"Oh God! It's me!" Damn, I was rank. I had just dropped off a pair of hikers I came across on the Mt Princeton road. Given my cab was in disarray from gear tossed everywhere, the two hopped in the bed and held on for the bumpy ride down the 4-wheel-drive road. If my windows were open when I responded to their hitchhikers thumb, they probably would have jumped in the back given the foul odor I was emitting.
What could I expect? I was still wearing the same polypro I put on Saturday morning. When I woke up Sunday at camp, I thought, "Why get other clothes dirty since you'll be sweating 15 minutes after setting off?"
When I got back to the truck I thought it was as big of a folly now to put on the fresh set of clothes since I would be home in less than three hours.
Now, I would have gladly traded my soul for a clean pair of boxer shorts.
Option D
My sights were set on Crestone Needle when last week began. If I could scrounge up a partner, the route I wanted to take was the Ellingwood Ledges - a 50 Classic Climbs of North America route. If I went solo, then up the punter route, maybe swing over to the north buttress and do some 5th-class up the last few hundred feet, and if the weather held, do the exposed traverse up and over to Crestone Peak.
And then Thursday and Friday happened. It rained, and it rained, and if you were high enough up, it snowed. I knew from a pal who climbed the Ellingwood Ledges route, this wasn't a mountain you wanted to be on when wet.
So Friday night I went to sleep with the Gore Range dancing in my head. Saturday morning I woke up and looked out west and was dismayed. There was quite a bit of snow blanketing Mount Evans.
It wasn't the snow. It was there wasn't enough snow. There would be just enough to cover things, melt on Saturday and Sunday and make the two peaks I had in mind treacherous.
Well Option C was a return trip to Fruita, but I decided to keep that one in reserve for next month with a buddy.
And so Option D it was.
Welcome to Buena Vista.
Saturday was spent bouldering and firewood gathering. The bouldering, well, let's just say I have the crimping strength of a paraplegic Still the two sessions were good. The first one came to an unceremonious end of me jumping from 10 or so feet up and sprinting away in my climbing slippers. With my feet perched on tiny crimps I reached up to my next handhold, and when my fingers were a couple of inches from the pocket, four wasps exploded out like X-wing fighters on the Death Star trench run.
Pulling over the lip on this sitdown start took a while. Body tension and methodical movements let my pull off of two slaps and get my right foot up.
Purging away the negative vibes. The fire was a good one, lasting over three hours.
Sunday after a cappuccino and a chocolate chip scone (not even remotely as good as my mother's), I made my way up the Mt Princeton Road. Now I've been on worst roads - stuff where you feel more like you're rock crawling than driving. But this by far is the road I never, ever want to drive up again. It was as wide as your vehicle and as I slowly lurched up the miles at a blitzing speed around 12 mph, I kept praying nobody would be coming down, cuz there are maybe a handful of very narrow pullouts on the stretch.
View from my parking spot around 11k. The way up follows the left skyline.
Why? Why would I do another choss slog? Well, it seemed like something to distract me - and this was a weekend of much, much needed distraction. I started hiking up the road and finally reached the trailhead. Off I went. Not much blow-by-blow. It's a friggin hike on choss.
Looking back towards the east. You can see the ribbon of Hwy 285 leading back into the hills and into South Park - the flat wasteland in the distance.
Two hikers I'm about to lap. I stopped counting after 12. People move slow & I've spent a lot of alpine time this summer, what can I say?
Looking towards Mt Democrat, Independence Pass, et al
Looking towards Gunnison and Crested Butte.
Looking back towards Buena Vista and the craggy foothills where I slept Saturday night.
Yes those are headphones in my ears. iPod is one of the 10 essentials on this trip.
I made it up in less than 2 hours. I made it down in almost the same amount of time. Two hikers lost their companion who stopped 300 feet short of the summit. I found him slowly plodding down a ways down. I yelled at him to stop and wait where he was and then signaled up to his buddies, still high up on the ridge.
I saw three teens cutting down too quickly and getting themselves in some nasty talus slopes. Because I'm an idiot and still have some concern for fellow beings, I dropped down myself to make sure they were okay and then directed them out towards the trail. I'm becoming more mountain goat (sans horns) this summer and getting quite used to the talus balancing.
I was distracted, it was good. Now just need to make it through Monday.
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