tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-76761579049011764602024-02-21T07:28:26.219-07:00The Banksian SphereJon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.comBlogger191125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-74204374371500336562016-12-18T20:41:00.000-07:002016-12-18T20:41:33.965-07:00Jon and Shelby's Christmas Letter - 2016<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">It's that time of year again when I try to write about our entire year in just a few paragraphs. Shelby and I have had lots happen over the past year, so it's a challenge to keep this short, but I'll try anyway! To summarize it in one sentence, I would say we've learned a lot and God has proved himself faithful in 2016.</span></div>
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Shelby is still working as a nurse for Denver Public Schools at three different elementary schools. It’s been a good job for her and she enjoys that she can help kids and their families. She always comes home with great stories about Diabetes Club and her kids with all kinds of interesting ailments. Most recently a student came into her office claiming that she was stuck walking sideways. The nice thing about working at schools is that she got the summer off, so that allowed us to spend lots of time together in the afternoons and my days off and allowed us to make a few trips.</div>
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Afternoon adventure in Clear Creek Canyon</div>
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I lost my job in January and spent the better part of 2016 working part time jobs and looking for a permanent job. I worked as a substitute teacher for DPS first,
which was a good learning experience, but incredibly challenging. For the summer and fall
I found a job working at the Golden Bike Library. If you’re wondering what that
is, it's like a regular library, but instead of books they do bikes! I learned a lot about working on bikes and
had a lot of fun talking with all kinds of people who stopped by. My time
working part time jobs was at times hard, but we were very thankful for those
jobs and the experiences that came with them. In November, I started working at
3D at Depth, working with subsea LiDAR systems, which are basically for taking
3D laser scans at the bottom of the ocean. It’s been a great job so far and I am learning a lot.</div>
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Best office in town at the Golden Bike Library</div>
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We have been married for almost two years now and live in
the same little house in Lakewood. The house has a large plot of land across
the street to the west which gives us a clear view of the mountains. So one of our favorite parts about the house is sitting
on the porch together sipping a drink and watching the sunset over the
foothills. In March we started going to a new church in Denver called Park
Church and are enjoying building friendships there and are feeling more at home
there. We've been playing a lot of disc golf this year and Shelby has been killing it. I've been playing disc golf for 10 years and I've never thrown a hole-in-one. Shelby's been playing for only 2 years and she got two aces this summer. She's a natural!</div>
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<o:p>Our other favorite thing about our house </o:p></div>
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This spring we went on a little culinary adventure called
the Whole30. The gist of it is that you don’t eat any grains, alcohol, added
sugar, beans, or dairy for 30 days. It was pretty hard at times, but it forced us to start looking
for alternative dishes to eat that aren’t so heavy on the carbs and to eat more
veggies. We learned a lot through it together and found some awesome recipes
that we continue to make regularly. Barbacoa taco bites with slaw on butternut
squash discs was one of the many amazing dishes Shelby concocted.<o:p></o:p><br />
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Barbacoa taco bites</div>
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Our list of big outdoor adventures was shorter than normal
this year, with most of our outdoorsing being quick after work adventures close
to town. But the big adventure for the year was a 300-mile bike tour around
northern Colorado. This took us from Fort Collins up to Estes Park, over Trail
Ridge Road to Grand Lake and Walden, then back down Poudre Canyon to Fort
Collins. The tour was really challenging, but really fun. We got to see a
beautiful part of the state we hadn’t spent any time in before and got to meet
all kinds of cool people along the way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
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We were pretty busy with traveling to South Carolina this
year with a total of 4 trips - a new record! We got to attend Shelby’s cousin's
wedding and her grandpa’s funeral. We got to welcome our new niece Ellison
into the world in July and then spent Thanksgiving with the Salley family in November. For Christmas,
we’ll be going to Alaska for my first time since 2012 and Shelby’s first time
ever!<o:p></o:p></div>
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Our cute niece Ellison</div>
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We’re looking forward to our new year, enjoying the things
that stay the same and all the new changes that are bound to occur. This year
has been a year where God has proved his goodness and ability to provide and we
look forward to knowing that to be true next year as well.</div>
Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-91544751458973983962016-06-30T20:31:00.000-06:002016-06-30T20:40:09.675-06:00Tour de Northern ColoradoEarlier this year Shelby started researching bikes that go by the names of Long Haul Trucker, Kona Sutra, and Marrakesh. These bikes are not known for being quick and agile despite looking like road bikes. They're designed for carrying a lot of junk long distances comfortably. Yep, she was getting the touring itch. With the school year coming to a close and no promising job prospects for me, we decided to go on a week long adventure, biking somewhere in Colorado. After throwing out a few ideas, we settled on a 290 mile tour around Northern Colorado. The route would go from Fort Collins to Estes Park, climbing over the infamous Trail Ridge Road to Grand Lake, up to the thriving metropolis of Walden, then back down Poudre Canyon to Fort Collins. Despite living in Colorado for 5 and 11 years, we had never been on 95% of the roads we'd be travelling on. No new bike for Shelby, this time, but her trusty Trek Madone was up for the challenge.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTR2ioiCjhngOkUp5btQCGy4jqwJbnE1uhXkvcf08sinSNCr2zLk1AqZ8cBWhDGGCleX9Qvu7tKfst8KYiZHZlMnUKoOgkFZx2DgtGGngOLtd1-h_8llrBPmkqp77M5VEG5hEkxuQz3ljZ/s1600/Colorado+Tour+Route.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="344" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhTR2ioiCjhngOkUp5btQCGy4jqwJbnE1uhXkvcf08sinSNCr2zLk1AqZ8cBWhDGGCleX9Qvu7tKfst8KYiZHZlMnUKoOgkFZx2DgtGGngOLtd1-h_8llrBPmkqp77M5VEG5hEkxuQz3ljZ/s640/Colorado+Tour+Route.png" width="640" /></a></div>
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An easy 26 hours according to Google</div>
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We parked our car at James and Dallas' house in Fort Collins and made our way to Loveland. Our elevation chart showed a nice flat ride down to Loveland, followed by some ups and downs and then a pretty serious climb for our first day. I asked Shelby how it felt to be on a bike tour while riding through Fort Collins and she said that it would feel more real once we set up camp. It didn't quite feel real yet, but when we turned right in Loveland to head up Big Thompson Canyon, the hills sure felt real! We admittedly didn't train as hard as we should have for this ride, but we set it up so that we had relatively short days, so it seemed manageable. </div>
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Soon we fell into a rhythm and remembered what it was like to ride slow. The canyon was quite beautiful and the climb wasn't too steep, so our slow pace allowed us to stop often for pictures and enjoy the canyon. Eventually, it got to be pretty tough and I was relieved to pull into the small town of Drake, where we'd be camping for the night. A 26 mile day that sounded pretty easy on paper ended up being pretty tough and I was exhausted. We set up our tent at the Drake Campground, then grabbed a beer in the local bar to get away from the standard afternoon showers. That night we met Lori and Jeff, our campground hosts who have apparently been running the Drake Campground for a long long time. They had a really awesome cabin that they lived in and I assume built back in the day.<br />
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Showing off her sweet farmer's tan</div>
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Tired</div>
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Day two was a nice 10 mile ride up to Estes Park. After how hard day one ended up being, we needed a good short day to recover before what would be a brutal day three. The ride up the rest of Big Thompson Canyon was nice. It was less steep than yesterday and the scenery was quite nice. The rock shifted from some kind of chossy black stuff to nice granite and the river grew slightly more clear as we rode upstream. We brought our fly rods, but the river looked too murky to stop to fish.</div>
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An excellent little free library find in Estes Park</div>
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Once we got to Estes Park, we setup our tent at the KOA. The spot was perched up on the hill with a great view of Long's Peak, so we were pretty happy with that ... and the ability to shower. We spent the day in Estes Park grocery shopping, checking out she shops, eating a cookie, throwing some flies in Lake Estes, and sampling the local beer at Lumpy Ridge Brewing, which was excellent. We met a really friendly older couple at the brewery and chatted with them for a while while we sipped on our Dirty Face IPAs. We also spent some time with our neighbor at the KOA around his campfire before heading to bed early.</div>
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Our okay view from the campsite</div>
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Day 3: The day I had been worrying about for over a week. The plan was to climb for over 18 miles to the top of trail ridge road in Rocky Mountain National Park up to 12,300ft, then to cruise downhill for over 26 miles to Winding River Resort in Grand Lake. The whole day would have 6,000 feet of elevation gain and I wasn't sure my legs could do it fast enough to sneak over the summit before the 40% chance of afternoon showers. We opted for the alpine-ish start of 5:00 for the wake-up call, getting us out of the campground by 6:15. We had about 6 hours to get back down to tree line on the other side. Here we go!</div>
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The ride started out with a nice and very gradual climb through town and up Fall River Rd to get into the park. We rode next to a wide meadow on our left for a ways and saw some tourists out of their cars, taking pictures. There was a bear just across the river! We were really excited to see it and enjoyed a couple minutes watching it walk around.</div>
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Soon, the real climbing started. The road curved to the left and got steep. Riding at 4mph is really very slow, but that was the speed that I could ride at on this grade without hating life too much, so I just churned along as Shelby pulled ahead and out of sight. She waited for me at the intersection with highway 36 and then we were officially on Trail Ridge Road. The next half mile was downhill, which is the worst thing ever when you know you're just going to have to climb back up that lost elevation. Oh well. </div>
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I could describe every detail of the climb, but the gist of it would be that after a little while we started to get quite tired and then it was just a long slog. The scenery was very nice, especially above treeline. We got passed by a handful of cyclists and lots of cars. At one point, we ran out of water and had to filter the snow-melt water on the side of the road while onlookers gawked at us, wondering why the heck I was holding a bag of water over my head. After what felt like forever we made it to the top of the road, an unmarked spot in the road where we and a few other cyclists took victory photos.</div>
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The long road</div>
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We stopped at the the cafe at the top for a sprite and some lunch and then made our way down the backside. The descent was really fun and long and we got up to 45mph at one time! Those miles really tick by at that speed. The miles continued to tick by pretty quickly for the rest of the afternoon. The day finished with a long and gradual downhill to Grand Lake where we learned an important lesson. Don't camp 3 miles before town and then ride down the steep 3 mile long hill to town to get groceries and then come back after the hardest day on your tour. Just stay in a hotel in town. We were dead at the end of the day and spent our evening eating two dinners and playing games in our tent while we waited out a 30 minute storm.</div>
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Day 4:</div>
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Today we rode from Grand Lake to Denver Creek Campground. It was probably the most pleasant day of the tour. It started out with a gradual downhill all the way to Granby, followed by a 6 mile round trip detour to the grocery store (Ugh). But the rest of the day entailed an easy climb followed by some pretty flat and scenic riding with little to no traffic. It was so nice not to have cars passing us constantly. We could actually ride next to each other instead of single file!</div>
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Shelby, mastering the art of no-handed riding with a bunch of weight on your bike </div>
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Quiet and pleasant road</div>
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This evening we waited out yet another storm in the tent and played more mancala and Connect 4. After the storm we met a couple other touring cyclists. John was an older man doing the second half of the TransAmerica tour, going east to west after having to stop in Pueblo on his attempt last year. We also met Barb, an older Canadian woman who had a friend driving in an RV with her, so she was riding 70-100 mile days and didn't have to carry any gear! Sounded pretty plush. The cool thing about meeting other touring cyclists is that you become instant friends. It was great to chat with them for a while and get to know them some.</div>
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Barb. Check out her highly entertaining blog <a href="https://barbsbigbikeride.com/">here</a></div>
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Day 5: Today we rode to Walden, the self-proclaimed moose viewing capitol of Colorado. The first half of the day was a continuation of the pleasantness of yesterday's ride. We rode through evergreen covered hills with large meadows in between with barely any traffic for the first third of the day. This part of the day concluded with our second Continental Divide crossing over Willow Creek Pass. The second half of the ride seemed to draw on and on as we passed through flat ranch country with a head wind on a really rough road. The elevation chart for the day seemed easy, but it ended up being one of our harder days due to the head wind and roughness of the road. We saw a couple riders with very little gear who were part of the Trans America race across the country. They had left from Astoria, OR only 7 days prior... Ridiculous. After a mentally draining day riding we got to Walden, picked up some groceries, stopped in a cafe for a beer, did some laundry, and then called it a night in a cheap hotel. I had been sleeping poorly on my sleeping pad so it was really nice to sleep on a real mattress.</div>
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At least we're not in Kansas</div>
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Day 6: Today was another hard day, but one of the most scenic days of the tour. We rode up Cameron Pass and then down the backside to a campground in Poudre Canyon. We rode through the town of Gould, which seemed like a pretty dead place. Next, we rode through State Forest State Park for a long time, through beautiful scenery at a pretty slow pace because it was a gradual climb for a really long time. We made it up to Cameron Pass and bundled up for the descent. It had been a pretty chilly day, but pedaling uphill kept us warm enough. </div>
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Shelby putting on her pants in the middle of the road</div>
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We started the descent, but it wasn't more than a couple miles before WHAM! I had ridden over a bad pothole and could hear air leaking out of my tire. I had been wondering when we'd get a flat tire! We stopped and after a comedy of errors, we finally fixed my tire. First try, I put a new tube in without checking for thorns or holes in the tire. Of course, after pumping up to 80psi with a hand pump, which is quite hard and takes a long time, I broke the valve somehow, rendering the tube useless. Bummer. Next up, I put a new tube in and remembered that we had CO2 cartridges to pump up our tires, so I used one. This was my first time using a CO2 cartridge, so I failed epicly and managed to hold the cartridge on so long that the air went in and then completely out of the tube. Doh! Next try I used my pump again since we only had one more CO2 cartridge. This time the tube got punctured because of a hole in the tire. Ugh. I've heard that you can use a dollar bill to cover over holes in a tire, so I asked Shelby for a buck and slid it over the hole. The tube I just broke a hole in was our last tube, so I patched it up and put it in the tire one more time. This time, I'd try the CO2 again and be careful not to mess it up again. It pumped right up and actually held! Whew! We were on our way again and it wasn't long till we arrived at our campground and enjoyed a relaxed evening playing games.</div>
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Going crazy after 4 attempts to fix a flat tire</div>
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Day 7: We had planned on making this an eight day tour, but due to extreme cravings for burgers with bbq on top and poor fishing conditions on the Poudre River, we decided to head back to Fort Collins today. It would make for a 60 mile day, but it was all downhill and ended up being pretty easy. The day had some nice scenery, but we rode so fast, I didn't stop a whole lot to take pictures. Our usual average up to this point had been 10-11mph, but today we averaged 15mph, so we were moving! We made it back to Fort Collins by early afternoon and had a second lunch at some burger joint and enjoyed some celebration burgers.</div>
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Poudre Falls</div>
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Scouting Poudre Falls for next time, err I mean never</div>
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We had a really good time and we'll be doing more tours together in the future for sure. </div>
Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-39029106622085016002015-12-20T11:53:00.001-07:002015-12-20T11:53:41.802-07:00Jon and Shelby's Christmas Letter - 2015<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Merry Christmas! Once again it's time to update you on our lives and I've been keeping meticulous records this year. It marks my 10th year in Colorado and Shelby's 4th year. We visited 4 different states, rock climbed over 150 pitches, survived 345 days and counting (we're hoping for 365 this year). We purchased 1 dress, 1 suit, 2 rings and are about to celebrate 9 months of marriage. Adding everything up, it's been a pretty good year!</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">After
a quick 6 month engagement, we got married this past March in South
Carolina. The ceremony was at the top of a beautiful mountain and we
had a great time celebrating with our friends and family. For our
honeymoon, we went to Leavenworth Washington. On the way, we
discovered the best biscuit sandwich ever and purchased an entire
king salmon, which made for a fun week in the mountains with plenty
of delicious food.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">We
spent a lot of time outside this year hiking, biking, fishing and
climbing. Some of the highlights were climbing Spearhead in Rocky
Mountain National Park, fly-fishing on the Frying Pan River with
Shelby's family, backpacking the Lost Creek Wilderness in Colorado,
and a climbing trip to Red Rock Canyon in Nevada.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Shelby
is enjoying her new job as a school nurse for Denver Public Schools.
She always has good stories like the time a kid told her that she
should dress up as Darth Vader because it was like she worked in the
death star since she has the office where people come to die! I'm
still enjoying being an engineer at ITN Energy Systems, but have far
less interesting stories about the batteries I work on.</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">We've
been blessed to have another wonderful year together and will report
back in 12 months!</span></div>
Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-40709701658397885962015-12-05T13:54:00.000-07:002015-12-06T09:13:07.097-07:00You Went to Vegas to do What?<div style="text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQefhpLi2U1j0XHciFxt6U4fSJtVLFMT_4zMmGizOU2GHP-xvNfmAr38abrr82TAkkzxd1ti2oG6uEsNcKMcEwdf21GWUci0xjk-4-8UcrA-t-HhO7g2qgziGM6aSJLH6TzhusGdXlGG-g/s1600/IMG_0045.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgQefhpLi2U1j0XHciFxt6U4fSJtVLFMT_4zMmGizOU2GHP-xvNfmAr38abrr82TAkkzxd1ti2oG6uEsNcKMcEwdf21GWUci0xjk-4-8UcrA-t-HhO7g2qgziGM6aSJLH6TzhusGdXlGG-g/s640/IMG_0045.JPG" width="360" /></a></div>
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It was completely dark and we were walking along an angled slab with a giant vertical wall to the right and a huge drop off to the left. Our headlamps gave us light to see 30 feet in front of us, but the rest of the landscape was dimly lit by the full moon and the lights of Las Vegas. Before this climb we joked that we'd always know which way was east as long as we could see the light beam shining up from the Luxor. It actually ended up being quite useful! We had been going for 12 hours non stop, so we were beat. We had climbed 13 pitches and were working on a complicated descent into Oak Creek Canyon, which we could follow back to our car. The slabs were wearing on us. We had to be careful not to slip when it got steep and the tension we felt, not being certain of our route, was stressful. We were ready to be done. We were actually ready to be done 3 hours ago, but we had no option but to continue. Looking beyond our headlamps we saw a terrace with trees on it, the first trees we had come across in a while in this sea of sandstone. Looking at our route description we knew that the terrace was a sign that we'd be off the slabs soon. We walked through the trees and just before turning to head downhill I saw a pair of eyes. The eyes moved and the creature started crawling down a steep rock. With my headlamp, I could see that the animal was about the size of a small fox. It stopped to look at us again and all I could see were white eyes again. As it continued crawling down, I caught a glimpse of a long furry ringed tail. "It's like a fox or a lemur thing! That's awesome!" I exclaimed. I was so excited that for a moment I forgot about the crick in my neck and how tired and thirsty I was and felt like a kid again, seeing a new animal for the first time.<br />
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In March last year, my Dad and I were hiking towards this same canyon. We had flown into Vegas for a backpacking trip to the Grand Canyon and did a short hike in Red Rocks to check out a climb that I had been dreaming about. I was just starting to really get into climbing and had read about a nice little climb called Solar Slab. The idea of climbing a long multipitch route was what inspired me to get into climbing in the first place and this was a long climb. 13 pitches of rock climbing sounded like a pretty cool adventure. At that point I hadn't even placed a piece of trad gear and had been climbing less than a year, so it was hard to imagine climbing something like that. But I explained to my dad the difference between top roping and leading and how cams and nuts work. I wondered if someday I'd learn how to actually use these skills I had read about and climb the Solar Slab.<br />
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The picture I took last year with my Dad. Solar Slab goes up the big white slab on the left</div>
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To many rock climbers, Solar Slab sounds like an easy day out. It's only rated 5.6, which is about as easy as a technical rock climb gets. But that easy grade meant that we could climb fast and cover a ton of ground within the short days of late November. The idea of a really long, easy climb sounded like a fun thing to do, but Shelby wasn't super keen on it at first. We initially planned to stick to the shorter climbs, but out of the blue one day she said, "I think we could climb fast enough to do Solar Slab." So we went for it.<br />
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We started out the day with an hour walk to the base of the climb and walked part of the way with another couple from Colorado. I don't remember their names, but they were really friendly and allowed us to start climbing first. If we hadn't been the first on the climb, we may have not gotten to the top before dark, which really would have sucked, so we were very thankful for them.<br />
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To approach the Solar Slab climb proper, we climbed a 4 pitch 5.7 route called Johnny Vegas. From what I heard, the climb was worth climbing on it's own, even without linking it with the rest of Solar Slab. Shelby lead first up the pitch following a crack with an unbelievable amount of features on the face to use for holds. Typically on trad climbs, you have to jam your hands and feet into cracks, but we found that many of the climbs at Red Rocks have so many face holds, jamming is rarely required. This made the climbing feel easier and was just a lot of fun.<br />
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Johnny Vegas goes up and to the left in the middle of this photo</div>
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We continued up another pitch which followed discontinuous crack systems straight up the face. On this pitch I realized that finding protection at Red Rocks could sometimes be tricky. There were long stretches without any cracks on this route, but the features of the rock often times created gaps between features that provided places to put gear. This was new to me, but I soon got used to it and enjoyed the process of looking carefully for protection opportunities. </div>
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Next, we traversed around a huge bulge by following a really sweet diagonal hand crack, which of course required nearly no jamming due to the abundance of face holds!</div>
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The diagonal crack</div>
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We had a great time climbing on Johnny Vegas. The climbing felt easy compared to a lot of the trad climbs we had done in Colorado and it was just a lot of fun climbing on such unique rock. Something that I've realized recently is that climbing teaches you to appreciate little details about rocks that you wouldn't notice just walking by a cliff face. We scrambled up easy slabs to get to the base of the Solar Slab proper and nobody was on the route yet! This was great because we didn't want to be held up by anyone and if we were to start climbing the route we needed to get to the top. In order to get off the route once you're on it is to either rappel with two ropes or to climb to the top and take the Painted Bowl descent off the backside, which can be done with only 1 rope. We didn't want to have to deal with a second rope, so we went for the second option. The climbing was well within our ability. We were moving at a good pace and had an early enough start that we knew we could get to the top before dark without anyone in front of us. And if for some reason we had to rappel, there would be many other parties climbing the route who could lend us a rope if need be. After doing some calculations, we determined that we could easily get to the top before dark and started climbing again.</div>
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Contemplating the rest of the climb. Note the headlamp, just in case...</div>
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The rest of the climb was something of a race with the clock. We didn't feel super hard pressed to climb fast, but knew we couldn't just doddle around all day or we would be caught in the dark. I didn't take as many photos as I would have liked, but rather just enjoyed the climbing. </div>
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There were a lot of pitches. Most were pretty fun, sometimes we combined two pitches into one to climb faster. The climb started with a very easy slab to the base of a crack that went over a bulge and up to a large ledge. Fun pitch, but it felt hard for a 5.6. Next up we followed a giant flake up and to the left, through a chimney and up to an uncomfortable stance. Then we went up and over to a tough corner where all the good holds were away from the crack, but I had to use the crack for protection, so it was tough to make the placements.<br />
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At this point I was getting pretty tired and the pressure of needing to climb fast was starting to wear on me. We were still making good time, but it was kind of a bother to not be able to climb slow and enjoy ourselves. Our next long pitch started with about 150 feet of a sweet hand crack which required some fun jamming as well as good face holds. This pitch traversed over to another crack where I belayed from a really uncomfortable spot. I was ready to be done. My neck started bothering me a few pitches back from belaying in awkward positions and it was killing me now. If we had two ropes I would have turned around at this point. But since we had one rope and no one else was within a couple pitches of us to rappel with, we pressed on, looking forward to being able to walk unroped. </div>
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We continued up a couple of easy pitches and got to a terrace where we could unrope, go to the bathroom and relax for a few minutes. But of course we couldn't stay long, so we scrambled up a class 4 slab to the base of the final pitch. It's really a beautiful pitch and the majority of the people who climb the route don't climb it because you can't rappel off of it. Most climbers turn around at pitch 7. I led up the corner, enjoying the fun climbing and told Shelby, "This pitch is great!" I continued up the corner until just below the top where the wall to the left closed in, forcing me to squeeze through a tiny gap. I took off my helmet so I could move my head around, removed my backpack and dangled it from my harness with a sling so that I could fit into the gap and wriggled my way up. Shelby couldn't see me at this point, but I yelled down to her, "Um you won't like the end of this pitch!" She's not a fan of squeeze chimneys, but she was able to figure out a way up without having to squeeze through the gap!</div>
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The scramble pitch and the beautiful black varnished corner of the final pitch above</div>
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We were finally done with the technical climbing and it was 3:00. 1.5 hours till sunset. Not too bad, but at this point I knew we would at least be walking in the dark some before we got to our car. We still had to scramble uphill along slabs to get to the top of the shoulder we'd be going around. Shelby's feet were killing her because her shoes were too small, but eventually we got to a point where she could take them off and put on approach shoes. </div>
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The final scramble and the pre-sunset shadow<br />
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We made it to the top of the slabs and saw another climbing couple topping out a different route. They pointed us in the direction of the descent route, so we headed down a narrow ledge for a ways, looking for rappel anchors. We got to a point where you had to jump across a gap to a giant block. It looked doable, but we set up an anchor with gear so Shelby could rappel the short section and I followed by making the jump after taking down the anchor. At the end of the ledge we found two bolts that we could rappel from. Since we only had one rope, we had to rappel diagonally to another ledge, which lead us to an old gear anchor which had a nut, a piton shoved into a large hole, and a bunch of slings. It didn't give us the most confidence in the world, but it was good enough. Finally we made the last rappel from a tree and were done with the rappels for the day, just in time for it to start getting dark.<br />
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The ledge leading to the rappels</div>
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Down we walked, traversing along angled slabs. Sometimes they would get steep and we'd have to walk carefully, other times we'd be able to walk at a decent pace. Eventually we started heading down after seeing the ringtail and with minimal route finding errors found our way to the base of the canyon. The last obstacle to the base was a 20 foot long polished slab that our sticky rubber shoes would not stick to! You just had to squat down on your feet and slide down the thing. Turned out to be a lot of fun and a tear may or may not have been shed when we were finally off the slabs. We had been back tracking all the way up till this point, so we still had a long way to go. Hiking through the wash was pretty tricky at points with lots of wandering around boulders and butt-sliding down boulders. Eventually we made it out of the canyon and onto the main trail which brought us back to our car.<br />
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We had been going 14 hours and were exhausted. Eating burgers at a restaurant in Vegas, we looked like a mess with our hair flattened from our helmets, just staring at each other we were so tired. It was obvious that we'd be taking a full-on rest day the next day. We needed it after this climb. <br />
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Despite being so tired, it was a great climb and a really fun adventure and it was only our first day in Vegas!<br />
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Mmm sweet potato fries</div>
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The next climb we did was the climbing highlight of the trip. Solar Slab was a lot of fun, but it was a lot of work and left us exhausted, so we were happy to have a more mellow climb. The climb of choice was Birdland, a 5 pitch 5.7+ route. After a 13 pitch day, 5 pitches sounded like a casual day out and it turned out to be so. We "slept in" and started our hike in around 7:30. </div>
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The hike was pleasant and along the way we could see several parties on the climb already, so we had no reason to rush. We'd just join the congo line and enjoy climbing slowly. We arrived at the base of the climb right after two Air Force ER Doctors who were getting ready to start the first pitch. They were really friendly and we talked to them at all the belays on the way up. It was also nice to have them right in front of us so we didn't have to do any route finding!<br />
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Shelby led up the first pitch, which was fun and juggy, up to a ledge with two other parties on it. In their conversation, Shelby realized that one of the climbers rappelling was one of her instructors from her NOLS course! The climbing community is relatively small and it's neat to find the connections we have with other people we meet on the rock. Another connection we realized was that the doctors climbing in front of us happened to work at the same medical center as our friend Erin, who lives in Vegas. Small world.<br />
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Shelby, finishing up the second pitch</div>
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The next pitch went up some chimneys and then up the face to another big ledge. This was a pretty good pitch, but the next pitch was one of the highlights for me. You climb diagonally up an angled ledge, then traverse across the face with thin feet and good hands until you get to a steep crack. The crack goes straight up and then you get to a small ledge for the belay. The traverse on this pitch was a lot of fun!</div>
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Matt working on the traverse ahead of us</div>
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Shelby at the top of the fourth pitch</div>
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Climber on neighboring route</div>
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One pitch led us up the face to a bunch of huge pockets in the rock that were big enough to stand in comfortably and belay. The final pitch was probably the best pitch on the route. It goes up and bypasses a roof, leading to a sweet, long finger crack. The climbing difficulty on the finger crack was pretty sustained with only small edges to stand on. It was tricky standing on the small edges while placing gear, but the climbing was a lot of fun. This led to a tiny, one person ledge where we took a couple celebration photos and turned around to rappel the route.</div>
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The beautiful crack</div>
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Shelby, about to finish the route</div>
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Happy to be done well before sunset</div>
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We rappelled the route without getting our ropes stuck at all and packed up for the hike out. No epic stories for this climb, just a fun day out climbing a great route, enjoying chatting with the other climbers. </div>
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The rest of our trip involved a couple days of sport climbing and just relaxing with our friends Erin and Cookie. We had a great trip, enjoying the beauty of Red Rock Canyon, the fun climbing, and good times with friends. </div>
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Feeding peacocks at the park</div>
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Rue listening in after an exhausting game of frisbee</div>
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The hike to the Panty Wall</div>
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Cookie on a fun route at the Panty Wall</div>
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Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-66695634347270727842015-10-14T14:29:00.000-06:002015-12-06T09:13:31.152-07:00Backpacking the Lost Creek WildernessThe South Platte is a special place to me and Shelby. We've now made 7 trips to the region this year alone. Its elevation is only a bit higher than Denver's so it is a warm, dry area. It's an area that is often overlooked and relatively unappreciated. The ground is composed mostly of BB sized granite gravel with a thin layer of decomposed pine needles. The land is mostly covered with pine trees except for the 138,000 acre burn scar from the Hayman fire in 2002, roughly a third of the entire area of the South Platte region. All this being said, the region visible from paved roads isn't scenic by most Colorado standards. Once you start to venture onto the dirt roads and trails, you start to see some of the gems - Sheep Rock, Cheeseman Canyon, Turkey Rocks, and the Malay Archipelago to name a few. Looking to get lost for a weekend, Shelby and I stumbled upon what may be one of Colorado's best kept secrets, found in none other than the South Platte area- The Lost Creek Wilderness.<br />
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Looking at a terrain map, the Lost Creek Wilderness looks like an unimpressive set of small hills relative to some of the giant peaks found elsewhere in the state, so it is easy to skip across when scanning a map. Somehow Shelby had heard about backpacking loops in the area and a quick google search revealed some beautiful photos. The photos combined with the excellent forecast were enough to ignite a spark and we couldn't wait to explore the area.<br />
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We chose a loop that cherry-picked the most beautiful parts of the area. We would start by following Goose Creek, then Lost Creek, climbing up to McCurdy Park, over to Hankins Pass and back down to the car. I drew out the route on MapMyRide and it came out to 20-25 miles depending on how many switchbacks I missed while drawing the route.<br />
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We got started early on Saturday morning and began the hike north along Goose Creek. Most of the time we were in the trees, walking along a wide trail that we assumed must have been used as a road back in the mining days. </div>
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Every once in a while the trees would clear and we would catch a glimpse of the granite domes and other rock formations that surrounded us on all sides.<br />
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Occasionally, we'd come across a giant boulder or a grove of aspens.<br />
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The miles ticked by quickly for the first half of the day. We had lots of energy and were excited to be in such a beautiful place, so the hiking was easy.<br />
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Much of the day passed in silence, both of us in our own thoughts, but with the occasional conversation. We would stop frequently, taking the time to look at the views. I would stop even more often to take pictures while Shelby continued and then I would slowly catch up. We stopped for a snack around noon and both of us realized that we brought less food than we normally do. Not a big deal, we just figured we'd be pretty hungry by the time we got to camp.<br />
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Eventually the trail went down to Lost Creek. We were low on water, so we took some time to filter water while we watched tiny trout feeding on food that drifted down to them. Just above this spot you could see the water come out of a dark cave. Lost Creek gets it's name from all the times it disappears underground and then reappears a ways downstream.<br />
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We weren't really sure where the trail lead from here. Following a less worn trail through some campsites, we eventually dead ended at the creek. It seemed really weird that the trail was less faint, so we weren't really sure that we came the right way. We ended up wading across the creek here and finding no trail on the other side. Darn. We came back across the creek to figure out where we went wrong and then continued along the trail barefoot, looking for a place we could sit down to put our shoes back on. Ouch! Ooh! Ouch! What the? I didn't realize it but we were walking through a field of thistles barefoot and I had about 5 thorns in my feet. Nice one. </div>
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After taking the time to pull all the thorns out of our feet, we made it back to where we filtered water and found the other couple that had been hiking at about the same pace as us. They had a much better map than us and got us back on the trail we were supposed to be on. </div>
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At this point, we started to realize that our map wasn't very good and we weren't exactly sure how far along the trail we were. We just kept hiking along the trail, figuring that we'd be able to figure out where we were eventually. Up a steep hill, down another hill, we came to two creek crossings, a landmark that allowed us to figure out where we were. By this point, we were both pretty exhausted. My mileage estimate seemed like it was way below what we had actually hiked due to switchbacks and we didn't bring enough food to keep our energy up. We sat down for a bit and shared my last clif bar before starting the long climb up to McCurdy Park. </div>
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This part of the hike dragged on and on. Endless switch backs traversing up the face always brought us back to the creek that climbed up next to us, so it felt like we weren't making any progress. Eventually we finally made it to the last switchback and just hiked straight up the valley. Finally the trees opened up to a meadow and I knew that we were almost there. We made it to a nice camping spot with a firepit, sheltered by trees from the wind and right next to the stream. We cooked dinner, gathered wood and made a nice campfire before going to bed early after a long hard day.</div>
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We heard the wind blowing all night long. It rushed through the tips of the trees above us, but never really hit our tent thanks to the good camping spot. In the morning, we made quick work of the usual morning chores of pulling the food out of the tree it hung from, cooking breakfast, taking down the tent and packing our bags. Yesterday Shelby had only drank a kale smoothie for breakfast and it was a big reason why she ran out of energy so bad, so we both made sure we had plenty to eat for breakfast and started the hike feeling refreshed and energized, albeit quite sore.</div>
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The scenery today was less epic than yesterday, but we had lots of pleasant meadows to pass through between stints in the trees. We passed through the rest of McCurdy Park, passing a hidden tower called McCurdy Park tower with over 20 climbing routes up it. We'll have to come back and do some climbing in this wonderful area. At the end of McCurdy Park, we dipped down a bit and then took the cutoff towards Lake Park. This trail would be our only climb for the day and was enough to get the blood pumping at 1.5 miles long, but we were good on energy this time, so it went by relatively easily. The climb brought us to our high point for the weekend where we could scramble up a pile of boulders to a great lookout where we could see the whole wilderness area.</div>
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The rest of the hike was just a long gradual downhill all the way back to the car. The majority of the time was passed in silence, lost in our own thoughts, watching the landscape shift as we descended in elevation down to Lake Park, then to Hankins Pass.<br />
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The miles went on and on and we found ourselves looking at the map more often, ready to get off our feet and eat a tasty burrito in Deckers. We took frequent breaks along the way and eventually Shelby felt inspired to start wearing aspen leaves in her hair.<br />
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We were ready to be done and eventually I saw a distant ridge that signified that we were close to the end. Passing through a narrow corridor with rock walls on both sides, we came around the corner and saw horses making the final climb to the cars. We were done.<br />
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While the long hike in two days may have been a bit ambitious, we had a wonderful time in the Lost Creek Wilderness. It's truly a special place with few people and a feeling of wildness that is rare in the front range of Colorado. Next time we'll come prepared with more food, more time to explore, and climbing gear! We will be back, oh yes, we will be back.<br />
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Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-92135617576544114302015-09-14T07:28:00.001-06:002015-12-06T09:13:45.653-07:00Chickenheads at the Devil's Head<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
This weekend we climbed at Devil's Head. It's a beautiful place with a pretty long approach, but good trails all the way and really good climbing.</div>
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The area was closed for a few weeks due to a tornado that did a lot of damage near the trailhead. </div>
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After a 45 min hike our first climb was a 5.8 trad route called Head Games. It went up bolted slab for the first half and then went up a small roof to a big corner for the second half. It was a fun, long single pitch.<br />
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Next up we did a 5.10a slab route called Remote Control. This was a really fun route, even though we only did the first pitch. Lots of tiny little nubbins to climb on and the bolts were at a good spacing compared to some of the runout slabs we've climbed in the south platte area before.<br />
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We finished off with a 2 pitch 5.8 trad route called Chickenhead. The first pitch is a fun, albeit dirty corner that leads to a comfy belay ledge. Then the second pitch traverses into a system of cracks and blocks with some really fun climbing. At one move you had to swing your body out over the empty space, using really good <a href="http://www.supertopo.com/photos/9/24/213939_9690_XL.jpg">"chickenhead"</a> jugs for your hands and feet to pull up on. The climb was a lot of fun and pretty unique since it was nearly vertical, but only a 5.8.<br />
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After Chickenhead, we walked back to our car and enjoyed the pleasant hike with good views along the way. We were quite amazed at the beauty of God's creation and felt really privileged to get to experience it in such a unique way.<br />
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<br />Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-60437928321038866052015-08-24T15:19:00.000-06:002015-12-06T09:14:02.813-07:00Luxury Climbing up Mt. Evans<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
Ah Mt. Evans. It's claim to fame is the highest paved road in North America. Throngs of tourists crowd the summit taking pictures of each other and the multitudes of goats and sheep that seem a little bit too comfortable around humans. The mountain also happens to have some really good rock climbing on it. Alpine rock climbing with the possibility of hitch-hiking down seemed like a pretty luxurious day out. So we chose our route - Second Apron, Right Side -5.7 (Really creative route name huh?). It's the second buttress from the right in the photo below. The route was supposed to be a "choose your own adventure" kind of climb, meaning that there were lots of ways to the top, all being 5.7 or easier.</div>
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At 5:30 we started our hike to the base of our climb. The sun wasn't far below the horizon, so there was just enough light to see where to go, which was nice since we forgot headlamps! We traversed the slopes south of Summit Lake for a while, looking back as the sun started to rise. Due to smoke from California and Washington, the sun looked deep red as it was rising. Some combination of smoke and altitude gave me a bad headache for about an hour, but it eventually went away.</div>
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As we approached the second apron, our route came more into view. I could recognize where the standard start was, but there were so many crack systems there was no single obvious path to the top. Rather, endless possible ways to get to the top!<br />
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We reached the base of the climb and by 6:45 we headed up the first pitch. It was a long lieback crack with a decent crack to pull back on with your hands and pretty poor feet most of the way up. The climbing was fun, albeit a bit tenuous at spots where it became really slabby. The rock was very cold, making my hands numb enough that it was hard to feel the tiny edges I had to pull on the slab sections. I got to the top of the crack and traversed over a slab to another crack to the right. This lead to a narrow ledge that I was able to follow to the left for a while. The ledge would have made a good belay position, but I looked down and could tell that I still had plenty of rope left to move upward. So I headed up some mossy cracks, passed a giant M-shaped set of dihedrals, and found a good belay on a small ledge with about 10 feet of rope to spare. We'd be climbing long pitches all day to finish the climb as fast as possible. It was pretty cold and windy all day, so we didn't want to dilly dally.<br />
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Shelby approaching the top of the first pitch</div>
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The second pitch was the most straight forward pitch of the day. It headed straight up a mossy crack from the belay and kept heading up. No traversing or any route finding really. It finished with a fun little step with a nice hand crack where I found a hidden jug to get up to the base of a dihedral. The left side of the dihedral blocked the sun and the wind seemed to be shooting straight the dihedral, so this was a pretty cold spot to sit.</div>
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From here, the dihedral looked like it wouldn't provide very good protection, so after heading up a bit, I moved out of the dihedral to the left, onto the face where I figured there would be better quality rock. I was glad to find some good cracks with good protection out on the face. This pitch made a zig zag pattern as I traversed left, climbed up, traversed some more, then climbed some more. The traverses were a lot of fun and I was glad to have done a bit of slab climbing recently to help me trust my feet. Just 30 feet away I saw a giant ledge, big enough for a small home and I knew I wanted to belay from there, but I was running low on rope. I headed towards the ledge and felt the rope go tight. I had run out of rope. The wind was blowing loudly and because of the length of the pitch Shelby and I could barely hear each other yelling. I yelled as loud as I could for Shelby to start simulclimbing, meaning that we would both be climbing at the same time with the rope attached to both of us. Since she is tied into the rope, she would still essentially have me on-belay even though she would be climbing. I felt the rope loosen, indicating that she was climbing and soon I was able to reach the ledge and set up an anchor to bring her up. </div>
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The ledge was sunny and sheltered from the wind so we just hung out there for a while before continuing, enjoying the warmth after how cold we were at the last belay. The final pitch was the only pitch we didn't use the entire rope for. It started out with some easy mossy blocks and then I had the choice of taking the easy, but boring way, or the harder but fun way. The route finding all day has had choices like this and since I was still having fun, I chose the harder, fun option which was a wide lieback crack which lead to the top of the technical climbing for the day.<br />
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The ridge we would walk to the main summit of Evans </div>
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The climb ends at a sub-summit which is a bit over 14,000 ft, but in order to reach the main summit of Mt. Evans we walked along the ridge for 25 minutes. The walk was a nice cool-down. We talked about our day on the way along the ridge, answering questions from curious hikers wondering why we had harnesses on.<br />
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Cairn with Bierstadt and Sawtooth in the background</div>
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We made it to the summit and spent some time taking pictures. The young couple that took our picture seemed nice so I asked them where they were from and started a conversation, hoping for a chance to ask for a ride. Sure enough, they were happy to give us a ride back to our car, so we returned the favor by giving them lots of recommendations on places to go during their visit. </div>
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Despite the cold and the wind, it was a really fun climb and a cool way to do a 14er. I'd say that the climbing was significantly better than the climbing we did on Spearhead a few weeks ago, only with less hype. It took a little more thought and the ability to be able to choose our own route up the crack systems was a lot of fun. It's always a bit frustrating to follow vague step by step instructions up a climb, always wondering if you're off route. So it was cool to just make our own decisions on the route we chose to take. The rock quality was excellent everywhere, except for the right facing dihedral we found on the very right side of the face. But the best part is you don't have to walk all the way down!<br />
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Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-19315468970474405612015-07-28T12:54:00.000-06:002015-12-06T09:14:18.604-07:00North Ridge of Spearhead<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
I've been wanting to climb Spearhead for close to 2 years now, since before I could even trad climb. The North Ridge of Spearhead is an easy, high quality, fun route, in the beautiful setting of Glacier Gorge in Rocky Mountain National Park. The climb is 8 pitches, 1,000 feet long, up to an elevation of 12,575 ft. As big as the route sounds, Spearhead is dwarfed by all the surrounding mountains with Longs Peak, Pagoda, Chiefs Head, and McHenry's all being much taller than Spearhead. Nevertheless, it was a great first alpine rock route for us.</div>
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The Estes Park/RMNP area was crowded as usual with flocks of tourists up to Alberta Falls. It wasn't too long before we started seeing fewer and fewer people.<br />
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Our packs were heavy with camping and climbing gear and neither of us were in particularly good shape, so the hike was pretty tough for us. But the farther we got from the crowds, the happier and more excited we became. Around Black Lake, the trees started to thin out a bit so we started seeing some amazing views.<br />
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Black Lake</div>
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After Black Lake, the trail starts to get steep and it's the final climb before hitting tree line, so we just put our heads down and ground our way up the gully. With some careful routefinding through willows and across streams, we finally crested the last hill and started singing Lion King songs in celebration. We made it to Glacier Gorge. </div>
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The park service doesn't allow tent camping in the gorge, so we had to find a boulder to sleep under for the night. Thankfully there are several nice "bivies" with good shelter from the wind and flat ground to sleep on. Ours was so nice we dubbed it the Marriott. We arrived right before sunset, so we had just enough time to cook dinner, filter water, and head to bed. We brought a couple bivy sacks (glorified body bags) to sleep in, which helped a lot with wind protection.</div>
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The Marriott</div>
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Wake up call was at 5:00 in the morning, a relatively casual start since we knew that the forecast for the day was nearly perfect with nothing to worry about except a bit of wind. We racked up and started the hike to the base of the climb which took a good 20 minutes.<br />
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Surprisingly, we were the first group on the route. The next three groups showed up as I belayed Shelby on the first pitch. Good timing! Shelby headed up the first pitch at 6:30 up some easy slabs to the base of a chimney. As I climbed up to her, I could already feel pressure to go fast since there were already 3 groups waiting to climb after us. I climbed a short pitch up the chimney and quickly set up another anchor so that we could climb the next pitch without as much rope drag. The next pitch was a pretty fun and thoughtful one involving climbing some cracks and up a slab to a slot which leads to the base of a v-shaped corner.<br />
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I belayed Shelby up to me and she quickly took off onto the next pitch. As I gave out rope, I could tell the climbing started getting easier because the rope was passing through my belay device faster and faster. When I climbed up to her I could see that the next bit of climbing would be easy class 4 stuff. So we unroped and scrambled up the next 150 feet to a nice big ledge right next to the Barb Flake. After roping up again, we headed up a couple easy, but fun pitches up good cracks to the base of the steep part of the ridge.<br />
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We were a bit off route, so I started by traversing to the left to get back onto the route. I found the route, but I also found a tricky looking roof that looked like it was much harder than 5.6. I made a move up the roof and couldn't find any solid hands, so I stepped back down and found a way to bypass the tough move. I came to a beautiful finger crack in a corner than I went up. The crack was so beautiful that I would have loved to place a bunch of gear in it, but it was really quite easy so it only got one cam before I found a small stance that I could sit on to belay Shelby. This belay was the coolest place to just sit down and look around from. Being right on the ridge crest, I could look straight down the east face to the harder climbing on Spearhead, looking north I could see the 5 parties climbing behind us, and looking south I could see the precarious summit of Spearhead not too far away.</div>
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The cool belay stance at the top of pitch 7</div>
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Shelby climbed up to me and we enjoyed resting for a minute. Her feet were tired of smearing up so much slab and we had felt like we were pressured to climb fast all day, so it was nice to pause for a minute. What next ensued was some of the most awkward climbing ever. The guidebook described it as an "awkward slot" and awkward it certainly was. Shelby did a great job climbing up this weird and difficult section, but when I climbed it, it was a pretty ugly sight to see. I wedged my body into the slot and tried to inch my way up it, but it was incredibly strenuous. Somehow I made it up without falling and then I caught up to Shelby at the end of the roped climbing. </div>
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We had heard that the summit of Spearhead was spectacular, so we wanted to make sure we visited it. So it took about 150 feet of scrambling up some cool natural stairs, through a tunnel, and then up an exposed slab until we reached the amazing summit. It was about a 6x10 foot block perched over the steep east face. If you looked over the edge you could see all the way down to the base. It was a pretty amazing summit and we were glad that we stopped by.<br />
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For the next two hours we made our way back down to the Marriott. The descent involved a lot of scrambling with plenty of loose rocks, but mostly pretty solid. It looked like we were going to run into a cliff, so we looked around the corner and found a rappel station where we made a rappel down to the route we should have taken off the mountain. Eventually we made it down to easy hiking and were glad to be almost done for the day.<br />
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So we spent the rest of the day napping, eating, walking around and generally relaxing. We slept in our cave again and then headed back home in the morning. It was great to finally get on some alpine rock. The climbing itself wasn't anything spectacular, but the setting was just amazing and the sense of accomplishment to have hiked in 6 miles, climbed a big route, and hiked back out was great. The scenery was amazing in Glacier Gorge and I'd venture to say that the cave we slept in was one of the coolest places I've ever camped. So overall, it was a great experience.<br />
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<br />Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-54067527535860546852015-07-20T13:23:00.001-06:002015-12-06T09:14:44.326-07:00Loch Vale and Boulder Canyon<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">
On Saturday, we had plans to hike Quandary Peak but they were cancelled since the weather didn't look very good, so we headed to Rocky Mountain National Park for a hike to Loch Vale for some fly fishing. </div>
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It was a 3 mile hike into the Loch. The trail was low angle most of the time and really well maintained, so the hike was pretty easy. The lake was beautiful and had some cool looking mountains all around with Thatchtop on the left and Sharkstooth on the right.<br />
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Once we got to the lake, we spotted a cool spot to fish from on the other side, so we had to cross the stream and bush wack for a little while to get to our spot. We fished near the inlet of the Loch from a big flat boulder out in the water where we could look down and see all the trout swimming around. It was pretty fun being able to see the trout and trying to cast the fly in front of them where they would see it. Sometimes they would get spooked and swim away, sometimes they would swim up to the fly and decide they didn't want it, and sometimes they would try to bite it but miss. What they didn't do is actually bite any of our flies.<br />
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After a while of fishing at our first spot, we found another one and after just a few casts Shelby caught her first fish while fly fishing! It was a little guy, but really exciting to finally catch something.<br />
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On Sunday we headed up to Boulder Canyon for some climbing. We're hoping to do some alpine rock routes in RMNP soon, so we wanted to get a bit more trad climbing practice in before going. Cob Rock was the destination for the day, a beautiful rock a little over 200 feet high with plenty of cracks for protection.</div>
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The first pitch looked a bit intimidating. It was relatively steep and looked like our only holds at a few sections would be the hand crack. Shelby lead this pitch, starting out with some tricky moves up the initial 15 feet up a nice hand/fist crack with only a few edges outside the crack to use for feet. A short section of easy climbing lead to a small roof with a hand crack for hands and just some small spots to smear your feet. The pitch finished off with a tricky traverse to the right and then a nice, easy dihedral to a ledge.<br />
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The next pitch pitch was also a lot of fun. It started out with some tough stemming up a dihedral to a small chimneyin a corner. I followed the corner up to a spot with some balancy liebacking and then an awkward straddling move onto a sweet small ledge on an arete where I belayed Shelby up to me.<br />
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Definition time: Dihedral is where two planes of rock intersect forming an inside corner. An Arete is a steep, sharp ridge.<br />
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The next pitch would be the last and hardest pitch. The first pitch was supposed to come all the way up to the ledge on the arete, where our second pitch ended. Since we were expecting the route to only be 2 pitches, we thought Shelby would lead the first pitch and I would lead the second pitch. But since we split the first pitch in two it was now Shelby's turn to lead on the crux pitch. Haha. So after we moved the belay closer to the wall and Shelby contemplated if she wanted to lead this pitch, she decided she'd give it a whirl and headed up the zig zag hand crack. The crack goes straight up to start with, traverses to the right 6 feet, then goes straight up again, making a lightning bolt shape. It was a tough pitch with no good feet to use for much of it, but the hand crack was really good, albeit slippery. Shelby made it up to the top and was excited to have pushed herself on a hard pitch and succeeded despite feeling intimidated before heading up.<br />
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"Well, I think I'm ready for Spearhead," Shelby told me at the top. Spearhead will be our main objective when we go back to RMNP next weekend, so hopefully you'll hear all about in the next post.</div>
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<br />Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-66025156694013622072015-07-10T23:52:00.000-06:002015-12-06T09:15:01.514-07:00Independence Pass on Independence DayIt was 10:00 and my wife and I had passed the last campsite along a 4 mile stretch of Lincoln Creek Road. It had been slow going because the road neared the limits of what we could drive in our Subaru Outback- 45 minutes of driving from one site to the next only to see a tent tucked away behind some trees or the twinkle of a campfire signifying that we had to keep driving. Campsite 22. A brown sign said, "No camping from here to Portal Campground." I had heard of this campground, but had no idea how far it was down the road. Would we drive another 45 minutes only to find a full campground? Having no better option, we continued on, picking up speed for maximum puddle splashing. We were desperate at this point. Our hopes had been destroyed at each occupied campground and we needed somewhere to sleep. We turned down a side road, but only found a lame camping spot where our friends, who would be meeting us later that night, would never find us. It would be our last resort if we found absolutely nothing else. We got back on the main road and continued up the valley along the roaring creek. It was fully dark now, but the full moon illuminated the valley revealing the grand mountains that surrounded us. We were in a special place, but the stress of not having a place to sleep overshadowed everything else. Eventually we saw the sign pointing us to the campground.<br />
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Tiki torches welcomed us to "The Portal," as we started calling it, which featured around 10 sites and 2 vault toilets. Around the one way loop we drove. Taken. Taken. Nope. Taken. Wait! Oh my goodness, the last site! Pull in... The absence of a car gives you the hope of a spring in a desert, but the upside down camp chairs and and the 3-man dome tent rips that hope right out of your chest and lets it fester in front of your blood shot eyes as you cry out in anguish!<br />
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Melodrama aside, we saw that the road continued up the valley. It went from a one and a half car width road to definitely just a one car width road, with the much more likely possibility of bottoming out. The full moon revealed a beautiful meadow above Grizzly Reservoir with daunting black peaks guarding the end of the valley miles ahead. We drove on, passing a couple groups camping at undesignated spots here and there, past stretches of meadow and patches of trees. The road curved to the left and crested a slight hill where we saw a large flat area on the right. Unoccupied. This would be our home.<br />
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We set up our tent and started a fire using pallet boards that we scavenged off of Craigslist over the winter. The air was cool. I had forgotten what 45 degrees felt like. The sky was clear and if it wasn't for the full moon, the stars would have been spectacular.<br />
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One beer down, my wife and I looked down the valley to the campground. The tiki torches had been blown out and only a few fires still burned. It was late and we had long lost hope that our friends would be joining us that night. It took us over an hour to drive down the dirt road to find this unlikely spot. Surely our friends would give up hope and meet up with us the next day. But as we looked down to the Portal, car lights appeared moving along the windy road. Could it be them? I started the car and drove toward the lights. Through the meadows and patches of trees, I noticed that the lights stopped moving. I came within 100 feet of the car. The lights shone in my face, so I couldn't make out the car but my lights revealed a single mountain bike on the back. Both of our friends are mountain bikers, but one of them has a broken wrist, so they would have only brought one bike. As I got closer I finally made out that the car was a white Subaru Outback. I rolled down the window and with a huge grin on my face said hello to my friends.<br />
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Back at the campsite we added more wood to the fire and drank one more beer. Sitting down, reflecting on our nights, I couldn't help but feel that that night was special. After our hopes of finding a decent campsite dwindled to nothing and the chances of our friends finding us were slim to none, we were reunited with our friends in the most beautiful alpine meadow that we would get to call home for 3 nights. I just felt very richly blessed by God that night.<br />
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The next day Shelby and I went to Weller Slab for some trad climbing. I didn't realize it until we showed up, but the area required a half mile scramble up a steep talus field to get to the climbing. We picked our way through the boulders and got really tired, but made it to the slab after 30 minutes. </div>
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Filtering through the info on mountain project we eventually found where our climb would start. The first pitch is a route called Two Ears, a moderate climb up a broken crack system up a face. The route was not always perfectly obvious, so I had fun figuring out the best way to the top. It was easy enough to find cracks that I could follow and place gear in. The tricky part was knowing exactly where the pitch should end . So I just kept climbing up. There were a few fun thin moves and a couple little roofs to pull through. The pitch was supposed to be 160 feet and looking down at Shelby, I could tell that I should be getting close to the end soon. Following what looked like the most natural line through a steep section, I climbed up through some rock that initially didn't look very solid, but actually ended up being pretty high quality when I banged the rock with my fist. Pulling up onto a ledge I looked to the right and saw that I passed the chain anchor. So I downclimbed an easy few moves to a small ledge and setup the anchor to belay Shelby up. </div>
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Next up, we moved the belay over to a larger ledge at the base of Zanzibar Dihedral, a pitch that gets 3.7 out of 4 stars. I had high expectations, but was a bit nervous as it was at about the peak of my trad climbing difficulty. The dihedral has good hand-sized cracks on the left wall, but the right wall was a pretty featureless slab. As the climb goes up, the left wall arcs overhead, threatening to take away all the nice footholds.</div>
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The dihedral from below (photo stolen from mountain project)</div>
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So I headed up, plugging away my gear. There were lots of good places to put nuts, so I think I set a personal record of 4 nuts in a pitch! I placed lots of medium sized cams at first, but realized that I should look around for other size cracks so I didn't run out of good gear before the crux. I used a combination of liebacking and stemming to move up the climb. Liebacking is when you hold onto a crack, lean back as far as you can and work your feet up a more or less featureless wall. Stemming is when you stem your legs (or arms) from one wall to another. The liebacking was exhausting and the stemming rests weren't very good either because of the lack of feet on the right side. I would try to rest in a stemming position, but my right calf would start to burn. After one particularly strenuous move I had no good place to rest so I placed a cam and I rested on the rope while I tried to catch my breathe. After the rest I moved through the rest of the crux and then found that where the left wall starts to arc over, you suddenly start to get more face holds and the climbing starts to get easy. Once you pass the point farthest to the right, the rest of the climb is just a jug haul to the top. I made it to the top and belayed Shelby while she climbed up, enjoying the views of Independence Pass.</div>
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The next day Alan and I went to the Grotto Wall while the ladies went on a hike up the valley where we had camped to some lakes at the base of the daunting black peaks. We only climbed a couple single pitch routes, but the highlight was a trad 10a route that is mostly a lieback on really juggy holds called Cryogenics. We were waiting to get on a fun 5.8 that I was interested in leading, but the group ahead of us was climbing very slowly, so I may have pressured Alan into leading Cryogenics, since he's a much better climber than me. He did a great job leading it even though he couldn't remember the last time he had lead a trad climb and ran it out at the crux at the top. I tried it out on top rope and I would rank it up there with some of the best climbs I've ever done. The liebacking was a lot of fun, you could find decent rests stemming across the dihedral, but it was pretty sustained up until you get to an amazing rest where you can basically wedge your body behind some rock, giving you a no-hands rest. After catching my breath at the rest I headed up into the crux where the crack narrows and you have to do some more powerful moves to make progress. Struggling to find a good foot placement, my right foot slipped out and I almost fell, but caught myself and was able to push through the crux to an easy top out to the anchor.</div>
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The Route (Photo stolen from Rock and Ice)</div>
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Afterwards we headed back to Aspen for gasoline and firewood and went back to our spectacular campsite for a bit of fly fishing. We didn't so much as see a fish, but it was nice to get the rods out and throw a few casts until it started raining. </div>
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The next day, Shelby and I made an early start and drove back towards Twin Lakes to get some climbing in at Monitor Rock. The climbing didn't go exactly as planned. We wanted to climb a long 5.6 route called The Nose, but it was crowded and the weather looked like it could turn bad before too long, so we just climbed a couple single pitch routes. The warmup was a 5.8 route on a seriously glacially polished face. There were some pretty sketchy moves using very slippery footholds to traverse, but once we passed that, the rest of the climbing was pretty fun. Next up Shelby lead a sweet 5.9+ called Going Greek, which started off up a pretty polished low angle face and then went up a vertical section that stretched a few bolts. She confidently went up the beginning part of the climb to the crux and after a couple attempts, made it through the 2 bolt crux, which required a few very thoughtful moves on slippery holds and then a few more fun moves to the anchor. Thankfully when I climbed it afterward, the rain decided to start immediately after I made it through the crux! I had the joy of cleaning the anchor and rappelling while it was raining, which actually turned out to be somewhat refreshing, but I was glad not to have to do much climbing in it. We were glad that we bailed on our initial plan to climb the 5 pitch route.</div>
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The drive home was inevitably a pain due to the 4th of July traffic, but overall, we had a great time camping at one of the coolest spots we've ever camped out, spending time with good friends, and getting some really good climbing in. We're looking forward to the next trip out there!</div>
Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-64820389065388862002015-05-09T21:16:00.001-06:002015-12-06T09:15:13.393-07:00Turkey Rocks Crack ClimbingThe South Platte area is growing to be one of my favorite places to climb. Away from the business of the climbing areas of Golden and Boulder you can drive through small towns like Deckers and Pine Junction, spotting beautiful granite domes in the distance among lush ponderosa pines as well as burn scars from the 2002 Hayman fire that burnt 216 square miles in the area. The area is just peppered with high quality granite with some of the best slab and crack climbing in the state. Aside from the giant granite domes, there are thousands of small rock outcroppings all over, just begging to be explored.<br />
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Shelby's excited to climb some cracks</div>
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Last weekend we went down to Turkey Rocks, which is one of the most popular SPlatte areas known for the highest density of crack climbing in Colorado. Cracks in the rock are an essential part of trad climbing. A crack in the rock is often the most natural line up an otherwise featureless rock because it gives you something to hold onto with your hands and feet and more importantly provides a way to place protection in case you fall. Before drilling bolts into the rock became common, a crack was the only way that you could place protection in the rock, aside from the odd rock horn or tree that you could wrap a sling around. So naturally, whenever you want to set off on a climb using traditional protection methods, you are restricted to following crack systems in the rock. You can sometimes find holds on the face and just use a crack for protection but sometimes there are no face holds and your only option is to jam your hands and feet into the crack to move upward. This is called crack climbing.<br />
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Pikes Peak in the distance</div>
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After a chilly and breezy night, we made some breakfast tacos, drank some coffee, and headed to the crag. First up would be a route called Left Handed Jew, a wonderful 5.8 hand crack. We top-roped this climb last year, so we knew it was probably easy enough for us to lead this year. I started up using the face holds at the bottom of the route as much as I could, but it wasn't long before I had to commit to using only the crack. I placed most of my hand-sized cams on my right side, which turned out to be a bad idea. The route goes up a left-facing corner, so my body was always pushed up against the right side of the corner, making it very difficult to get my gear. The jamming felt solid all the way up the main crack with only one section that bulges out a bit, making it a little difficult. I had been practicing on a 5.9 crack at the gym so this crack felt easy compared to the one at the gym. About 2/3 of the way up you have to traverse over on nice big feet to another crack so you can top out. Once I traversed to the left I stopped and evaluated what my next moves would be. I was able to get a mediocre cam into the crack that I would be entering, so I had some reassurance that I'd be caught if I fell. The crack starts around face-height, so in order to get into the crack you have to jam your hands in the nice hand crack and smear your feet on the mostly featureless face, working your hands up as much as you can until you can get a really high left foot, which you can stand on to get fully into the crack.With a good amount of effort I was able to get up into the crack to an okay stance and placed another piece of gear before I got to a no-hands rest. The last 20 feet of the climb were easy, using a hidden lie-back crack and a very low angle hand crack to get to the top where I set up an anchor on a giant boulder. It felt great to get my first crack climb cleanly and I was excited to clean all the gear and watch Shelby lead it again after me.<br />
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Dave leading Left Handed Jew last year</div>
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For some reason, we decided to try to climb off-widths for the rest of the day. Off-widths are cracks that are an awkward size that is too big for your hands or fists, but too small to wedge your whole body in it. They are notorious for being painful and difficult. The next climb was a 5.7 and is called Wet Turkey. It starts up some easy hand cracks till you get to a big ledge. From the ledge you can either stem your legs across a huge gap or climb a slightly overhanging hand crack for 10 feet. Since I haven't been able to do the splits since never, I opted for the handcrack. This was pretty strenuous but short. I climbed up a bit higher to a small ledge, which was where the off-width crack started. I foolishly already used my #4 cam, which is used to protect relatively large cracks from 3-4in wide. So the only gear I had that would really be useful was a single #5 cam for 20 feet of the hardest climbing on the route. If I were an off-width master, this wouldn't be a big deal, but for a noob like me, I just hoped I could bump the cam up little by little as I climbed and find some hidden small cracks somewhere. I started climbing up by sticking my whole arm into the crack, bending it at the elbow to bridge the large gap. I shuffled up by bridging my foot from heel to toe across the crack. This was exhausting. I would sometimes find a small face hold that I could use for my hands or feet and I was able to jam half my body into the crack and have a very uncomfortable rest. But the movement was very strenuous. As I moved above my cam I jammed half my body into the crack and attempted to bring the cam up. But of course I had jammed the rope between my body and the rock, so this was very difficult since the rope was connected to the cam. Eventually I got the cam up and above my head, which was exactly when I told Shelby to take and I sat back on the rope, resting on the cam. Exhausted and a bit concerned about the protection situation, I looked around for opportunities to place some of my smaller gear. I found a half inch constricting crack that was perfect for placing a nut (a small trapezoidal piece of aluminum with an attached wire that can be placed in constricting cracks and used for protection). I felt a bit better about bumping the cam up with some extra protection, so I attempted to move up a bit. No go. I couldn't make any progress anymore because the rock was starting to bulge out, making it slightly overhanging and way beyond my skill level. So I decided to try aid climbing for my first time. Aid climbing is where you place gear into a crack and pull on the gear or step onto the gear to move up. This is in contrast to free-climbing, which is when you never pull on or step on gear to move up - you only use your hands and feet on the rock to move up. So I was able to step on a sling attached to the cam and get up into a position where I could climb again. I shuffled up towards the top, crawled through a tunnel into a topless cave where I set up an anchor and belayed Shelby up. We were totally beat after this climb, so we walked down together and took a nice long lunch break before contemplating climbing anything else. </div>
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Taking a break before our last climb of the day</div>
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Eventually we worked up the motivation to try one more. After getting beat up by a 5.7, we opted for an easier 5.6 off-width called Sangaphogos (aka Easy Offwidth (I like the name of this one!)). This one was much more pleasant and doable. I may have hung on gear once for a rest, but mostly climbed it cleanly. It was nice to get to practice off-width technique on something that was actually possible for me to climb. I got to the top and brought Shelby up where we decided we were satisfied for the day.</div>
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Tired after a hard day of climbing</div>
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The next day we visited a different area of Turkey Rocks to climb a 4 pitch 5.7 called Nighttime Madness. Here we would put to test our crack climbing skills that we practiced the day before and get high up on the rock. Shelby was up for taking the lead on the first pitch. So, she started up two parallel cracks, which from the bottom look like a perfect hand crack on the left and a pretty nice finger crack on the left. It bulges out a bit, but the cracks look so nice it couldn't be too hard! Wrong! Shelby got two good pieces in and started up the slightly overhanging part. She stepped up, made a bit of upward progress, then downclimbed and rested on the rope. She tried a few times, but couldn't make it work, so she let me give it a try. I got up to her second piece and started to move up when I realized that the parallel cracks were no good at all! The left one was too big for a fist and the right one was too small and too shallow to jam my fingers in it. The feet were bad and the hands were bad. I told Shelby to take and hung on the rope. It turned out that this was the crux of the entire two pitches that we climbed. Part of what made it tough was that it was so close to the ground. It's ironically nerve wracking to have the hard part so close to the ground because it means that if you fall you could run into the ground due to rope stretch instead of being cleanly caught by the rope. While sitting on the rope I was able to figure out a sequence that would work and grunted up the crux to get to easier climbing. The rest of the pitch wasn't too bad. There was a short traverse to the left, similar to Left Handed Jew and had bad feet with a high crack that you needed to get into. Once I got into the left crack it was pretty easy to get to the top of the pitch. </div>
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The route with the belay locations in yellow</div>
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The second pitch was a ton of fun. The first half was an off width crack in a corner. Yesterday's offwidth was miserable, but today there were lots of face holds on the left side, so it made the climbing much more doable. I was able to get my right arm deep in the crack and either bend my elbow to bridge the crack or find hidden holds inside the crack. My right leg was in the crack using a heel-toe cam and the occasional face hold to move up. And my left arm and leg used faceholds almost exclusively. I went up like this for about 25 feet and made it to a good rest. From here it was a somewhat steep hand crack with some faceholds along the way which was tough but a lot of fun. I made it to the top of the second pitch without hanging on gear and I felt great. Shelby got up to the top and we discussed our options for the next pitch. </div>
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As you can see from the above photo, there are tons of cracks on this rock, so it can be difficult to find your way. We had a few options for ways to get up the next pitch so we decided on the easiest option and then looked out at the view. The clouds were starting to get pretty dark, the wind was starting to blow, and the temperature seemed to be dropping. Shelby reminded me that we still had 2 pitches to go and pointed out that if we were going to bail from the climb, now would be the time to do it. We didn't know about any fixed anchors up higher, so once we decided to continue up we would most likely need to climb all the way to the top since we wouldn't have any anchor to rappel off of. This option sounded like it could be miserable if it started raining and getting cold, so we decided to rappel back to the bottom off of a steel cable anchor and then two bolts at the top of a neighboring route to the first pitch. As soon as we set up the rappel it started raining, so we were happy to have made the decision to bail. The two pitches we climbed were a ton of fun and felt like a good accomplishment considering how challenging they were for us.</div>
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Rappelling from Nighttime Madness</div>
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Despite being defeated by the weather, we were really satisfied with our climb for the day and had a great weekend climbing some beautiful cracks in a wonderful place. The aftermath on our hands and arms wasn't pretty, but the smiles on our faces were wide.<br />
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<i>P.S. If you're curious what I'm talking about when I use the words trad climbing, nuts, protection, cams, etc. REI has a decent article explaining it all linked <a href="http://www.rei.com/learn/expert-advice/traditional-climbing-basics.html">here</a>.</i></div>
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The aftermath</div>
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Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-91271384497344254162015-04-29T22:19:00.000-06:002015-12-06T09:15:44.852-07:00HoneymoonWell, I'm a married man now. Shelby and I got married about 4 weeks ago where else but on the top of a mountain in South Carolina. The mountains are where we have had some of our best times together as a couple. So as was probably expected, we chose a place in the mountains for our honeymoon - Leavenworth, WA. Shelby spent a summer as a raft guide nearby Leavenworth so she knew a little about the place. Bavarian town with lots of sausage and beer, surrounded by beautiful mountains with all kinds of outdoors things to do. It regularly ranks in the top 10 for Cutest Tourist Towns and Coolest Outdoor Towns, so what's not to like?<br />
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The trip started out with a delicious biscuit sandwich and the purchase of an entire king salmon at Pike's Place Market in Seattle. You can imagine that we ate well this week.<br />
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We rented a cabin 20 minutes from Leavenworth. The cabin had everything we could want for a honeymoon week, including antlers.<br />
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Our first day in Leavenworth we pretended to be tourists and checked out the nutcracker and lederhosen selection. Shelby had to restrain me so that I wouldn't buy the $200 pair of lederhosen.<br />
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The next day, the weather was a bit dreary again, so we went for a casual hike in Icicle Canyon and stumbled upon a beautiful crack climb that Shelby lead a few years ago.<br />
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We had much better weather on Wednesday, so we decided to go for a short hike till it warmed up a bit and then go on a climb. The adventure for the day would be the 3 pitch Midway route up Castle Rock in Tumwater Canyon. It was a really cool climb that got you up high above the canyon with some fun climbing. The first pitch went up a steep corner chimney that was super fun and pretty tough to the top of a pinnacle that is detached from the main wall. You get to start the second pitch by stepping across the void onto the main wall, which made for a pretty exciting move. The next pitch went up a crack system then had a fun traverse over to the next crack system. And the final pitch went up more easy cracks then to some easy runout slab to the picturesque summit. The weather was perfect, the climbing was fun and we just had a really great time climbing together and then enjoying a celebration beer afterwards on Logger's Ledge. One of the highlights of the honeymoon for both of us.<br />
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Castle Rock from across the river</div>
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Shelby climbing the first pitch </div>
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Summit selfie</div>
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The view</div>
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The next day started out with a riveting game of golf on the putting course in Leavenworth. This isn't your typical mini-golf course. It was made entirely of real grass without any of the crazy loop-de-loop nonsense. Just a game of golf with nothing but the putting greens. It was quite fun, but Shelby beat me soundly.</div>
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Shelby got an eagle on this hole and subsequently whooped me</div>
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Once it warmed up a bit that afternoon we headed to Icicle Canyon again for another multipitch rock climb. This time we'd be climbing a route called R&D up Icicle Buttress and this time the wind decided to harass us the whole day. The climb started with 2 pitches of forgettable slab climbing on licheny rock before the climbing started getting interesting. At this point I knew I didn't want this climb to last forever because of the wind, so I climbed a full rope length pitch up a blocky step, along an easy slab, to the base of a chimney. The anchor here was at a very small ledge in the middle of a relatively steep face, so it wasn't super comfy. Next up was a very short pitch to the top of the chimney, which was pretty fun and easy and I found a nice spot to set up an anchor that was out of the wind finally. Enjoying being out of the wind, but ready to finish the climb I didn't wait long before heading up the next pitch. It had a short but beautiful hand crack that had no face holds, so it was 100% jamming in the crack which was pretty new to me and a lot of fun! The final pitch had an easy traversing undercling crack which led to easy slabs to the top. The descent was pretty annoying because we opted to walk down the back side, which was very loose and steep. We were pretty tired by the time we were done, but overall the climb was still pretty fun thanks to the top few pitches. After the tough climb we treated ourselves to a beer at Icicle Ridge, which was quite satisfying. </div>
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Licheny slab climbing</div>
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A cozy belay at the top of the slabs</div>
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Smiles less authentic than yesterday, but still having fun despite the wind</div>
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On our last day in Leavenworth we decided to live high class. So, we got massages, which of course was very nice and we went to a "wine tasting" at one of the local wineries (there are a lot of them). I didn't learn much about wine there, but I did learn that I'm pretty content with cheap wine, which is convenient.</div>
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And that concludes the honeymoon activities. Now we're back to normal life again, enjoying our new home in Lakewood and enjoying figuring out marriage together.</div>
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kimdeloachphoto.com</div>
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Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-64819140046452653982014-12-19T10:03:00.000-07:002014-12-19T10:03:38.062-07:00The Jon and Shelby Christmas Letter<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: left; text-indent: 0.5in;">
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<span style="background: white; color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 9.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; text-align: justify; text-indent: 48px;">2014 started out with a breakfast of pancakes made from scratch with real maple syrup. The only better way to start out the year would have been with biscuits and eggs, but pancakes are good too. Despite the less than perfect start to the year, it has been a very good year.</span></span></div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-OMP7VWjuwow/VA8_BT9fdFI/AAAAAAAADGE/zrOHaKShZP8/s1600/IMG_0050.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-OMP7VWjuwow/VA8_BT9fdFI/AAAAAAAADGE/zrOHaKShZP8/s1600/IMG_0050.JPG" height="360" width="640" /></a></div>
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<span style="background: white; color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 9.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="font-family: Arial, sans-serif; text-align: justify; text-indent: 48px;">Shelby on the Four Pass Loop</span></span></div>
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</v:shape><![endif]--><!--[if !vml]--><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 9.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Many adventures were had in 2014. The first big trip, my dad and
I backpacked the Grand Canyon. It was pretty awesome to get down into the
canyon. The view from the rim is amazing but to hike all the way to the bottom
was spectacular. In the fall Shelby and I did a 26-mile backpacking loop called
the Four Pass Loop near Aspen. This was one of the most beautiful hikes I have
ever done with the leaves just starting to change and the wildflowers still
blooming below giant red and white peaks. We also spent many a weekend camping
and climbing around Colorado, with the highlights being two all-day climbs up
Mt. Royal in Frisco and the Sheep Rock formation in the South Platte.</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 9.0pt;"> </span><span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 9.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 9.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">Climbing Mt Royal in Frisco</span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 9.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">The first cause for celebration this year was when Shelby graduated
from nursing school at UC Denver! It was so good for her to be done and to get
out into the work world. First she had to pass the NCLEX, but that proved to be
a breeze for her and now you can call her Shelby Salley RN.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: left;">
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: left;">
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">But pretty soon you
can call her Shelby Banks RN.! What?! Yep, we got engaged! One Sunday afternoon
in September, I hiked alone to the top of Mt Zion in Golden and then prayed my
rope would be long enough for the rappel to leave some flowers for her.
Luckily, the rappel was 100ft long and my rope folded in half is also 100ft
long, so that math worked out nicely, and the flowers made it to the ledge
where I would propose to her that Tuesday. Despite pressuring her to lead the
first pitch, which isn't very fun and she had done before, she said yes! Now
we're engaged to be wed in March 2015.</span></div>
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<div style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;"><div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-size: 9pt;">You would have thought
it unlikely last summer but the odds were ever in our favor. We met in June of
last year. I was itching to learn how to climb and Shelby was willing and able
to show me the ropes. Somehow she trusted me to belay her on a climb in Clear
Creek Canyon and we started climbing together regularly. Friendship turned into
relationship, and before we knew it, we were 1000 feet above that same canyon as
the sun was about to set and I got down on one knee. </span></div>
</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: left;">
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="background: white; margin-bottom: 0.0001pt; text-align: left;">
<span style="color: #222222; font-family: Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 9pt;">Anyways, once Shelby
started introducing herself as Shelby Salley RN., she found a job! Now she's
working as a nurse at Professional Pediatric Home Care taking care of the kids.
It has been a good opportunity to gain some valuable experience working as a
nurse.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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an engineer at ITN Energy Systems for two and a half years now. This year I've
had some good variety at work by splitting my time between a water filtration
project and a battery project. Both are very interesting and enjoyable projects
to be on.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #222222; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 9.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";">We are excited to get married in March and can’t wait to see
what our next year together will hold. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-79411424292913691002014-09-25T15:05:00.000-06:002014-10-29T14:55:40.140-06:00Tour de Platte<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-i8a1-ZRlV5U/VCBCrB77fCI/AAAAAAAADgE/QgyZW3mP2YI/s1600/Photo%2BSep%2B20%2C%2B3%2B37%2B16%2BPM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-i8a1-ZRlV5U/VCBCrB77fCI/AAAAAAAADgE/QgyZW3mP2YI/s1600/Photo%2BSep%2B20%2C%2B3%2B37%2B16%2BPM.jpg" height="480" width="640" /></a></span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">With plans to camp with friends west of Cheesman Lake, Shelby and I made plans to climb a fun link-up of the main domes of the Sheep Rock massif during the day when everyone else is napping, shooting guns, and playing lawn games. The link-up is sometimes referred to as the Tour de Platte and it enchains any routes up Helen's Dome, Acid Rock, and Velcro Wall. The route goes from the bottom to the top of the formation in the picture above. Relative to our last big climb, Royal Flush, there was relatively little information about this climb and the approach and so it made for a fun adventure with all the route finding. The approach was a beast. Easy hiking for about 20 minutes led us to a giant boulder where we turned left and headed straight up the hill with lots of scrambling and steep hills to ascend. Getting to the base of the climb was the most tiring part of the entire day. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Luckily we were able to get to the base of the first route which was called Fractured Fairy Tales which is a 6 pitch 5.7 route that goes all the way up Helen's dome. If we were going to finish the entire Tour de Platte, it would be a total of 11 pitches which would take a long time. In order to save time, we decided to try to simul-climb the easy climbing on Helen's Dome. Simul-climbing is necessary when the leader climbs far enough that she runs out of rope, but doesn't have an anchor to belay from. When you run out of rope the second climber can fix the rope to himself and begin to climb at the same rate as the leader until she reaches an anchor. This is the fastest way to climb easy terrain since both climbers can move at the same time.</span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-RCR1sDDYsmo/VCBCX0bEXWI/AAAAAAAADcQ/Z0-9wc4uthA/s1600/Photo%2BSep%2B20%2C%2B10%2B07%2B28%2BAM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-RCR1sDDYsmo/VCBCX0bEXWI/AAAAAAAADcQ/Z0-9wc4uthA/s1600/Photo%2BSep%2B20%2C%2B10%2B07%2B28%2BAM.jpg" height="480" width="640" /></a></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">About to start the climb.</span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">We rock paper scissored for the first lead and Shelby took off first leading some pretty easy low angle slabs. At points you could easily stand up on the slab without touching the rock with your hands it was such a low angle. After reaching the first anchors, Shelby started a traverse pitch to the right, hoping to link the first two pitches. She ran out of rope and called for me to simulclimb, so I took off after her. The rope drag became too much for Shelby to continue leading, so she just stopped at a bolt while I caught up with her. From here, the bolts started going up, but disappeared with no bolts anywhere near us. We were dumbfounded. Going straight up where the bolts appeared to be heading looked very difficult. There was a ledge we could take down and to the right that seemed like it might make sense, so I stopped at a bolt and belayed Shelby while she continued down that ledge to find the route. Glancing back at me she started laughing. The anchor was 10 feet below me where I was belaying from the last bolt of the route. Any time we had saved by simul-climbing was eaten up in the time we took to find these anchors which were placed in a very odd location right under out noses. </span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">We were off to a rough start, but after this the climbing went much more smoothly. We had heard that there were some spots on this route where it was nice to place a bit of protection to reduce the runout, so we brought a small trad rack. I had the pleasure of placing one cam on the next pitch and I belayed Shelby up to the anchors at a very small ledge. I led the next pitch which had a fun little 5.7 roof move. The views started getting better and better the higher we went up. You could see leaves changing on the mountains in the distance.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigFxtqmwXZBjIe5VEszJxWm1i_GAP-YfuDDEoxSDrxcdO2eaI0Kd5owPHm6x9w-MKEEQ_aYZhnYGjk93Aj000hsbvlLDKKpFoRwjYB8b_xwBe6_ViExf_JcIvPqTi8lbTGL2qgVx_PlvFH/s1600/Photo+Sep+20,+11+47+23+AM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigFxtqmwXZBjIe5VEszJxWm1i_GAP-YfuDDEoxSDrxcdO2eaI0Kd5owPHm6x9w-MKEEQ_aYZhnYGjk93Aj000hsbvlLDKKpFoRwjYB8b_xwBe6_ViExf_JcIvPqTi8lbTGL2qgVx_PlvFH/s1600/Photo+Sep+20,+11+47+23+AM.jpg" height="640" width="480" /></a></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Shelby at the top of pitch 3</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Our route description told us that the next anchor wasn't at a very comfortable spot, but that if you kept climbing another 10 meters you could belay from a comfy ledge using gear for an anchor. Shelby took the lead on this one and she ended up linking all of pitch 5 and 6 with some simul-climbing, practically finishing the route without noticing. Oops!</span></span></div>
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDBEGpVsTShZN-koYbh5axWjjmGVWJTjnvIX0PqoMjv0PP_CF-A10U1xs09qRsUvLSaqtpwueD92jTOCHc0l-0VCztnmkIA9xnVnRSaJLYDu430YPArxUkOh2JPBwAeTeRp2bR99PdMPKf/s1600/Photo+Sep+20,+11+56+06+AM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiDBEGpVsTShZN-koYbh5axWjjmGVWJTjnvIX0PqoMjv0PP_CF-A10U1xs09qRsUvLSaqtpwueD92jTOCHc0l-0VCztnmkIA9xnVnRSaJLYDu430YPArxUkOh2JPBwAeTeRp2bR99PdMPKf/s1600/Photo+Sep+20,+11+56+06+AM.jpg" height="640" width="480" /></a></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Shelby leading pitch 5 up the fun arete</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEkNmDmQ1cQ-BDhOusJU19HqjJrBVMuzA4ZqhOwM4XiNuk6c6ulDbzrhna2H95bSwbbNLE4mjkEgddUy0JYieFri2NTEYvytOj6jNCvGH8thndouXe_7Xyq1xB_qzsPFWI5TZUkal-PT1W/s1600/Photo+Sep+20,+12+21+32+PM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiEkNmDmQ1cQ-BDhOusJU19HqjJrBVMuzA4ZqhOwM4XiNuk6c6ulDbzrhna2H95bSwbbNLE4mjkEgddUy0JYieFri2NTEYvytOj6jNCvGH8thndouXe_7Xyq1xB_qzsPFWI5TZUkal-PT1W/s1600/Photo+Sep+20,+12+21+32+PM.jpg" height="640" width="480" /></a></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">Shelby belaying from the top of pitch 6</span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">The last part could have been done easily without a rope, but I dragged the rope along for the ride and clipped one bolt on the way. Later, Shelby climbed to the top of the dome in her Chacos. Yep, pretty easy finish. The view from the top was spectacular. </span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: left;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></div>
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Yx3AaOqzvto/VCBCiOS9zAI/AAAAAAAADhc/cogbMIhyhII/s1600/Photo%2BSep%2B20%2C%2B12%2B40%2B31%2BPM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Yx3AaOqzvto/VCBCiOS9zAI/AAAAAAAADhc/cogbMIhyhII/s1600/Photo%2BSep%2B20%2C%2B12%2B40%2B31%2BPM.jpg" height="142" width="640" /></a></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: center;">
<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;">The top of Helen's dome with one of the "hot-tubs" on the right.</span></span></div>
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<![endif]--><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small; line-height: 115%;">Funny looking selfie from the top of Helen's with Acid Rock in the background on the right.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small; line-height: 115%;">Upwards we hiked/scrambled towards Acid Rock. At this point our feet were starting to bother us. Neither of us had brought the right shoe for the job of climbing up so much slab, so we were starting to question whether we would finish the Tour. I wanted to at least try out the next route on Acid Rock, so we found a good rock to hide under to take a 15 minute snack break before continuing. There were boulders everywhere up there. Some were absolutely gigantic and we had to find our way to the base of the next climb by crawling through caves formed by huge boulders leaning on each other. All the scrambling and navigating around obstacles was part of what made this day an adventure for us.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small; line-height: 115%;">The route I chose up Acid Rock is referred to as "Unknown Between Divine Miss M and Erotic Plants." Shelby decided to just call it Miss M's Erotic Plants. It's listed as 5.9+, but it felt like at least 5.10a to me, but I admittedly haven't been climbing too much recently and I'm not a slab climbing master, so my rating could be off. We weren't optimistic about finishing all four pitches, so I dragged our second rope so that I would be able to climb as much as possible and still be able to rappel off. The first few bolts were the crux of the first pitch with some pretty thin, slabby moves and then the pitch finished off with easier climbing with lower angles and bigger edges. I headed up the second pitch immediately and it brought me to where the wall steepens. The route goes up between two black water marks that look like car skid marks. As I approached the crux I told Shelby that it was about to get pretty hard. I made the first couple moves and clipped the next bolt. As I started up again I started to get scared and told Shelby that I could fall here. The holds were absolutely tiny and I was afraid that my feet would slip or that the tiny edges would break beneath my fingers. I made it to the next bolt and looked up. This crux was relentless! The angle wasn't about to ease off anytime soon and the wall was smooth all the way up. I had started going up the left skid track, but at one point I was stopped. I would step up into an insecure stance and would find no hands and no feet any higher. I went up and down between this spot and a more secure stance a foot below several times before my feet couldn't take it anymore. My feet were tired of standing on these tiny edges and I wasn't making any progress. I called out to Shelby to take in the rope and I took a rest hanging on the rope. While hanging I looked at the right skid track and saw much better edges that I could use to make some better progress. Soon I started back up and made it to the next bolt, finding that the right skid track was much easier. But the pain in my feet didn't go away. These shoes were not made for this kind of climbing and my toe knuckles were dying for a break. I wouldn't be satisfied stopping where I was, so I determined to just push through the pain and make it to the top where I could take off my shoes. I inched up the slab and got to the last bolt. I stemmed my legs from one skid track to the next and was able to pull out of the steep part. I climbed the remaining easy ground, clipped into the anchor, and ripped off my shoes. Shelby told me that she wasn't going to climb up after me. Her feet were already tired of her shoes and she could see how bad the pain was for me on this pitch, so I contentedly tied my two ropes together and rappelled back to the ground. This climb felt like one of the hardest leads I've done and Shelby later told me that she had never heard me make the noises I made on that climb. When an edge broke under my fingers I made a loud gasping/grunting noise while doing everything I could to stay on the rock. Near the top I was making a pretty bad groaning noise because my feet where hurting so bad.</span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small; line-height: 115%;">Despite not finishing the entire Tour de Platte, we started the hike down feeling content. The climb up Fractured Fairytales was very pleasant and the views were amazing. I felt very accomplished to have pushed myself to my limit on Acid Rock and we were looking forward to coming back to this wonderful climbing area again. </span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small; line-height: 115%;">But what made this climb special was that it was our first big climb after getting engaged. We first met climbing and somehow she entrusted her life to me, a complete stranger, allowing me to belay her. Climbing will always be a reminder of the early times of our relationship. I have always had a passion for adventures and I'm so happy to have Shelby to share these adventures with for the rest of our lives. Especially the adventure of marriage which might be one of the most epic adventures ever.</span></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: inherit;"><span style="font-size: small;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-1Blhs_bKeTw/VCBCsNlAGeI/AAAAAAAADgU/KAtXWMicrKs/s1600/Photo%2BSep%2B20%2C%2B3%2B40%2B10%2BPM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-1Blhs_bKeTw/VCBCsNlAGeI/AAAAAAAADgU/KAtXWMicrKs/s1600/Photo%2BSep%2B20%2C%2B3%2B40%2B10%2BPM.jpg" height="480" width="640" /></a></span></span></div>
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Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-81939553829630956192014-09-12T15:23:00.000-06:002014-10-29T14:55:57.166-06:00Four Pass Loop<br />
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Likely the result of a Sunday evening daydreaming about my next
adventure, I somehow stumbled upon a trip report on December 2, 2012
about the Four Pass Loop. I knew nothing about the hike's reputation. I just knew that the trip report had some pretty amazing pictures. It turns out this route is often ranked among America's best backpacking loops and it is known for excellent scenery of big mountains and wildflowers. If you've ever seen a picture of the maroon bells, chances are you are familiar with the view at the start of this hike.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJr8oz40SsXnXtqG0kfQJnG5zCLsG-18fipyLgF24EtCYcQtOrSRZEa7oa48bN7t9A5iCe4RoZX3aZaCD3amvwlbXpHuUanc76qLxHCl1aX0Erb4bNw394oK1_Xuz6LrqzC_IgfASksQEu/s1600/IMG_0003.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgJr8oz40SsXnXtqG0kfQJnG5zCLsG-18fipyLgF24EtCYcQtOrSRZEa7oa48bN7t9A5iCe4RoZX3aZaCD3amvwlbXpHuUanc76qLxHCl1aX0Erb4bNw394oK1_Xuz6LrqzC_IgfASksQEu/s1600/IMG_0003.JPG" height="360" width="640" /></a></div>
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The route starts at Maroon Lake and makes a loop around the Maroon Bells crossing four passes: West Maroon Pass, Frigid Air Pass, Trail Rider Pass, and Buckskin Pass. This makes for a 26 mile-10,000ft elevation gain hike.<br />
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFvbx420wcmp3D2V6VW-HJ72_v3Aftztj-rwG70moExD-kgtU5SnOOlisyy4EUTSwSE6Q4IaBPWMk4FI8bOGDomsfPor75yf2zZ1EKgbF4RW-sndTnd1_3b1n4qhg7p6jD8Rhoo77ugp1t/s1600/FourPassLoop.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFvbx420wcmp3D2V6VW-HJ72_v3Aftztj-rwG70moExD-kgtU5SnOOlisyy4EUTSwSE6Q4IaBPWMk4FI8bOGDomsfPor75yf2zZ1EKgbF4RW-sndTnd1_3b1n4qhg7p6jD8Rhoo77ugp1t/s1600/FourPassLoop.png" height="640" width="598" /></a></div>
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Our route with miles marked in red circles and camping spots with yellow triangles. Hiked clockwise.</div>
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After an uncomfortable night sleeping in the parking lot in the back of a Subaru, we were ready to get going on Friday morning. The hike started out with a gradual elevation gain as we passed through the valley towards maroon pass.</div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-KOsmCmCXuSg/VA8-yIgEwGI/AAAAAAAADBk/5sRsMNObbiw/s1600/IMG_0004.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-KOsmCmCXuSg/VA8-yIgEwGI/AAAAAAAADBk/5sRsMNObbiw/s1600/IMG_0004.JPG" height="360" width="640" /></a></div>
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The hiking was easy for several miles and we passed a few groups on the way. I was ready to give us the "Best Hikers of the Day" award until we made the long, painful slog up the last mile of the pass where we met a man who had already ran 20 miles of the loop that morning. We ended up seeing around 10 of these runners who do the loop in one day. Getting to the top of the pass was quite the challenge for me, but Shelby made it look easy. She's a backpacking machine. </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6Q2Uv-DBJqt2udhlCubKA35bh_XufnUcE77bmIjUJ1EYWGzc_4J73DN9H0wHwjzO7b6row5zIqpA3f5qyKGdewxxYEiqnfIvSofECm9-TaCp82TV6t-a5ddxfPTb8uRjVjK-6aQ36SEyO/s1600/IMG_0023.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh6Q2Uv-DBJqt2udhlCubKA35bh_XufnUcE77bmIjUJ1EYWGzc_4J73DN9H0wHwjzO7b6row5zIqpA3f5qyKGdewxxYEiqnfIvSofECm9-TaCp82TV6t-a5ddxfPTb8uRjVjK-6aQ36SEyO/s1600/IMG_0023.JPG" height="360" width="640" /> </a></div>
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After a short break at the pass, we made our way down the north side of the pass towards Frigid Air Pass. No more than 100 feet down the trail my knee started giving me issues. The same issues it gave me a couple months ago. My knee became a constant concern of mine, but I was able to manage by compensating with my trekking poles. </div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-DaAcX6YoWN8/VA8-55mzR2I/AAAAAAAADP4/qSJAuGN8fyY/s1600/IMG_0028.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-DaAcX6YoWN8/VA8-55mzR2I/AAAAAAAADP4/qSJAuGN8fyY/s1600/IMG_0028.JPG" height="360" width="640" /></a></div>
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The wildflowers along the entire route were gorgeous.</div>
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<a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-AqIOal0Jhuw/VA8-9kjyk1I/AAAAAAAADE0/vzKyDswRep4/s1600/IMG_0039.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-AqIOal0Jhuw/VA8-9kjyk1I/AAAAAAAADE0/vzKyDswRep4/s1600/IMG_0039.JPG" height="360" width="640" /></a></div>
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The walk over to Frigid Air Pass was easy and pleasant with lots of low angle trail and pretty wildflowers. The final part of the pass was steep but short. At the top we got our first glimpse of Snowmass Mountain as well as a view of the back side of the Maroon Bells.</div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-monANqI6g-8/VA8-_GI4TZI/AAAAAAAADFU/OiQBg6jue58/s1600/IMG_0043.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-monANqI6g-8/VA8-_GI4TZI/AAAAAAAADFU/OiQBg6jue58/s1600/IMG_0043.JPG" height="360" width="640" /></a></div>
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Fravert Basin and Snowmass Mountain from Frigid Air Pass</div>
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<a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-NLGuGIEr-wg/VA8--RTSQ2I/AAAAAAAADPo/y_Rbai0hajc/s1600/IMG_0042.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-NLGuGIEr-wg/VA8--RTSQ2I/AAAAAAAADPo/y_Rbai0hajc/s1600/IMG_0042.JPG" height="360" width="640" /></a></div>
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Maroon Bells from Frigid Air Pass</div>
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We started to see the same people throughout the day and we would end up seeing them throughout the whole trip. There was the 'Group of Four' who seemed to have an identical pace to us, the 'Descenders' who joked to us, "We're really good at going downhill," the 'Gang' who carried a boom-box and enjoyed making loud cuckoo calls, the 'Patriarchs,' our 'Buddies,' 'Speedy McGreedy,' and others. They all began to feel almost like family. The grand parents, the annoying little brothers, the cousin who seems nice but we rarely hear from her, etc.</div>
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The descent from Frigid Air Pass was the worst descent of the whole trip. My knee was really bothering me and we were at the tail end of a difficult 11 mile, 2 pass day. Eventually we found a nice campsite in Fravert Basin. We set up our camp and enjoyed basking in the sun and simply relaxing before dinner time. </div>
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The descent from Frigid Air</div>
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Dinner was satisfying and we spent the evening playing Mancala on a sleeping pad board with little twigs for the playing pieces. It worked quite well. We also have the option to play Scrabble, Connect-Four, and Tic-Tac-Toe on Shelby's sleeping pad.</div>
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In the morning we slept in a bit and then started the hike for the day towards Trail Rider Pass. We hiked through Fravert Basin for a few miles, passing a waterfall and an easy stream crossing.</div>
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Eventually the trail started traversing the slope on the north side of the basin and we began our long climb. The trail switched back several times on the way up and the trail was pretty steep for much of the climb.</div>
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Eventually the angle eased off and we made it to the upper basin below the pass. This was one of the most beautiful parts of the trip for us. There was a beautiful lake with wide open views in all directions. It was nice to take a break in this area before finishing the climb to the pass.</div>
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After a short break, we headed up the last bit of hill before the pass. We caught our first glimpse of Snowmass Lake from the pass and were quickly off down the hill since it started hailing on us. It wasn't too long before the hail went away and the clouds started to break, making for probably the best scenery of the trip.</div>
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Snowmass Peak from right above Snowmass Lake </div>
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Snowmass Lake with double rainbow (part of the way!)</div>
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The descent from the pass was steep to start out with, then mellowed out for a while, then got steeper again as we approached the campground at Snowmass Lake. We set up our camp quickly and spent the rest of the evening hanging around the lake, reading, and eating.<br />
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Snowmass Peak, Haggerman Peak, and Snowmass Mountain from the lake</div>
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We had planned for our trip to be 4 days - 3 for backpacking and 1 for hiking Snowmass Mountain, but due to the condition of my knee and a nasty cold that Shelby developed, we opted to hike back to the car the next day. This ended up being a good call since we were able to get some Niquil!</div>
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The last day of hiking was pleasant. We started out hiking through the woods a ways to Snowmass Creek and then started our way up towards Buckskin Pass. The climb started out with lots of trees and after gaining some significant elevation we made it to treeline where we found a pretty upper basin area. </div>
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One more short break before the pass and we made the final climb to the top. It was definitely the easiest finish to a pass that we did on this trip. The trail is very low angle with long nice switchbacks. It wasn't too long until we made it to the top and had views of Pyramid Peak and the Maroon Bells.</div>
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Pyramid Peak on the right from Buckskin Pass</div>
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As it typically goes on a long hike, the last stretch feels like it is the longest. We made our way down the steep trail to Minnihana Gulch. The previous days had a long hike leading to the pass followed by a short descent to camp, but this day was the opposite, so we still had a ways to go.</div>
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I started to get a rhythm and figured out a good way to walk fast without hurting my knee, so I picked up the pace so that the end of our hike didn't drag on for too long. The trail brought us to the trees before too long and then it was a mostly forgettable hike to Crater Lake. Walking along the trail back to the car, some people ahead of us stopped us and told us there were a couple bull moose down in the valley. This made our trip feel complete. We had heard about the bears and moose in the area and hoped to see one or the other and we were rewarded with a great moose sighting and Shelby's first!</div>
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The last mile and a half dragged on, but we eventually made it to Maroon Lake. Our feet were tired and we were looking forward to a celebration beer in Aspen. But first we took a few minutes to wade in the frigid lake and enjoy the bliss of having spent a wonderful weekend together in the wilderness.</div>
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Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-86418416253957260162014-08-26T13:12:00.000-06:002014-10-29T14:56:09.447-06:00Royal FlushI had heard about Royal Flush a couple months ago browsing the mountain project for climbing near Frisco. It's a unique climb for Colorado since it is a 1500ft, 8 pitch, 5.9 sport route - the longest sport route in Colorado. It looked like a ton of fun for a sport climber like myself who is itching to get on something long.<br />
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Our first attempt was on Saturday, but since the weather forecast didn't look ideal we decided to just wait for Sunday. So we headed to a nearby single pitch crag called the White Wall and then spent the day attempting to watch the USA Pro Challenge, visiting Dillon Dam brewery, and eating.<br />
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Wake up call was at 5:15 on Sunday. We took down our tent and headed over to the parking lot. After a quick breakfast of leftover pizza we headed to the base of the route. The weather was beautiful albeit quite cold, so we bundled up in our Melanzana hoodies and started our climb.<br />
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The first pitch was pretty easy, even in approach shoes, but I soon realized why people said that you should be comfortable running it out on easy rock. There was lots of space between bolts which could mean a long lead fall, but it kept us on our toes. At first the runouts were nerve racking for me, but it wasn't long before I just accepted them and expected them.<br />
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The first three pitches passed by without much to mention. The climbing was typically no harder than 5.7 and the rock was good quality. There was a 100 meter walk to the left and we soon found pitch 4. We took a short break here among all the trees before starting up again. Supposedly there is a 5.10 variation straight up and a 5.7 out to the right, so Shelby went in search for the 5.7 variation. She ended up having to climb runout 5.9 until she was able to get back on the main route. That was definitely interesting.<br />
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At the top of pitch 4 we had a pretty long hike up through a talus field to the base of the headwall, which would contain steeper and more difficult pitches with more spectacular views and exposure.<br />
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The beautiful view of Dillon Lake from the talus field.</div>
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We were excited to get to climb the headwall in the background</div>
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Shelby took the lead again on the opening pitch of the headwall. She climbed up the apron, a beautiful low angle slab up to the prominent dihedral where she crossed to the left and started out the steep climbing for the day. The delicate slab climbing was a ton of fun and it was exciting to change modes in the middle of the climb to the jug haul up the steep face. This was one of the best pitches of the climb and I was glad we did it instead of the harder variation.</div>
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Next up was a 5.9 pitch that started out with a fun layback and then traversed a bit over to a tight dihedral. Getting into this dihedral was the crux for me, but probably because I didn't climb it well. I was attempting to mantel onto a tiny ledge while being cramped in a tight featureless dihedral. I had most of my weight on my right hand for way too long and I was afraid that I would fall. Somehow I made it up on my feet and continued, but my right wrist was sore for the rest of the climb. To finish off the pitch there was a pretty fun and pretty tricky roof to a nice wide ledge where I could take my shoes off and sit down for a while. While I belayed Shelby from this ledge I was just giddy. Being in the middle of the steep headwall with so much exposure was just amazing. </div>
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Still inside the hoodie on pitch 6. Cold day!</div>
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We had one more pitch of real climbing and it was a great finale to the climb. Several blocky roof-like moves brought us up to a tree with an ammo box full of several volumes of summit registers. We could see two groups of climbers below us on the headwall alone and it was really cool to see how far we had climbed. We signed the register and climbed the remaining 3rd class gully to the lower summit of Mount Royal. This was the first time we could bask in the sun all day and it felt great. We took some summit photos and started the long hike down.</div>
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The hike down took around an hour and it was somewhat miserable. The step trail was hard on our knees, but nothing could damper our spirits. Back at the parking lot we sat on Shelby's tailgate and enjoyed a couple IPAs together. A good celebration after a great day of climbing.</div>
Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-86185205608051141422014-07-29T12:43:00.000-06:002014-10-29T14:56:20.897-06:00Estes Park with FriendsThis weekend Shelby and I made a trip to the Allenspark/Estes Park area for some time camping, hiking, and climbing with our friends Zach and Hilary. We ended up retreating to out tents from the rain a couple times, the hiking wasn't what we were expecting, and the climbing a bit humbling but all in all it was a wonderful time spent with good friends outside.<br />
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We've become used to going to less popular camping areas so we showed up around 9:00 to find that all the campgrounds were full. Thankfully a drunk old man named Chip offered us a spot next to his trailer for us to set up out tents. After an hour of shooting the breeze with Chip we hit the hay.</div>
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After a lazy start to the morning, we found a new campsite and headed over to the Brainard Lakes area for a hike. Again forgetting about the business of this part of the state, we showed up and they didn't let us passed the toll booth since there were no parking spots ahead. Instead of waiting around, we opted for a walk up the rough dirt road to Left Hand Reservoir. </div>
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The walk up the road was pleasant and easy. At the top we were rewarded with good views and did a little exploring around the lake. We saw moose poop but sadly saw no moose. We need to get up to Alaska sometime soon!</div>
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Back at our campground, we were soon tent bound because of a storm passing through. A few card games, a short snooze, and a beer later we emerged from our shelters an went on a stroll around Lily Lake next to where we'd be climbing the next day.</div>
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After a delicious dinner of steak fajitas, we were tent bound once more and had a vicious game of Indian rat slap or whatever that game is called. This time a stream flowed beneath our tent and we were very thankful for the good waterproofing. Eventually we were able to leave the tent and spend the rest of the evening around the campfire.</div>
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The next day we headed back to the Lily Lake area for some climbing at a crag called Jurassic Park. The pictures I had seen made this crag look absolutely gorgeous and it definitely was.</div>
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We started out on Coloradoddity (5.6) which was a fun long slab with a gorgeous backdrop of Longs, Meeker, and Lily Lake. Next up was a 5.8 that was really pretty weird but somewhat fun. The crux is an odd traverse the right that forces you to skip easy rock that would follow the natural line up the rock. Kind of a weird route, but Shelby crushed it!</div>
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Our next climb would be the route that ends up on the cover photo for every guidebook in the area: Edge of Time (5.9).</div>
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(The photo we saw before coming)</div>
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We waited patiently for about 45 minutes to get on this climb. It gets 3.5 out of 4 stars and after climbing it, I think that rating is more for the beautiful formation than for the excellent climbing. Getting to the first bolt is challenging but doable. The crux is between the first and second bolts so a ground fall is entirely possible. I stood there balancing on a large edge with okay hands for a while worried about the next moves. The hands were bad, the feet were bad, and a fall would be scary here. I eventually made the first crux move and found a good finger lock which Shelby later called a jug. It wasn't enough of a jug for me when my foot slipped. I clung to the finger crack for just a second with my weight flying outward. My wonderful girlfriend made the smart, quick decision to take in the rope by moving several steps back which could have saved me from hitting the ground when my hands came off and I took a long fall onto the first bolt. I dangled there for a second scared from my fall and sore from banging my ankle and scraping my wrists and then was lowered to the ground. Spooked from my fall, I was reluctant to try again, but I felt okay so I didn't have a good excuse not to try again. This time I got the crux moves, locked my fingers in the crack and pulled up onto lower angle rock where I thankfully found my second bolt. The rest of the route was runout which normally would have been thrilling, but I was still nervous from my fall so it ended up being a bit scary for me.</div>
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We finished off our climbing day with another fun climb: Middle Toe (5.9). This was a great climb. It was long and sustained. Still being nervous, I got a bit scared at a couple points but it was certainly an enjoyable climb with a great view at the top.<br />
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I left the crag somewhat humbled for getting so scared on a couple 5.9s. I love the challenges that climbing presents, but they inevitably bring out my own insecurities and remind me that I am a very finite being. <br />
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<i><span class="text Isa-55-9" id="en-ESV-18750">For as the heavens are higher than the earth,</span><span class="indent-1"></span></i></div>
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<i><span class="indent-1"><span class="indent-1-breaks"></span><span class="text Isa-55-9">so are my ways higher than your ways</span></span><span class="indent-1"><span class="text Isa-55-9"> </span></span></i></div>
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<i><span class="indent-1"><span class="text Isa-55-9">and my thoughts than your thoughts.</span></span> </i></div>
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Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-65447566775151172012014-07-22T11:46:00.001-06:002014-08-26T15:04:20.572-06:00Pacific and Atlantic Peaks<div class="doc" style="margin: 0px 4px; position: relative;">
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<span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Due to a slight shift in recreational interests as well as general business of life, I’m finally getting around to my first highish altitude hike of the year. Shelby rode in the Courage Classic fundraiser ride for Denver Children’s Hospital on Saturday, so I found myself in the mountains with nothing to do. I only had so much time since I wanted to get back to meet Shelby at the finish line, so that limited my options to hikes nearby the Copper area. Luckily there are all kinds of great hikes within 10 minutes! My route would start out at Mayflower Gulch, I would climb the 3rd class west ridge of Pacific Peak and then hike over to Atlantic Peak before coming back to my car along Atlantic’s more mellow west ridge.</span></div>
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<span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">The hike started out with a mile walk along a road that leads to the Boston Mine ruins. The standard way to do this hike is to go all the way to the end of the road and then head north to a gully between Atlantic and Mayflower Hill. But that added at least a half mile of backtracking, so I went off trail and took a shortcut across the gulch to get to the gully shown in orange above. My feet got soaked since it was boggy, but the shortcut worked pretty well. Eventually I found a faint trail that went up the gully towards the basin area where the scrambling would start.</span></div>
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<span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Two men in their 50s/60s were hiking behind me and eventually caught up to me at the base of Pacific’s west ridge. They happened to be doing the same ridge as me so we talked about the route a bit and I let them go ahead of me before heading up.</span></div>
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<span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Sitting at the base of the route I was reminded of how alive I feel when I am in the mountains with a big (to me) route ahead of me. The ridge looked menacing. It was steep, loose, and chaotic looking. It was going to be a challenge, but one that I was excited to figure out.</span></div>
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<span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">I put on my helmet and started hiking. Following the men 100 feet ahead of me I stayed to the edge of the gullies we went up or on top of a ridge crest to stay out of the way of rock fall. The route was quite loose for most of the way up. I was always looking for more solid sections that I could climb up favoring exposed ridges to crumbly scree gullies. Solid is relative of course.</span></div>
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<span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Eventually we made it to the top and spent 15 minutes enjoying the summit. From here, it was a descent to the saddle between Pacific and Atlantic and then a class 2 hike up Atlantic.</span></div>
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<span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Atlantic Peak from the summit of Pacific Peak</span></div>
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<span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">It was nice to not have to worry too much about loose rock, but the hike over to Atlantic wasn’t anything too special. I did start getting really tired part way up Atlantic though. I had to start my habit of walking 50 steps and taking a quick break before continuing. I made it to the top and the clouds were starting to form.</span></div>
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<span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">I munched down most of my remaining food and then started down the west ridge of Atlantic. The ridge was actually pretty cool going down. It was boulder hopping all the way down and the ridge started out narrow and widened as I went down. I would be a pretty enjoyable hike up.</span></div>
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<span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">Unfortunately, it wasn’t a very enjoyable hike down for me because I tweaked my knee at some point near the top. So I walked with a slight limp all the way down. I got quite tired on the way down so you can imagine my sheer joy when I found a perfect snow field that I could glissade down to save 200 feet of down hiking.</span></div>
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<span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">At this point I got back onto an actual trail, which was very nice. I decided I would head to the Boston Mine ruins since I figured the trail would be better in that direction than my short cut. Eventually the trail disappeared and I found myself bushwacking for a quarter mile through very thick willows anyway! Luckily I was rewarded with a wonderful view of the Boston Mine ruins with the treacherous Atlantic-Fletcher traverse in the background.</span></div>
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<span style="-webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">The hike finished off with a mile and a half walk down the road to my car. I was completely exhausted at this point and annoyed by my knee. But I was ecstatic to have spent a day alone in the mountains on a challenging route.</span></div>
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Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-36126449419363899222014-05-08T21:24:00.001-06:002014-10-29T14:56:35.082-06:00Backpacking the Grand CanyonFor as long as I can remember, my dad has dreamed about backpacking the Grand Canyon. Last year, I decided that enough was enough and suggested that we do it this spring.<br />
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I was feeling really antsy on Friday to get out of the office and get out to Arizona. Some time away sounded wonderful. So we arrived in Vegas on Saturday, picked up a few things in town and then headed out to Red Rock Canyon, just west of Vegas, to camp for the night. We were fortunate enough to get an overflow spot to camp since it was the weekend in the middle of prime rock climbing season.<br />
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After setting up camp we went out on a little hike to go scope out a climb that I'd like to climb someday. It was a nice hike. Very pretty views of the canyon with lots of Joshua trees and cactuses around us. The walk was mostly flat, so it made for a good warm up hike to help dad acclimatize to higher elevations. We stopped at the foot of the mountains and talked about my new obsession, that is climbing. After a bit of a rest we turned around and headed back to the car to make for a good 5 mile hike.<br />
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That night at the campground it was pretty windy and chilly. Luckily, we were able to start a fire after dinner and sipped some hot chocolate for a while and enjoyed the luxury of camping chairs, thanks to Shelby!<br />
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The next day we made a casual start and checked out a church in Vegas before picking up a few last things and leaving town. The drive to the Grand Canyon was mostly uneventful, although we did take some time to check out the Hoover Dam and I contemplated the entertainment value of having a bouncy ball that I could throw down the dam. And alas, I forgot to ask my dad what the fish said when it ran into a wall. Dam. We also got really confused about what time it was in Arizona.<br />
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Upon our arrival at the Grand Canyon village we found our campsite at the Mather Campground and spent another evening enjoying the luxuries of car camping. We opted to make an early start in the morning, so we were off to bed around 8:00. The 5:00 wake up call was to become the standard for the next several days in order to avoid the heat.<br />
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We woke up easily in anticipation for our hike and caught the bus to the South Kaibab Trailhead. It wasn't the best start to our hike because I forgot my hiking boots at our campground - I was wearing trail running shoes - and I broke my trekking pole cams while tightening them. I got my kinks worked out and we headed down the trail figuring it would be a good test on how well trail runners work for backpacking!<br />
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The hike down to the river ended up being the hardest part of the trip. We walked along a ridge for about a third of the way down. It was very pretty and the view seemed to change every time we went around a corner. On the second third of the descent, the slope eased off a bit and we had a chance to stop at an outhouse where the Tonto Trail runs into South Kaibab. After a nice long break, we continued our trek and were soon greeted with our first view of the Colorado River. It was at this point that the hike just dragged on and on. The river seemed so close, but it took quite a while to get there.<br />
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Eventually we made it down to the river and shuffled into camp to grab a spot. We found a good site and took a nice nap in the shade. It was 85 degrees at the bottom of the canyon, so it was nice to get in the shade and take it easy. This was probably my favorite part of the backpacking trip, just relaxing in the little oasis with all the cottonwood trees, the cool stream, and the deer wandering around camp.<br />
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The next morning we made our usual early start and headed uphill towards Indian Garden. About a half mile down the trail I realized that I forgot my sunglasses, which would not have been a good thing to lose with how sunny it was! So I made a little extra trip back to the campground without my backpack to retrieve the sunglasses and caught up with Dad up the trail a ways. It wasn't long before we started seeing people jogging down the trail. I was very inspired by all the runners attempting to run down to the river and back in a day. I would love to attempt such a thing if I was in good enough shape.<br />
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We had hiked a few hours and came up to a sign that I thought said 3 miles to Indian Garden. Still a while to go. And 0.3 miles later we came to a sign that said Indian Garden Campground. What a pleasant little error in my reading. We spent the rest of the day defending our stuff from squirrels, napping, and eating at the campground. While we were eating dinner there was a crazy incident involving yelling and lots of nasty words and people thinking that they are entitled to the many amenities that the Grand Canyon corridor trails provide. It was crazy to see such a big dispute that far away from roads.<br />
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The next morning we left our campground and began what we thought would be a hard day. It had more elevation gain than the previous day, so we anticipated the possibility of stopping on the trail in the middle of the day to avoid the heat. This was not necessary since we were both in better shape than we realized, so we made it back to the top of the canyon relatively quickly after pacing ourselves well up the long climb.<br />
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It was a great sense of satisfaction to top out on the rim. We took one more look at the beautiful canyon and ran for the showers since we were beginning to stink. After spending another night at the Mather Campground at the Grand Canyon, we made our way to Zion National Park in Utah. The park was absolutely beautiful with probably the biggest rock walls I've ever stood next to.<br />
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We found a free campsite on BLM land and enjoyed our last night camping. The next day we took a short day hike up Angel's Landing, which involved countless switchbacks on a paved trail and then a ton of really fun scrambling along an exposed ridge. The trail has become so popular that they have chains to hold onto for the exposed section. The ease of access to this ridge scramble has let to many deaths over the years. Not because it is a particularly dangerous trail, but because people who wouldn't normally feel comfortable on such a hike attempt it because of how easily it is accessed and because of the chains that give a false sense of safety.<br />
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Anyways, we drove back to Vegas, lived it up for a night (we had tacos and went to bed), and in the morning we came back home.<br />
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It was a wonderful trip with lots of really good scenery, fun hiking, and lots of quality time and discussion with my great dad.Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-3432765381502552932013-10-11T10:24:00.000-06:002013-10-11T10:25:00.112-06:00Sangre de Cristo Trip: Crestone PeakI was sitting in our hotel room in my long underwear texting my friend, feeling defeated. We had been turned back from the Crestones by a bad hailstorm and we were discouraged enough that there was mention of leaving the range all together. Our plan for the rest of the peaks was to backpack into the basin and then climb the nearby peaks. But we were turned off from backpacking since all our gear was soaked and we had to waste a day drying it out. The thought of leaving the range all-together to cherry pick some easy peaks elsewhere just sounded depressing. We came to the Sangres to climb the Sangres. It's an amazing range and it would be a shame to leave after only 2 summits. So we decided to drive around the range and make an attempt on Kit Carson, Challenger, and Crestone Peak.<br />
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At the Willow Lakes trail head (TH for Kit Carson/Challenger), we parked our jeep and spread out all our gear in the sun to give it a chance to dry out. It wasn't long before most of it was completely dry and we just had the day to relax at the campsite. We sat out a one hour long storm in the afternoon inside the Jeep. Throughout the day, hikers came down the trail to head home and I made a point of talking to as many of them as I could. Kit Carson and Challenger are right next to the Crestones, so the area experienced the same storm that we did the evening before. One man got stuck above treeline in a cave at 11,800 while his wife waited for him in their tent below, but they spoke of it like it was nothing. The next lady tried to cross the creek and almost fell in but was caught by a man on the other side. One couple made it across one of the two stream crossings, but had to stay the night, hoping the next stream crossing went down enough to be safe. Two old men told us about how incredibly scary the stream crossing was since it was white water directly above a cliff. They met a couple climbers who were climbing the Prow, a class 5 route up Kit Carson, and were stuck on the wall, exposed to the elements for the 30 minute hail storm. Finally, a couple forest rangers returned and showed us pictures of the stream crossing. All the rocks and logs that they had personally placed there were completely washed out and the creek was raging. Seeing the pictures, there was no way I would even consider trying to cross that stream, so we decided that we wouldn't attempt Kit Carson/Challenger for at least another day. We decided to attempt Crestone Peak via Cottonwood Creek the next morning.<br />
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None of us knew very much about this route up the peak. We had a short description about the approach in our Roach guide book, but none of us had studied the route like we had all the other routes in our plan. So I took a horrible photo of our map and we woke up at 1:30 for a 2:00 start time.<br />
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A completely useless iPhone photo of our map<br />
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The approach was tough. With our early start, we would be walking in the dark for a good 3.5 hours, which made the poorly maintained trail very difficult to follow. We lost it several times throughout the morning, but always found it again, since we at least knew that the trail followed Cottonwood Creek for the majority of the time. Eventually, the trail veers left and climbs up towards the basin area below the needle and peak. There were a couple sections where we had to climb up some steep, featureless slabs, knowing that it wasn't going to be very fun to descend. The sun started to rise as we approached treeline, but even in the sunlight, we had trouble finding our route. Standing in a talus field, we looked all around us and saw cairns in all directions. To continue in the direction we were already going looked like a dead end at a large waterfall and cliff. So we followed a cairn that cut to the left up a steep hill. We continued passed the cairn and climbed up a steep, grassy gully. The cairns disappeared and we figured that we must have gone the wrong direction. We could see very far, so we just chose our own route to the base of Crestone Peak's red gully through boulder fields and grassy slopes. </div>
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About 5 hours into our hike we were finally at the base of the actual climb. The red gully seemed to go on forever above us. From here it would be a 2,000 ft class 3 climb up to a saddle about 100 ft from the summit. The view was daunting to say the least.</div>
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The red gully</div>
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So on came our helmets and we packed our trekking poles for the climb. The gully was relentless. We were gaining elevation fast because it was so steep, but it was very tiring. It was really just a long slog up a gully with the same view the entire time. There was water flowing down the gully most of the way up so there was a lot of wet rock to avoid. A few times, Tony and I chose some more difficult lines to avoid the slippery rocks in the middle of the gully.</div>
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But the climb went on and on and I was ready to be at the top. Richard ran out of water about 2/3 of the way up so we stopped at the stream flowing down the gully and filtered some water for him.</div>
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Towards the end of the gully we could see all the way to the sand dunes and the Blanca group.</div>
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Finally we made it to the top and enjoyed some time on the most spectacular summit I had ever been on. It was a shame I was so tired and that clouds were starting to form. Otherwise I would have enjoyed sitting on the summit more. </div>
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Remember how we were hoping to climb Kit Carson and Challenger? Well, we took a look to the north to see how much hail hadn't melted yet and sure enough the Kit Carson Avenue (the long diagonal white line near the top) was piled full of hail. The Avenue is a wide ledge that must be followed from the Challenger summit on the left in order to keep the climb up Kit Carson class 3. Combining the danger of the hail-filled ledge and our fatigue from this difficult hike we were on, we decided to not try to climb the peaks the next day.</div>
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The climb down from the peak was long and frustrating. The gully was quite loose and we kept on triggering small rock slides. One small rock hit my head, which thankfully had a helmet on it. The clouds seemed like they got thicker and thicker. About halfway down we met a man who was climbing up. He had left his pack at the base of the gully and was carrying nothing. Not even a water bottle or a rain jacket. Crazy man. </div>
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Right when we reached the bottom of the gully it started sprinkling. And then it started raining. And then we heard thunder right when we were reaching some trees. On the descent, we actually found the correct route that we should have taken up and it really wasn't any better than the route we chose. There was a ton of bushwacking through wet bushes and at one point, we had to shimmy down a steep and slippery class 4 chimney next to the waterfall. I didn't blame us for thinking the waterfall was a dead end on the way up. It was a sketchy down climb. With all the bushwacking, Richard eventually blew up. I could hear him struggling to get through a bush and then he just screamed out in anger. The rest of the hike out, he barely said a word except to complain about this horribly maintained trail that we had to hike. He was having a rough day and apologized to us later that evening.</div>
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The hike out was mostly uneventful and the trail was much easier to follow than it was in the dark that morning. It was raining for about an hour, so the steep slabs that we had to climb up were terrifying to go down. If we lost our footing, we would slide about 100 feet down the slab and while it wouldn't be fatal, it would be very painful and bloody.</div>
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It took forever, but we finally made it to the bottom and all three of us wanted nothing but a burger and beer. So we drove out of town to this place that we saw had a big sign saying, "Burgers and Beer Here." Sadly the place was closed so we drove back to the town of Crestone to find another restaurant. A man at the grocery store pointed us towards the only restaurant in town where we went and enjoyed some pizza, burgers, and beers. It was a nice way to unwind and observe the interesting Crestonian hippies that congregated at the restaurant. Exhausted, we all slept well that night. </div>
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This was definitely the most difficult hike of our trip. It was something like 13 miles with 6,000 ft of elevation gain. Definitely long enough to have done as an overnight trip, but it felt like a big accomplishment to do it in one big push. The fast and light alpine style, I guess. I would like to come back to the Crestones someday, camp at South Colony Lakes and then attempt the traverse between the peak and the needle. And maybe someday in the not too distant future I'll get to climb the 5.7 Ellingwood Arete up the needle. These are some truly spectacular mountains.</div>
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Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-43035417247447633832013-09-27T15:26:00.000-06:002013-09-27T15:30:32.589-06:00Sangre de Cristo Trip: Humboldt PeakI was really excited to spend a night or two out at South Colony Lakes. From the pictures I had seen, it looked like an amazing place with a beautiful view of one of the most picturesque peaks in Colorado - Crestone Needle. It was going to be nice to just spend some time away from the roads and just relax in the wilderness.<br />
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We left early this morning, around 4AM. It was going to be a long walk up to the lakes and we would be carrying our big backpacks with all our camping gear. Little did I know, my partners were planning on taking everything but the kitchen sink for this short, 2 night backpacking trip. Their packs weighed over 50 lbs, and I was carrying less than 25lbs, still falling into the "heavyweight" category according to ultralight hikers. The hike up south colony road was painfully slow. Eventually, we got to the old trailhead where a small trail cuts north to the lakes and the sun was starting to rise. We hiked through the woods as the trees started to thin and finally got our first good view of Crestone Needle.<br />
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Soon we arrived at the lower south colony lake and looked around for a campsite. Being Labor Day, many of the camping spots were full, but we were able to find a good one sheltered by short pine trees, close to the creek where we could collect water. We didn't eat a proper breakfast that morning so we set up our tents and spent some time cooking oatmeal. Enough lollygagging around, we decided to head on up Humboldt before any storms came in.<br />
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The classic Ellingwood Arete on Crestone Needle</div>
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The climb up Humboldt was much harder than I expected, mostly because I've started a bad habit of not paying attention to route descriptions for "easy" hikes. The hike starts out with a bunch of switchbacks up to the saddle below Humboldt. I was expecting this to be the only hard part and the rest to be really easy. But it was actually the other way around. From the saddle to the top, it was a bunch of tiring boulder hopping up a steep slope.<br />
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Slowly but surely we made progress. I could tell that Richard was starting to acclimatize. He still said that he felt very tired, but he was climbing noticeably faster than yesterday. The hike itself wasn't anything to write home about, but the views certainly were with the Crestones in full view.<br />
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We made it to the summit and as usual, we only spent about 15 minutes there and made our way down to avoid storms. We saw a young couple taking two corgi dogs up the mountain and it looked like a horrible idea with all the boulder hopping. It wasn't long until we looked back and saw that they gave up because of the dogs' slow pace and headed back down. We made it back to our campsite and began our day of lounging around.<br />
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While we were lounging at camp an older man told us that his water filter was clogged asked if he could borrow ours. So I went down to the creek with him to help him fill up. I got down to the creek and realized that I forgot the bladder for my filter, so I left the filter with the man and jogged back to camp to get the bladder. At this point, it was starting to rain and by the time I got back to camp, it started to pour. I had no interest in going out in the rain to get my filter back, figuring the man would return it. So I just hunkered under a pine tree to wait out the storm. Tony found a tree nearby to stand under and Richard went into his tent. We figured the storm wouldn't last too long, but it wasn't stopping. The older man, soaking wet, came up to our camp to return my filter. I had some dirty water in my bladder, so we sat under the trees and chatted for a few minutes while the water filtered into his Nalgenes. He thanked us and ran over to his site just 100 feet from ours.<br />
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The storm didn't get any better. It started hailing and the lightning was getting closer. We were staying relatively dry under the trees, but the hail was able to get through the branches and there was really no place we could stand without getting pelted. We started to notice that a stream was starting to form and it was flowing under our tents. Tony and I tried to dig some quick trenches to get the water to go around the tent, but the hail just got worse and we gave up, just praying that the tent stayed waterproof and didn't let our down bags get soaked. We felt horrible for choosing such bad places for the tents. My dad had always taught me to not set up a tent where water would flow, but over the years I had grown lax and just chose the nice flat spot.<br />
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The storm had been going for 30 minutes at this point, with 15 minutes of rain and 15 minutes of hail, and I was starting to shiver. I was wearing a rain jacket with a t-shirt and hiking pants. There were no signs that it was going to stop anytime soon, so I opened up my pack to get my puffy jacket, hat, and gloves and I put them on under my rain jacket. This helped a lot, but I was still cold. The hail was piling up and Tony and I decided we would try to get into the tent to stay warm. When we opened to tent and Tony jumped in, it was floating on 2 inches of water and it just didn't seem like it would be very helpful for us to sit in there. So we continued waiting under the trees. The hail finally stopped after coming down for 30 minutes. The rain continued coming down, but seemed to be relenting a bit. At this point all 3 of us were cold and most of our gear was wet. The hail had piled up to about 3 inches. If we stayed there for the night, we would be cold and wet and none of us really felt like having a miserable night, so we decided to head back to the Jeep, which would take 3 hours. We packed up all our heavy soaked gear and headed out. It was a long, tiring walk, but we made it just as it was getting dark. We threw in the towel for the day and decided to stay in a hotel where we enjoyed a nice shower.<br />
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I was really disappointed and upset with myself for not choosing a better camping spot. It we had chosen a higher spot to put our tents, we probably could have comfortably stayed the night and had a chance to attempt the Crestones the next day. That night at the hotel we were talking about what we wanted to do for the rest of the week. It seemed that our plans for the week were toast. We were a bit turned off from backpacking and unfortunately the other hikes we had planned would include at least one night of backpacking. We almost decided to leave the Sangres and do some day hikes in the other ranges, but that would have been really disappointing to have driven all the way down there only to hike 2 14ers. So we decided to just spend a day drying out and drive to the other side of the range and then attempt to do two really long day hikes up Kit Carson/Challenger and up Crestone peak from the west side.<br />
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The two lakes in the hail piles where our tents were</div>
Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-83959306850554822332013-09-26T16:12:00.001-06:002013-09-27T15:30:44.434-06:00Sangre de Cristo Trip 2013: Mt. LindseyMy checklist was checked and my backpack was packed. I spent the morning drinking a hot cup of coffee and listening to music. Before I knew it, two men were walking down my stairs and greeted me. I wondered, who are these two white guys coming down my stairs and how do they know me? It took a few seconds, but I realized that they were Tony and Richard, my two climbing partners for a week in the Sangre de Cristo mountains. It was time to go, so we hopped in Richard's rental Jeep Grand Cherokee and started our drive south. I had met Tony the week before on a hike to Mt. of the Holy Cross, but I had only gotten to know Richard via Facebook stalking. So the conversation had its gaps, but we all had enough to talk about and were comfortable enough with each other.<br />
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After a long highway and a long rough dirt road, we made it to our campsite for the night at the Mt. Lindsey trailhead. We camped at the trailhead and had a beautiful view of the Iron Nipple.<br />
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The plan was to get a 5:00 start the next morning, so we gathered water from the creek, ate our dinner, and headed to bed early. These alpine starts suit me pretty well because I'm usually so excited for an upcoming climb that I can't sleep anyway. I can't say I'm too crazy about walking in the dark though.<br />
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Walking in the dark the next morning proved to be challenging. The trail to Mt. Lindsey had social trails that diverged then converged and it was very easy for us to get lost while navigating in the dark. As we approached treeline the sun rose and we got to see the beautiful views once again.<br />
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We walked through this beautiful valley above the trees with a great view of Blanca Peak and climbed to a saddle that connects Mt. Lindsey to Iron Nipple. From here we could finally see our route. There are two options. The first is to climb a loose scree gulley up the face that supposedly stays class 2 and the other option is a class 3 climb up the ridge on solid rock with a short easy class 4 section near the top. I was eager to try out a class 4 route for the first time, so I had already convinced my partners to do the ridge. I would say that it was the safer option. There was some exposure, but much less chance of a rock fall compared to the north face.<br />
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Mt. Lindsey's northwest ridge and north face from the saddle</div>
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At the saddle we all put our helmets on and packed our trekking poles. The ridge looked foreboding and Tony would later tell me that the scariest part of the route for him was standing here at the saddle, looking at the route. It wasn't long before it was evident that we were going to need to do a good bit of route finding to stay on route. I took the lead and kept us high on the ridge for the majority of the climb. It was a lot of really fun class 3 scrambling with a bit of exposure and, of course, really good views.</div>
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We were getting close to the crux of the route and I stayed close to the ridge crest. I saw 2 climbers ahead of us who had descended to the base of a narrow gulley that leads to the crux. I thought they had stayed too low and got themselves into a difficult climb. But it was only a minute later when I cliffed out and could not stay on the ridge any longer. So we backtracked 100 ft and traversed the ridge lower down across a pretty sketchy exposed section to get the the base of the crux gulley. The crux was a lot of fun. It took some careful climbing and time to find holds, but we all made it up. The crux was actually easier than I expected, but I must have given my climbing partners the wrong impression about the climb. Richard was pretty shaken by the exposure and told me that he didn't plan on climbing any more class 4. Tony, however was a bit surprised by the difficulty of the climb but later told me that it was one of the most fun routes he had ever climbed. It was the same for me. Right up there with Kelso Ridge.</div>
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<a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-BUJCVKZVQ1Y/Uip5jWbFzYI/AAAAAAAAB_g/arIqzpudiLI/w1313-h875-no/100_1662.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="426" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-BUJCVKZVQ1Y/Uip5jWbFzYI/AAAAAAAAB_g/arIqzpudiLI/w1313-h875-no/100_1662.JPG" width="640" /></a></div>
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We were nearly at the top and it was just a tiring hike to the summit. We only spent about 15 minutes at the top because clouds were starting to form. Again, we had the option of the two routes to descend, but we opted for the north face gulley to avoid the very steep sections on the ridge. The gulley was less loose than I expected. We were able to stay to the side, which had somewhat solid rock. Still, we saw several people heading up the gulley without any helmets and deemed them to be crazy for not using helmets on the loose rock.</div>
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The walk back to camp was pretty nice. I'm always pretty tired after climbing a 14er, but relative to some of the very long days I had earlier this summer, I felt great. The hike was 8 miles and 3500ft of elevation gain. We went really slow because this was Richard's first day at high altitude after flying in from South Carolina. Probably not the best idea to get him killed on his first day. The slow pace made for a good warm up hike for me and left me excited for the rest of the climbs.</div>
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That night we drove up the road a ways to South Colony Lakes trailhead and set up our tents for the night. We had another early start in the morning, so we didn't sit around the campfire for too long.</div>
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Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-55622762709720208572013-09-23T10:39:00.001-06:002013-09-27T15:30:54.262-06:00Summer of HikingAll last winter I was itching to do some hiking and I resolved that this summer would be the summer of hiking. Originally my goals were to start climbing class 3 and to do Long's Peak, Kelso Ridge, and The Sawtooth by the end of the summer. Class 3 climbing means that you need to use your hands to climb, but it is easy enough that you can go down the slope with your body facing outward. The only 14er routes I had done previously were class 2, which is just difficult walking, so class 3 seemed a bit intimidating to me.<br />
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I started out the summer with a climb up Kelso Ridge with my coworker and his friends. It was the funnest 14er route I had ever climbed. There were 3 or 4 sections that required careful climbing and a few spots with a ton of exposure. The exposure was exhilarating and the climbing was fun. I immediately knew that I wanted to do more climbing like this. This kind of climbing is so much more engaging for me. You actually have to use your brain to carefully make hand and foot placements and to keep yourself from freaking out with a hundred foot drop on either side.</div>
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The infamous Kelso Ridge knife-edge</div>
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Fun exposure on Kelso Ridge</div>
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Summer was speeding by before I knew it and I hadn't come up with any vacation plans. This couldn't stand. Last summer involved lots of knitting, reading, and bike riding around Denver. I wasn't going to let that happen again, so I started thinking about a trip to the Sangre de Cristo Mountains in southern Colorado. These mountains are absolutely beautiful and have lots of challenging routes, the kinds of class 3 routes I was now hooked on. I would have been okay doing this trip alone, but I knew I'd have people bugging me about how dangerous solo hiking is, so I took a look on 14ers.com to see if I could find some climbing partners. Sure enough, a guy from South Carolina posted on the website looking to do a similar trip to what I had planned. A few emails later I was committed to climbing with him and another Coloradan guy for a trip to the Sangres at the beginning of September. </div>
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The trip looked daunting. We planned on climbing 8 14ers in 5 days of climbing, which meant lots of miles and lots of vertical feet to gain. I wasn't in shape for this, so I immediately started training. Cycling was cut down to a minimum with only 1 ride a week and instead I started running and hiking more, with a goal of climbing a 14er almost every weekend.</div>
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Over all my time training I summited 11 14ers, hiked a total of 92 miles and 41,000 ft of elevation gain. By far the most hiking I've ever done in a summer! It was good for me to have a goal to train for. I am not someone who is very good about exercising for the sake of exercising. The running was tolerable and all the hikes were a lot of fun. My two favorites were a traverse of the Gray's-Torreys valley (Steven's Gulch) and a Bierstadt-Sawtooth-Evans combo.</div>
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The Steven's Gulch traverse made for a long day. It was 9.2 miles with 6,000 ft of elevation gain, so I started early at 4:15 and was hiking for over 9 hours. The majority of the hike was just a walk, but I had the pleasure of climbing Kelso Ridge again, which was plenty of fun. Towards the end of the day I was absolutely exhausted and found myself stopping frequently to rest. I had summited 5 peaks that day already, and near the end of the traverse I was able to see this view.</div>
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<a href="http://14ers.com/images/trips/13ertrips/510_201308101739207_l.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="476" src="http://14ers.com/images/trips/13ertrips/510_201308101739207_l.jpg" width="640" /></a></div>
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Steven's Gulch</div>
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Just being able to look at the entire route from the day gave me a great sense of satisfaction even though my body was completely beat. I plotted out the route in Google Earth afterward and I couldn't help but be giddy at how aesthetically pleasing the route was. I had never done a big valley traverse like this before, but I thought it was wonderful because you get to spend a ton of time above treeline on fun ridges and return back to your car by the end of the day.</div>
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Steven's Gulch Traverse Route</div>
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Earlier in the summer I did the Bierstadt-Sawtooth-Evans combo, which also made for a long day, but a great sense of satisfaction afterward. I went up Bierstadt via the standard West Slope route and it was raining the whole time, even with a 5:43 start time. By the time I got to the top, my gloves were quite wet and the summit was sitting inside a cloud. There were two small groups of climbers at the top and we spent 20 minutes talking about the dangerous conditions on the Sawtooth that connects Bierstadt and Evans. The rocks were slippery and the visibility was poor. I was tired of waiting for the others to decide and I was confident that this route was well within my abilities as long as I was careful. So I said goodbye to the two teams of climbers, put on my helmet and headed to the ridge by myself. It was only about 20 minutes before visibility cleared up and the rocks were never all that slippery. The traverse across the Sawtooth was quite fun with only one tricky climbing section. The rest of the hike was just a long slog. It felt like it took forever for me to get to the summit of Evans because I never looked at the route description enough to realize that it is actually quite far to the summit from the Sawtooth. But I eventually got there and spent 15 minutes with everyone that drove up there on the road. On the descent back to Guanella Pass the sun finally came out, just in time for me to walk through the muddy valley back to my car. I was exhausted after 10.25 miles and 3500 ft of hiking, but happy that I decided to make it a long day instead of turning around at the top of Bierstadt.</div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5G8o6agMgQITflnDydhtHeJ-ckvkIkKn4HxaN94as1as63bS2PjlBrJPdQqJOWKWryiIAIDFc0hYWn4dQA2vQHMkSemPiytKxDsKtrSUmk3zw4L132Ie9YoyGMfZ642KOABacMae7zITE/s1600/Photo+Jul+28,+10+07+21+AM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="640" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh5G8o6agMgQITflnDydhtHeJ-ckvkIkKn4HxaN94as1as63bS2PjlBrJPdQqJOWKWryiIAIDFc0hYWn4dQA2vQHMkSemPiytKxDsKtrSUmk3zw4L132Ie9YoyGMfZ642KOABacMae7zITE/s640/Photo+Jul+28,+10+07+21+AM.jpg" width="478" /></a></div>
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The Sawtooth Ridge</div>
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These were just two of the many hikes I did this summer. I discovered two fun hikes near Denver called Mt. Morrison and Goat Mountain. They're steep climbs with a little bit of class 3 and very little foot traffic. Bear Mountain in Boulder is a really fun and easy way to get tired without driving very far. The Decalibron is a hike that combines 4 14ers and I was glad I did it because it's a really easy way to get 4 summits without walking very far. The Mt. of the Holy Cross was probably the most scenic hike I did while training. We took the Halo Ridge route and it made for lots of boulder hopping and a very long day and we were absolutely exhausted by the end of it. Missouri was a disappointing hike for me because I had high aspirations of combining it with Belford and Oxford, but was thwarted by the weather and my exhaustion, so I only summitted Missouri. Here are the stats for my training hikes:</div>
<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="border-collapse: collapse; width: 428px;"><colgroup><col style="width: 128pt;" width="170"></col><col style="width: 51pt;" width="68"></col><col style="width: 69pt;" width="92"></col><col style="width: 74pt;" width="98"></col></colgroup><tbody>
<tr height="20" style="height: 15pt;"></tr>
</tbody></table>
<table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" style="border-collapse: collapse; width: 428px;"><colgroup><col style="mso-width-alt: 6217; mso-width-source: userset; width: 128pt;" width="170"></col><col style="mso-width-alt: 2486; mso-width-source: userset; width: 51pt;" width="68"></col><col style="mso-width-alt: 3364; mso-width-source: userset; width: 69pt;" width="92"></col><col style="mso-width-alt: 3584; mso-width-source: userset; width: 74pt;" width="98"></col></colgroup><tbody>
<tr height="20" style="height: 15.0pt;"><td class="xl63" height="20" style="height: 15.0pt; width: 128pt;" width="170"><b>Route</b></td>
<td class="xl63" style="border-left: none; width: 51pt;" width="68"><b>Date</b></td>
<td class="xl63" style="border-left: none; width: 69pt;" width="92"><b>Miles</b></td>
<td class="xl63" style="border-left: none; width: 74pt;" width="98"><b>Elevation Gain</b></td>
</tr>
<tr height="20" style="height: 15.0pt;">
<td class="xl64" height="20" style="border-top: none; height: 15.0pt;">Mt. Morrison</td>
<td align="right" class="xl65" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">6/7/2013</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">3.6</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">2000</td>
</tr>
<tr height="20" style="height: 15.0pt;">
<td class="xl64" height="20" style="border-top: none; height: 15.0pt;">Goat Mountain</td>
<td align="right" class="xl65" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">6/8/2013</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">6.4</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">1980</td>
</tr>
<tr height="20" style="height: 15.0pt;">
<td class="xl64" height="20" style="border-top: none; height: 15.0pt;">Decalibron</td>
<td align="right" class="xl65" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">7/6/2013</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">7.25</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">3700</td>
</tr>
<tr height="20" style="height: 15.0pt;">
<td class="xl64" height="20" style="border-top: none; height: 15.0pt;">Kelso Ridge</td>
<td align="right" class="xl65" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">7/13/2013</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">6.75</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">3100</td>
</tr>
<tr height="20" style="height: 15.0pt;">
<td class="xl64" height="20" style="border-top: none; height: 15.0pt;">Mt. Morrison</td>
<td align="right" class="xl65" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">7/21/2013</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">3.6</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">2000</td>
</tr>
<tr height="20" style="height: 15.0pt;">
<td class="xl64" height="20" style="border-top: none; height: 15.0pt;">Goat Mountain</td>
<td align="right" class="xl65" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">7/24/2013</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">6.4</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">1980</td>
</tr>
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<td class="xl64" height="20" style="border-top: none; height: 15.0pt;">Bierstadt-Sawtooth-Evans</td>
<td align="right" class="xl65" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">7/27/2013</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">10.25</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">3900</td>
</tr>
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<td class="xl64" height="20" style="border-top: none; height: 15.0pt;">Mt. Morrison</td>
<td align="right" class="xl65" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">7/30/2013</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">3.6</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">2000</td>
</tr>
<tr height="20" style="height: 15.0pt;">
<td class="xl64" height="20" style="border-top: none; height: 15.0pt;">Bear Mountain</td>
<td align="right" class="xl65" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">8/4/2013</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">5.9</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">2941</td>
</tr>
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<td class="xl64" height="20" style="border-top: none; height: 15.0pt;">Tour de
Steven's Gulch</td>
<td align="right" class="xl65" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">8/10/2013</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">9.2</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">6000</td>
</tr>
<tr height="20" style="height: 15.0pt;">
<td class="xl64" height="20" style="border-top: none; height: 15.0pt;">Mt of the Holy
Cross</td>
<td align="right" class="xl65" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">8/17/2013</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">15</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">5210</td>
</tr>
<tr height="20" style="height: 15.0pt;">
<td class="xl64" height="20" style="border-top: none; height: 15.0pt;">Mt. Morrison</td>
<td align="right" class="xl65" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">8/20/2013</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">3.6</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">2000</td>
</tr>
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<td class="xl64" height="20" style="border-top: none; height: 15.0pt;">Missouri</td>
<td align="right" class="xl65" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">8/24/2013</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">10.5</td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;">4500</td>
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<td class="xl63" height="20" style="border-top: none; height: 15.0pt;"><b>Totals</b></td>
<td class="xl63" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;"></td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;"><b>92.05</b></td>
<td align="right" class="xl64" style="border-left: none; border-top: none;"><b>41311</b></td></tr>
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After all this training, my trip to the Sangres was just around the corner. I felt like I was capable of tackling our hardest day in the Sangre's, but I really didn't know if I could do strenuous hikes every day for a week. I just spent the week resting and hoped I wouldn't be in the worst shape of the 3 of us.</div>
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Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-39870001094170339742013-08-25T21:35:00.001-06:002013-09-27T15:31:17.079-06:00Feeling Small<span style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px;">I turn on my headlamp and start to walk. All that I have is a map and a small cone of light in front of me to find my way. I can barely see the silhouette of the mountains nearby and it is faint because there is no moon. It is easy enough to get lost in the trees when it is light, but the only light I have today is powered by two AAA batteries.</span><br />
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I walk around a chained gate and follow an old road that was probably once used for a mine. My map is telling me that my route starts at the end of the road, so my first goal is to follow the road to its end. Soon I come to a creek that flows across the road. It's only a few inches deep, so I decide that I can just walk across in my boots. I get halfway across and realize that the road is not on the other side. I look downstream and upstream and I'm not sure what happened to the road. No more than a quarter mile into my hike I've already lost my one landmark. Hopefully I can find the road again if I can get back on dry ground so I start to hike into the trees. The mental picture of my map reminds me that the road does not head straight uphill, but to the right some, so I choose to turn to the right and there the road is, just 50 feet away. This would all be so much easier if I could actually see where I was going.<br />
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On the road, I'm not lost anymore. I pass through an opening in the trees and I can hear the trickling of a stream just before my boot splashes into it. Soon I come to the end of the road. The end of the road should lead me to a gully with ridges on both sides and sure enough I can hear the stream again, which tells me that there is a gully for the water to flow down. I can just make out the silhouette of a ridge on the right side of the gully. Everything tells me that this is my ridge, but I'm hesitant to make a big route decision with such limited visibility. But I make my decision and head up the ridge.</div>
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This is a very steep, sharp ridge and I'm impressed that these trees can live on such a steep hill. Step by step my legs burn and slowly but surely the trees start to thin. I am finally above the treeline. The sky opens up and I can see the Milky Way again. It is relieving to be away from the trees. A dark forest is one of the scarier places to be walking alone.</div>
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This ridge does not relent. It's so steep. I stop frequently to give my legs a break and sometimes I turn off my headlamp to look at the stars. They are so far away. It's so dark my peripheral vision can't distinguish between the ground and the sky. I feel myself falling and put my foot out to catch my fall.</div>
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It is quite the feeling to be here, alone, above the treeline, off the trail, and in the dark. I've never felt so small. What little light there is draws my attention to big things. Silhouettes of grand mountains far away and light from giant stars that has been traveling for years just to get to my eyes. In the distance I can see a light from a climber's headlamp on Gray's peak -- Just a tiny speck of light beneath the stars on a vast mountain face.</div>
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When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and the stars, which you have set in place, what is man that you are mindful of him, and the son of man that you care for him?</div>
Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7676157904901176460.post-6489049377421575972013-02-09T11:14:00.003-07:002013-02-09T11:22:09.432-07:00How Music Has Shaped Me As A PersonIf you were to ask me what my biggest passion in life is, I would certainly tell you that it is music. I actually am passionate about a lot of things in life, so music only wins by a little bit. Most of the things I am passionate about have roots that go way back to when I was a child. I have yet to fall in love with any activity in my adulthood that isn't in some way connected to something I did as a child.<br />
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Music has been an important part of my life ever since I was a child. I come from a very musical family. My dad was a music minister for most of my life, my mom plays guitar and sings, my two sisters sing beautifully, and my brother plays drums, guitar, saxophone, bass clarinet, and I may be missing a few others.<br />
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My first encounter with music was probably in children's choir. From what I'm told, I wasn't a very good singer. This doesn't surprise me because I'm still not that great of a singer. I sang in church choirs all the way through my childhood until I was a senior in high school. I can't say I was ever that crazy about singing. It was okay, but it just never clicked with me.<br />
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Next up was piano. My dad worked a half day one day a week and during that time he tried to teach me piano. Again, it just didn't click. I wasn't interested in practicing and if you know piano at all, you know it requires a lot of practice. It's a very difficult instrument to really play well. These piano lessons didn't last long, maybe a year or two? But I learned Chopsticks and Heart and Soul, so that was good enough for now.<br />
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At my elementary school, every kid was required to either play an instrument or be in choir in sixth grade. At this point in my life, I really wanted to be cool. And being cool meant not caring about silly things like music. I heard the cool boys talking about what instrument they were going to play and it seemed like the coolest option was trumpet. It only has three buttons, so how hard could it be. The plan was to play the easiest instrument, then drop it once I got to middle school where it was no longer required.<br />
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Well, I started to play trumpet and once I started to learn it, I started to enjoy it a bit. It was moderately fun, but compared to football and baseball, it was pretty boring. I did enjoy it well enough to keep playing in middle school. All the while I became more and more interested in music. 8th grade was when I was first introduced to jazz. We learned the blues scale and I discovered improv for the first time. I thought it was really cool that you could stay in a certain scale and pretty much whatever you played, it sounded like blues. Jazz band was really a lot of fun for me. Regular band bored me like nothing else, except for the chance to say hi to my crush Karen. But once 7th period came around, I was legitimately excited to play some jazz.<br />
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After finishing middle school, I was still pretty excited to play music, so I joined the high school band. Once again, I was at the bottom of the totem pole, so I was stuck in the freshman band. I wasn't challenged and the music wasn't interesting to me, so I began to seriously consider dropping band. I was one of the best trumpet players in the freshman band, but the music did not interest me at all. I remember telling my close friend Bethany about this on the bus ride home one day. She was upset that I was considering quitting. She told me that I was really talented and that it would be horrible to just throw away my talent by quitting. I took this to heart and decided to keep playing.<br />
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In band there was a freshman band, a concert band, a symphonic band, and a jazz band. I had heard the concert band before and they sucked! I had no interest in joining a band that just goofed off and didn't play good music, so I tried out for symphonic winds and made it sophomore year. This year was much better. The music was actually challenging and I was no longer one of the best trumpet players. I had several upper classmen to look up to and to learn from. I wanted to keep improving, so at the end of sophomore year, I tried out for the jazz band. This was the band for the most talented musicians in the school and it just seemed like more fun.<br />
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Junior and senior years I played in the symphonic winds and the jazz band. So two bands every day, 5 days a week. I fell in love with jazz these years. It really pushed me to become a better player. The music was very challenging and there were many opportunities for improvising. I finally learned the importance of having confidence while playing. Mr. Boysen just told me to play loud even if I know I'm screwing up all the notes. I started to do this and eventually realized that when you do this, you start to realize that the mistakes you make are no big deal. You just take the mistakes as they come and move on to the next notes confidently.<br />
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Senior year was pretty hard for me. I was somewhat depressed. I hated most of my classmates because I thought they were living immorally. I was also sad that I had very few friends. The two of these things put together made for a pretty miserable year. Jazz band started at 6:30 in the morning, so I had to wake up at 5:45 every day to go to this completely optional class. One day on the drive in, my dad told me that he was surprised that I was willing to wake up so early just to play jazz. I told him that band was what held me together. Band was the only thing that motivated me to wake up each morning and go to this school where I was miserable. This was the year where I started seeing the comradery in band. There were four sophomore girls in symphonic winds who must have seen my depression and reached out to me. Kelsey, Lexi, Rachel, and Anah really annoyed me at first. They would always say hi and would try to get me to smile (I have a deeply ingrained hatred for being told to smile). But they began to wear on me and by the end of the year I realized that I was actually going to miss these girls who had been so friendly to me. At our last concert Rachel gave me flowers and a page long note saying how much she appreciated my musicianship and how she looked up to me as a musician. On the last day of school, I had just grabbed my trumpet from my locker and was about to slip out of the building, never to be seen again, when Kelsey caught me and gave me a big hug with a look on her face telling me that she was going to miss me. It was these girls and the rest of the band nerds I spent 2 hours a day with who got me through high school And to this day, music people are still my favorite people.<br />
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At some point in high school, I decided to pick up the piano again. It was really really heavy, so I just gave up. Instead, I decided to start playing the piano again. I was able to play really easy songs with two hands and over time I taught myself to play some pretty challenging tunes. Piano was mainly a good stress reliever for me. School was stressful because I was always taking challenging classes and every day I would come home and pound on the piano for an hour before starting my homework. It also got me out of doing chores occasionally because I convinced my mom that I would provide entertainment for the rest of the family while they washed the dishes.<br />
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Junior year I taught myself to play guitar using an old Mel Bay book that my mom used as a child. At some other point I also taught myself to play saxophone, using my brother's sax, as well as violin, using some horrible violin that we had sitting in a closet at home. There was just something exciting about learning a new instrument. It was a challenge and in the end gave me a lot of confidence in my musical abilities.<br />
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Once I went to college, I started playing a lot more guitar. I didn't have a piano in my apartment freshman year, so guitar naturally took its place since it was small and easy to play. In college, band only took up about 3-5 hours a week and I was used to 10 hours of band a week plus 5 hours of playing instruments at home, and an hour of youth choir every week (about 20 hours of music per week). So trumpet was not satisfying my desire to play music often. So I gradually started playing more and more guitar and got better and better at it as I started to learn challenging fingerpicking tunes from the likes of Trace Bundy and Andy Mckee. I led music worship for my sunday school class at church for a while, I led the music for Intervarsity for a semester, I led for my church small group for a while, and now the majority of the music I play is playing guitar for my church on Sundays.<br />
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So that's my musical autobiography. Music has been an important part of my life since I was a kid and through time I've grown in my appreciation for it. Hopefully you can see through my story that music hasn't just been a hobby for me, but actually has been an important factor in shaping who I am today. It has taught me the importance of practicing and having confidence. It has shown me the comradery that is possibly between people with similar passions. And it has helped instill in me a passion for learning new things.Jon Bankshttp://www.blogger.com/profile/16057060812856372514noreply@blogger.com1