Day 1: I drove to Salida. Salida is a really cool small town and I think I could see myself living there. I stayed at the Simple Lodge and Hostel, which is a really cool place if you find yourself in Salida. Unfortunately I was the only one there, but did get to spend some time talking to Jon, the owner. I met up with a couch surfer Kyle at a great little brewpub called Amicus. Emily had recommended Amicus and the beer was great, but the people were better. Kyle was a really friendly guy who struck me as being about 10 years more mature than his age. He had offered to host me, but since I was getting up so early I didn't want to bother him. I talked to a few different people at the bar about Salida all of whom had great things to say. A waitress, Ashley and the bartender, Renee were both really great as well. I felt like I already had three friends in Salida. Everyone was a lot more friendly that I had expected and all were willing to learn about my trip and evangelize for Salida.
Day 2: I woke up at 0430 and met Andrew, an Army SF guy from Ft. Carson for the climb up Shavano. Andrew is also into a lot of different endurance sports with great success. He's been to the world duathlon championships a few times. Anyway, he had done all the work planning this climb, which I didn't have time to do and wouldn't have gotten far without him. We left the trailhead at 0600 and 9800 feet. There had been a lot of snow in the Sawatch range the
previous two days and we weren't sure what we were in for. For the most part the 70mph wind had kept most of the snow off the side we were climbing from, but there were still some snowy and icy areas. To make a long story short, it was cold (that's ice stuck to my hair and beard), we still had 30mph winds to deal with and 21 hours is not long enough to acclimate from 700 feet above sea level to climbing a 14er. However, it was gorgeous. We got above the treeline in time to see the sunrise over the clouds below us with snow covered peaks all around. When we reached the summit (14,229 feet) we were in real snow and had to deal with the full force of the wind. We had discussed going over to Tabeguache Peak, another 14er just a saddle away but I wasn't so sure once we were up there. We started a little ways down the traverse and were in waist deep snow. I wasn't up for going down through that when I was going to have to climb back up, particularly the way I felt. Andrew said he would give it a go and I took off for the trailhead on my own. It was a fun hike back and I could enjoy a slower pace and take things in. All told it was 10 miles and 4429 feet of climb. Andrew made it over to Tabeguache despite the snow, so now I'm a little mad I didn't tough it out. Next summer I'm going to do the double, just to say I did it. I also missed out on a free beer at Amicus by not getting the double. Here are a couple more photos from the day. You can see the rest here.
After the climb I went back into Salida for a shower and some lunch then took off for Gunnison. The folks in Salida didn't think I would care for Gunnison too much and they were right. It was half college town and half cowboy town. Everything seemed pretty run down to me and despite having the college there it seemed to only have college bars and none of the other things you expect with a college town. Gunnison is not on the list anymore.
I left for Boise the next day, where I'm at now. I will post on Boise another day, but so far it's lived up to what the spreadsheet said it would. The drive on all the rural highways through CO was amazing. It is definitely the most beautiful state I've been to outside of Alaska, but we will wait and see how MT and WY fit into that mix. I will try to post about Boise tomorrow when I get settled into Spokane.
2 comments:
nice icebeard, sir.
Post a Comment