1 Down, "53" to Go.

(ed. note) I say "53" in quotes because there is now way in hell I'm doing all of them. I will be lucky to get through the 13 easy ones. And By easy I mean "not going to fall off a cliff and die" ones.


June 7, 2008 - Colorado Springs, CO

Defying all odds (and gravity) I made it to the top of my first "14-er"! Laura, Brian and I woke up at 4:30 on a perfectly fine Saturday morning (you already think I'm lying don't you?) to tackle the first 14,000 foot mountain of the season. Laura picked one of the few with enough snow melt that we could actually attempt it without snowshoes or ice axes (wait...wha?) Pikes Peak. This was especially good for me, knowing that if something TERRIBLE happened, there is a nice driveable road that I could hitchhike my way up/down as the situation was needed. Nice little safety net for me.



Here's a picture at the very beginning of the hike. Look at me...I look lost already. Looks like a nice and easy walk through the park from here. I can handle that no problemo. Little did I know that within the morning I would be fearing for my life not 1, not 2, but three times. Ahh...so clueless...


So we keep hiking on and on and on. Really there isn't much to report on. Me being the city girl that I am, wasn't interested much in "taking in nature" as I had my trusty ipod strapped to my head for the majority of the walk. Here's a picture of where we were trying to get to, once we got above timberline and past Devil's playground.

Once he got out of the trees, the wind started. And didn't stop. And kept going. Hard. And fast. And cold. So back out come the gloves and hats. I had my ipod on full blast, with my head wrap, and the wind was blowing SO HARD that I couldnt' even tell that my ipod was turned on. It was freaking windy.

So we are hiking along trying not to blow away, still kinda of concerned that we really hadn't gained THAT much in altitude (maybe 2000 feet by then). When we rounded a corner past mini pikes peak (or whatever the name of it was, I can't remember) when I stop dead in my tracks. I can now officially say I've had a panic attack. Which is not a good thing to happen when you are 12000 feet in the air. See in this picture...
Right in the middle of the picture there is like a line of snow that starts up and to the left, then goes down the side like 45 degrees down and to the right? Yeah the side of that hill that IS COVERED IN SNOW and drops down into what B&L fondly referred to as "the bottomless pit". And we had to walk right across it. Anyway. I round the corner and see it. Snow covered slope falling away into nothingness. I sit down and freak out. Laura and Brian shortly come up behind me, and all I say is "I'm scared". Laura goes "That sucks I'll go first" and off they go. Luckily for her (and me) she did this, because I'm pretty sure that I would have sat there and thought about it long enough to talk myself out of it and turning around and going home. Honestly. 4 hours into the hike, I would have turned around and quit. That's how scared I was. But she didn't give me that opportunity and looking back, I thank her for that (I know you are reading this, so there you go, I admit it) Brian, being the helpful compassionate guy that he is changed the name for me to "topless pit" to make me feel better about it. Thanks Bri.

So I made it past that crazyness (please feel free to read all the comments, I'd be willing to bet that Laura has some input on how death defying it really was) and made it to the top! Woo-hoo!

Pikes Peak, Elev 14,110 feet