An Almost Perfect Afternoon in the San Juans

"I wish I had a more impressive story," I thought to myself as I staggered back to the parking lot--knees bloodied with a slightly busted chin. Just a couple hours before, I found myself, slightly hypoxic, navigating my way across a scree field at 13,000 feet. The article I read the night before said the climb ended in a Class 3 scramble. But, as I crested the pass and turned my gaze north toward the towering 14,158-foot peak, all I saw was a mess of unmarked, loose rock meandering its way from outcropping to outcropping. I sat down next to an elderly couple—because that’s apparently a Sunday afternoon stroll in Colorado—and sorted out my options. I had to meet Chris at the trailhead at 6:00. If I was going to make a summit attempt, it would have to get me back down to the pass in under an hour and a half giving me minimal time to make the 4ish mile return. Hmm…is it worth it? I took a snapshot of the mountain face for reference and set a timer for 45 minutes. 

My phone didn’t have to count down for too long. Once the barely visible trail had me making short climbs and swinging around boulders at the tops of potential 1,500ft tumbles, I was done. Maybe if I wasn’t up there solo or if I wasn’t under an ambitious time constraint or if the climb had actually ended in a Class 3 scramble, I’d keep going. But, it’s never worth putting all of your eggs in one basket. I turned around.

The trip down kept me on my toes even more so than the ascent. My Vibram soles weren’t even a match for pulverized mess of grit that wound its way back and forth down the mountain face. I knew it would be tricky making my way down, but I slid down the trail like I would on a snowy day in the Smokies—not an arid August afternoon in the San Juans. In shock that my shoes were struggling that much with the terrain (and probably a little hypoxic), I squatted down like surfer and leaned into the slope—just in case—and began my oh-so-painfully-slow descent. Thankfully, no one else was around to see me traverse the mile-long slip’n slide that snaked its way down the eastern face.

As the air became thicker, signs of life started to show themselves along the rock. Grasses formed roots to hold the mountain in place and bees hummed from wildflower to wildflower (I’m still in amazement that bees can fly at 12,000 feet. My Piper Cherokee can barely do that!). The sub-alpine zone is my favorite region—and the overlooked gem of this hike. Above the tree-line, glacial streams gather into ice-cold blue voids unaffected by and unaware of the world below them. Along side, swaths of alpine meadows ebb and flow in the cool, mountain breeze. Exhausted, I stretch out in the late summer sun and begin to breathe again. Out of the corner of my eye, I can see a couple taking turns paddling around the Upper Lake on an inflatable kayak beneath an amphitheater of snow and rock. “One of those would pack down nicely in the jet,” I thought to myself. Though, I didn’t want to think about trying to inflate the thing at this altitude after that hike. Only a handful of tiny cumulus clouds hung between the waning sun and the lonely peaks that began to cast shadows over the valley. I can see the trail work its way along the meadow spilling off the mountainside into the forest below. “Better head back.” I savor one last glance of the perfect summer day and disappear into the trees.

On the way back, I thought about how I couldn’t have asked for a more perfect first visit to Colorado. I had been planning for weeks to spend at least a few of my sixteen-day break between the summer and fall semesters on the road. Though, it never panned out. I was offered a handful of trips flying PIC (pilot-in-command) on a Baron, so that took precedence over my road-trip. I was surprised to get Chris’s call night-before-last asking to help him fly a Citation to Colorado. But, not as surprised as I was as I suddenly came-to in mid-air over the forest floor, and then, a moment later, rolling into a ravine along side the trail. My face broke my fall. Then, my knees. I quickly ran my tongue over my teeth—mortified at the thought of living up to my Tennessee roots. “All there. The rest can’t be that bad.” I felt a few scrapes on my face and the tumble bloodied up both of my knees nicely. By the time I had surveyed the damage, a woman rounded the corner hauling an overnight bag.

“You wouldn’t happen to have a first-aide kit, would you?” I asked with half-embarrassed laugh—still in disbelief that I had scaled a mountain pass only to snag my foot on a tree root two miles from the parking lot, “I usually carry one, but I’m just here on business.”

She glanced over my cuts and scrapes rather indifferently before throwing off her pack: “Actually, I’m a nurse.” I think it was at that point that I was sold on Colorado.

August 2016 on the Blue Lakes trail near Telluride, Colorado.