I love autumn. All my cutest clothing is for autumn, my birthday and my favorite holiday (Halloween) are both in autumn, and the colors of the changing leaves bring out the Ansel Adams in even the grinchiest of photographers.
I took Cameron up his first fourteener today, Mount Bierstadt. Actually, at its largest, my group was supposed to be Cameron, Wendy, Jo, and me, but Jo was in Fort Collins for the night and Wendy lost her nerve, so it was just the two of us. For me, Bierstadt was a means to an end, as I really wanted to climb the Sawtooth ridge, and the easiest way to cross the Sawtooth is from Bierstadt. Map scavenger that I am, I could only find a topo for the Bierstadt-Sawtooth-Evans route, but we skipped the Evans part and just continued along the cliff north of the Sawtooth and down the gully.
We began from Guanella Pass, which, by the way, is closed off from the north at Clear Creek due to rockslides, so if you’re headed to Bierstadt, you need to approach from Grant south of it on 285. I could never find exact mileage on the hike, but the Bierstadt-Sawtooth-Evans route is 10.25 miles roundtrip, so I’m guessing… eight? (Believe it or not, I did do my homework on this - checked the weather, printed out maps, read route descriptions, etc.)
As usual, the dull trudge up to Bierstadt was miserable - a bland Class 1 hike up a beaten path filled with other hikers. We were on the wrong side of the mountain when the sun rose, so it took a few extra hours in the morning for it to get high enough to hit us, and in the meantime, we were freezing cold even though we were each wearing five layers.
We talked about the things we wished were on the summit to keep ourselves motivated; Cameron was hoping for a Starbucks that employed only Australian strippers, I just wanted sex and cake. It took us close to four hours to reach the top of Bierstadt (I had wanted to get up in two); we summitted far behind schedule, around ten. No stripper-manned cake factories with attached Starbucks to be seen.
At the rate we were going, I would not have considered doing the Sawtooth had the weather been anything less than perfect, but it was - there was not a cloud in the sky. The Sawtooth is a fun scramble - not too difficult as long as heights don’t bother you, but strenuous. I kept making the mistake of not losing enough height and/or regaining too much between the “teeth” so Cameron had to follow me down and up some steep routes, but we managed, even though I had to learn to ignore him repeating, “I hate you I hate you I hate you I hate you,” as he climbed down behind me. Somehow, he was still impressed with my skills as a guide.
Here’s the thing about mountains - the distances can be deceptive. To look at this picture - or indeed, to look at the real thing - you wouldn’t guess that the peak on the left is very far away; it just looks like a gravel slope. But in actuality, every single one of those “pebbles” is a rock that’s at least the size of a person.
Cameron is as friendly and outgoing as I am awkward and aloof, so we met a lot of people on this hike, as Cameron can strike up a conversation with anyone; as such, we became a little invested in each of them, and I hope the woman we did the final stretch of the Sawtooth with who said she was going on to Evans before hiking back to Guanella Pass at two in the afternoon (!!!!) is all right, as I hope the man who was too nervous to attempt that final bit and turned back to return to Bierstadt via the Sawtooth made it okay. A note to prospective Sawtooth hikers: The slope at the end is *not* as steep as it looks - DO NOT turn back!
Just north of the Sawtooth, we met up with a couple, an ex-Navy SEAL and his wife, who had hiked to Mt. Evans from Guanella Pass and were wandering lost above the cliffs north of the Sawtooth. I guess that I seemed competent because suddenly my little group of two became four, and I was nominated guide. I didn’t think the trail was difficult to find (it was a beaten path with cairns and everything), but no one but me spotted it until we were right on it. Glenn would have laughed to see me dispensing mountain wisdom like I knew what the hell I was talking about (“On these loose gravel slopes, walk with your heels and make sure to slide with the gravel…”). Cameron had a good time talking to the wife (she offered him a job! That’s the kind of charismatic Cameron is - random people will offer to pay him after talking to him for ten minutes) while I concentrated on taking my charges down the least challenging route possible. As Cameron put it afterward, “Oh my god, you just guided a Navy SEAL down a mountain!”
We’d heard some ugly things at the summit of Bierstadt from grim-looking Sawtooth veterans about the route back from the bottom of the gully to the parking lot - swampy, muddy, hard-to-find trail, long, bushy - and every single one of them were correct. We thought we were basically done when we finally reached flat ground after navigating the shifting gravel of the gully - we’ll just power back to the parking lot and be done in less than an hour, we proclaimed optimistically - but we quickly lost the path and found ourselves wandering among the scratching claws of the willows for a couple more hours. It got so warm, we started stripping down, but then the bushes would rip us apart. The choice was between heat or pain - I chose heat, Cameron chose pain.
I still can’t figure out where we went wrong. The path forked numerous times, but we kept taking the fork to higher ground to avoid the marshy ponds; however, the whole area turned out to be swampy and muddy. Poor Cameron and his new shoes (and thank god for my waterproof boots - I’d regretted wearing the hot heavy things on the Sawtooth, but they really came in handy on the way back). We attempted to backtrack and find the original path, but finally a stonefaced Cameron just started crunching straight through the willow plants in the direction of the parking lot, come what may (he was already really muddy and wet anyway, I guess). I noted the direction of the lot on my compass, in case we lost line of sight (we never did) and just followed behind him, hoping that he was just joking when he said that he’d hated me before.
It was fun taking someone’s fourteener v-card; it was like reliving my first big hike. Cameron was very excited about a stream crossing and other little things I’ve since become inured to (because I’m a jaded grizzly woman with my seven mountains har har har). Cameron and I have been friends since third grade (14 years!), and we crack each other whenever we’re together, so even when things were looking dire, we were still laughing and joking the whole time. But boy were we happy to get back to the car!
Frankly, the entire trip was awful. Just unrelentingly awful. The worst part was the hike up to Bierstadt, except for the Sawtooth and the hike back. And now that it’s over, my face hurts, my nose is bright red, and my legs don’t bend anymore. But I loved it!
ETA:
I took Cameron up his first fourteener today, Mount Bierstadt. Actually, at its largest, my group was supposed to be Cameron, Wendy, Jo, and me, but Jo was in Fort Collins for the night and Wendy lost her nerve, so it was just the two of us. For me, Bierstadt was a means to an end, as I really wanted to climb the Sawtooth ridge, and the easiest way to cross the Sawtooth is from Bierstadt. Map scavenger that I am, I could only find a topo for the Bierstadt-Sawtooth-Evans route, but we skipped the Evans part and just continued along the cliff north of the Sawtooth and down the gully.
We began from Guanella Pass, which, by the way, is closed off from the north at Clear Creek due to rockslides, so if you’re headed to Bierstadt, you need to approach from Grant south of it on 285. I could never find exact mileage on the hike, but the Bierstadt-Sawtooth-Evans route is 10.25 miles roundtrip, so I’m guessing… eight? (Believe it or not, I did do my homework on this - checked the weather, printed out maps, read route descriptions, etc.)
As usual, the dull trudge up to Bierstadt was miserable - a bland Class 1 hike up a beaten path filled with other hikers. We were on the wrong side of the mountain when the sun rose, so it took a few extra hours in the morning for it to get high enough to hit us, and in the meantime, we were freezing cold even though we were each wearing five layers.
 |
| Cameron likes this photo because he says it looks like I’m scouting. I like it because it’s the perfect album cover for the Christian rock band Cameron and I need to start now that we have the perfect album cover. |
Here’s the thing about mountains - the distances can be deceptive. To look at this picture - or indeed, to look at the real thing - you wouldn’t guess that the peak on the left is very far away; it just looks like a gravel slope. But in actuality, every single one of those “pebbles” is a rock that’s at least the size of a person.
Cameron is as friendly and outgoing as I am awkward and aloof, so we met a lot of people on this hike, as Cameron can strike up a conversation with anyone; as such, we became a little invested in each of them, and I hope the woman we did the final stretch of the Sawtooth with who said she was going on to Evans before hiking back to Guanella Pass at two in the afternoon (!!!!) is all right, as I hope the man who was too nervous to attempt that final bit and turned back to return to Bierstadt via the Sawtooth made it okay. A note to prospective Sawtooth hikers: The slope at the end is *not* as steep as it looks - DO NOT turn back!
Just north of the Sawtooth, we met up with a couple, an ex-Navy SEAL and his wife, who had hiked to Mt. Evans from Guanella Pass and were wandering lost above the cliffs north of the Sawtooth. I guess that I seemed competent because suddenly my little group of two became four, and I was nominated guide. I didn’t think the trail was difficult to find (it was a beaten path with cairns and everything), but no one but me spotted it until we were right on it. Glenn would have laughed to see me dispensing mountain wisdom like I knew what the hell I was talking about (“On these loose gravel slopes, walk with your heels and make sure to slide with the gravel…”). Cameron had a good time talking to the wife (she offered him a job! That’s the kind of charismatic Cameron is - random people will offer to pay him after talking to him for ten minutes) while I concentrated on taking my charges down the least challenging route possible. As Cameron put it afterward, “Oh my god, you just guided a Navy SEAL down a mountain!”
We’d heard some ugly things at the summit of Bierstadt from grim-looking Sawtooth veterans about the route back from the bottom of the gully to the parking lot - swampy, muddy, hard-to-find trail, long, bushy - and every single one of them were correct. We thought we were basically done when we finally reached flat ground after navigating the shifting gravel of the gully - we’ll just power back to the parking lot and be done in less than an hour, we proclaimed optimistically - but we quickly lost the path and found ourselves wandering among the scratching claws of the willows for a couple more hours. It got so warm, we started stripping down, but then the bushes would rip us apart. The choice was between heat or pain - I chose heat, Cameron chose pain.
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| The shins of a Bierstadt survivor. |
Frankly, the entire trip was awful. Just unrelentingly awful. The worst part was the hike up to Bierstadt, except for the Sawtooth and the hike back. And now that it’s over, my face hurts, my nose is bright red, and my legs don’t bend anymore. But I loved it!
ETA:
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