The Day I Climbed a Thirteen-Niner

This June Mike and I celebrated our 7th wedding anniversary. Tradition would indicate that we would gift each other with something made out of wool or copper. I opted to give Mike the gift of climbing a Fourteener instead. Colorado has 53 mountains over 14,000 feet and I have never been to the top of any of them. We decided to give Long's Peak a try.

Because Long's Peak still has snow until later in the summer, we waited until August to do our climb. Thursday night we dropped the kids off at my parents' house and headed up to the mountains. In order to summit before the afternoon lightening storms, they suggest you start hiking very early in the morning. We planned on starting at 3 am. It wasn't really worth it to get a hotel for only a couple of hours, so we folded the seats down in the Expedition and a queens size mattress fit perfectly back there. We basically parked at the trailhead (though not technically in the parking lot because that is against the rules) and spent the night. Yep, seven years and you get to sleep in the back of a car for your anniversary!

It was actually a lot of fun. There wasn't much to do and we had an early morning ahead of us, but we had a great time talking and catching up as a couple while trying to force ourselves to fall asleep at 9 o'clock.

The alarm went off at 2:30 and there was already a steady stream of cars filtering into the parking lot. We cooked up a quick breakfast of oatmeal and coffee, threw on our gear, and we were ready to roll. We logged in at the base of the trail at 3:00 am. With headlamps on, we began the 6 mile hike up to the Boulder Field.

The thing about hiking in the dark is there's nothing to look at, so we cruised up really quickly. I mean, we were really moving fast. We ended up at the Boulder Field sometime after 6 am and stopped for a Powerbar breakfast. We got to see the sun rise as we ate.

The Boulder Field is exactly what it sounds like: a gigantic field of nothing but boulders. The goal from there is the make it to the Keyhole, which is isn't far away, but it took some time to get there because we were just climbing over rocks the whole way.

This is the Boulder Field as seen on the way back, in full sunlight.

Here is the Keyhole. To get to the top you do one thing: start climbing.
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At the top of the Keyhole I definitely felt on top of the world. Elevation: 13,200 feet.

You can just do this hike and stop here, but we wanted to get to the top.

Somewhere around the Boulder Field it stopped being a hike and truly became a climb. In order to reach the top, we had to go along the back side of the peak and climb our way through what is called the Trough.

Again, not too much distance to cover, but it takes a long time to navigate and climb the rocks. There is no trail at this point, but bullseyes are painted on certain rocks, indicating the best route to take. The wind was really starting to pick up by now and it was easy to look down and feel intimidated by the sudden drop down the side of the mountain.

Once we had moved along the Trough for a good distance there was nothing left to do but go up. Sadly, I don't have a good picture of the incline to the top of the Trough. Something about being too busy scaling the side of a mountain to be able to take out a camera. But between the Keyhole and the top of the Trough we had climbed 700 feet and were sitting at an elevation of 13,900.

It was here that the weather really took a turn for the worse. The wind became incredibly intense. I am not kidding when I tell you that sitting here at the top of the Trough I could feel my eyelashes blowing to one side. As you can see from the bullseye on the rock, the next step is to go over the top and start climbing on the other side of the mountain. Past the Trough is a stretch called the Narrows. It is called that for a reason. It is an extremely narrow place to climb, situated on the exposed, sheer side of the peak. 

Due to the weather, we decided this was as far as we could make it. The wind had gotten bad in the Trough, but that was nothing compared to the other side of the mountain. We just didn't feel comfortable scaling the Narrows in that kind of wind. We turned around and went back through the Trough and toward the Keyhole.

Back at the Keyhole, the wind was again vicious. Many people who were just getting to the Keyhole were deciding to turn around and head back right then. It was literally body-moving wind. Not the kind of thing you want to be experiencing at 14,000 feet above sea level.

We were disappointed not to have made it to the summit, and now refer to Long's Peak as the Thirteen-Niner we did, since we didn't quite make it to 14,000 feet. But we still had at least four miles to climb and hike until we got down to tree level and the more we were thrashed by the wind, the better we felt about our decision.

Of course, we didn't leave before taking some time to enjoy the scenery. There is truly nothing like it.

Goodbye, Long's Peak. We'll meet again someday.

Once we got finally got back to the tree line, the wind was much more bareable. But I have to say, those last few miles seemed to go on forever. I mean, I posed nicely for pictures, like this:

But really I felt like this:

Fourteen miles after starting our journey we were back at the car. It was only noon by that time. Since we made it up to the Boulder Field so quickly, we probably could have left a little bit later. But if we had, I'm not sure we would have gone past the Keyhole. At least by leaving so early in the morning we were able to get to where we did before the wind really got bad. After that we drove to Loveland, enjoyed some burgers, picked up the girls from grandma and grandpa's house, and we were all home in time for naptime.

Climbing a Fourteener might not be everyone's idea of a romantic anniversary, but for Mike and me it was an incredible bonding experience. We kept mentioning how much fun we were having, how nice it was to get to talk and laugh together, and what a great experience it was to be on top of the world together. I am already looking forward to the next one we do together. Only maybe next time we'll pick a little bit of an easier Fourteener to climb!