foot elevation gain and about 4.5 miles each way. This picture of Kellyn is at about 13,700 feet, so we had gone about 4,000 feet in elevation. This is as far as we got though. We talked to some guys who were on their way down, and they said it was really snowy at the top and slippery on the way down. There were a couple of groups ahead of us, but we watched the groups behind us turn around. Also, as you can see in this picture you can barely tell the path down as the snow was covering it fast. As much as we wanted to make it to the top, we (I) made the decision here to turn around as I didn't want to get stuck on the mountain. The weather reports were incorrect about timing of the storm, as we turned around sometime around 9:30am.

Almost back to the car after about 5 hours of hiking.

We didn't get to cross this 14er summit off the list, but it was still a nice trip and good to get away to a small town for 24 hours. Once we were finished hiking we drove back to Denver, took showers, went to dinner and then Kellyn and I slept on the plane ride back to Phoenix.

Cabin Day Trip

Today my mom, dad and Grandma Hazel were driving up for the day to the Hiatt's cabin in Happy Jack, AZ. I didn't have plans and had never been before, so I decided to go up for the day with them. We left Phoenix at about 7:45am this morning...goal was 7am, but we couldn't get on the road without a Starbucks stop.

On the way up we stopped at a local honey shop in Pine and I bought AZ local honey, peach butter and BBQ sauce. Wish I took some pictures but left my phone in the car.

We arrived at the cabin right at about 11am. We ate breakfast there, and then took Cruzer for a walk to see a couple of his siblings that still live up there. We then pretty much spent the afternoon on the porch, in sweatshirts, with blankets and a fire burning.

It rained in the afternoon for about an hour, and poured for probably a good 20 minutes. It was so refreshing to listen to the rain. The thunder was pretty loud too.

 Cruzer thinks he is a person and needed a chair for himself.

We stayed for dinner, and I found a recipe for honey mustard veggie kabobs.

Grandma, MaryAnn and Jim visiting on the patio before dinner.

I also made quinoa to go with the kabobs.

It was a great day. I decided that having a cabin up north would be kind of nice :)

Thanks to the Hiatts for having us.

And I am so thankful for every day that we get to continue to have Grandma Hazel here with us.

AZ High Point

I decided I should get back to blogging - I know it has been a LONG hiatus. I was working on my 2009 scrapbook the other night and it was so easy to come back to this blog to figure out details from certain events. If I ever get to 2012 and 2013 in my scrapbooks it is not going to be as easy to come back to this blog for details since they will not be here. 

This last Saturday, August 24th, I hiked to the top of Mt. Humphrey's in Flagstaff, AZ. I have been wanting to do this hike for a while, and someone from New City planned it so of course I said yes. We left Phoenix at about 6am Saturday and made it to the base of the mountain a little before 10am. I had been watching weather.com the entire week because it said "scattered thunderstorms" but only a 40% chance.

The beginning of the hike was pretty simple - felt like we were in a rain forest (especially since it had started raining at this point).

You can't really tell, but there is a Snowbowl ski slope in the background of these pictures.

Tim and Dave had gotten in front of Kyle and I but we caught them here just before we got above the timberline.

As soon as we got above the timberline and we were out of the tree cover, it was miserable on the mountain. It was windy, freezing and the rain was coming down hard. Just past the saddle I made the comment that I was ok with not making it to the top. Tim then said let's get to the first false peak (there were multiple) and make the decision from there. Fortunately after a bit of time the rain had let up and once we were to one false peak we decided we couldn't turn around without making it to the top.

Made it to the top in about 2 and a half hours - we were all pretty happy with the time since it said it takes about 3 hours to get to the top, and most people take 4 to 4.5 hours. We only stayed at the top for about 5 minutes because it was hailing, windy and freezing.

Conquered the top of AZ - 12,633 feet.

                                    

There really was no view given all the clouds.

Once we got back into tree cover we took a short break to eat something. Usually when I hike I stay at the top for a while and have a snack but since it was so cold up there we just wanted to get down. We were all still pretty cold at this point...I didn't have feeling in my hands until we got to the car.

Back to where we started - that is Mt. Humphrey's in the background of this picture. It was sunny and warm again back at the base. This hike was definitely an experience to remember. I would like to go again when the forecast says "sunny." Good job team - and now I am so happy that we did not turn around. We definitely would have regretted not making it to the top!