Crestone Peak, Buena Vista and The Best of Colorado

SUNDAY

I wasn’t planning on adding today to the travel diary, as it’s mostly about hiking Crestone Peak but damn does God have a sense of humour. Really test running the nerves before heading out to Europe.

We left McCall this morning at the fresh ol’ time of 10.30AM, thinking oh heck yeah, mall day and maybe a lil manicure.

We arrived in Boise around 1PM, and headed straight to the pinnacle of US industrialism – Walmart. Picked up some travel supplies like toothpaste and the cutest little hairbrush I’ve ever owned before heading to Barnes & Noble. First mistake, should have got food and some damn water. 2.5 hours in an unconditioned Subaru in 90 degree heat (35 degrees for my fellow kiwis) is NUTS. Don’t recommend. We then proceeded to overwhelm ourselves with language learning books for Spanish and German, and left not long after that.

This is where the chaos began. Best Buy. BB. BB bullet in my butt. Whatever you want to describe it as. I traded in my old laptop, the US phone I had to get because the one I had in NZ didn’t work with a US sim (looooong story), and my NZ phone. I figured I’d pick a new phone up right away, but hey, classic. They weren’t in stock. Not to worry, I’d head into a phone store in the mall. No cigar, or three at the amount of stores I looked at.

Anyway, amidst lingerie, an assualt on the sense perfume wall in Victoria’s Secret and a full stomach of weird teriyaki chicken, my stomach dropped. It was approximately 48 minutes after leaving Best Buy -with their newly acquired two phones and a laptop- and I’d just I realised I had left my New Zealand sim card (which I have had my entire digital life) in my old phone. Panicking, we drove back, suffered three disappointed, skeptical stares from the employees, who promptly went digging in their storeroom for my apparently already-disappeared-into-the-nether phone. Cigar. I got it back. I thought I could relax.

No biggie, I’d just print off my flight pass tomorrow morning (at a good ol’ 4AM) for my flight and pray for the best. But, this is Denver airport we’re talking about. I managed to get a hold of Julie online via my laptop, explaining the situation. Thus, the plan was started.

I’m now sitting on the couch at 10PM in Boise at Keely’s grandma’s house, mentally preparing for tomorrow. I have my adventure tools prepared, including:

A tracking receipt (from the $260 bucks I used to send my cowboy boots home) with EXACT instructions on how to get from the plane’s front door, to the door of Julie’s white Jeep Liberty

A laptop stowed for potential use at the airport

A phone on order to be delivered on Wednesday to Buena Vista

Wish me luck buckaroos.

Update: The phone has been delayed and will not arrive until Tuesday (the day after I leave for Iceland)

Update: I had to go to FedEx and stand outside their barbed wire fence (not joking) and wait for them to find it. Success.

MONDAY

I was lucky enough to meet two of the sweetest people in the world before I left New Zealand. Jake and Julie spent a year in New Zealand on a year long visa, very similar to what I was doing in the states.

We’ve crossed paths a couple of times since including in Hawaii and this week I was able to see where they are from. I also got meet some of their family and friends too! I started the week off well, after navigating Denver airport Julie and I went straight up to her parents chalet, where we played disc golf, I CAUGHT A FISH! (it’s been at least 10 years) and got to decompress a little.

THURSDAY

Pro tip with the benefit of hindsight: don’t recommend walking 5 miles down one of the 14ers the day before you plan on hiking in to scale another one. Let alone Crestone Peak. Pretty views though.

FRIDAY – Crestone Peak Trailhead

Today was an incredible day, though I can tell you hiking at an altitude similar to that of the tallest mountain of New Zealand is not easy. Immediately went from oh yeah, I’m relatively fit to oh heck, nevermind. We drove 2 hours to the South Colony Lakes trailhead before 4x4ing 2 miles. We were very underprepared for what 4×4 actually meant, being passed by Wranglers, Colorados, Rubicons, you name it on the way down…. Go our little Jeep Liberty! Jake, Julies husband was down in Baja doing the Baja400 race… He really missed out on the Liberty2.1. We did get stuck for a little bit, but made it out with a good old 20 point turn or two.

We packed up and walked 4 miles into the beautiful colony lakes to meet up with Julie’s friends Frank, Chelsea and Bruno who had already scaled Humboldt Peak, one of the 14ers. I stayed up for some astrophotography but unfortunately the clouds came over after dark. Slept like a log.

SATURDAY – Scaling Crestone Peak

What a huge day! We got up around 5am, and whaddya know, the stars are out. While the others got ready I snapped a few star photos. I think it was about 200m in and about 20ft up that I thought to myself ‘oh no, what have I got myself into’. We made the saddle at sunrise, of which I am glad was on the dark because man those cliffs were steep. I wouldve been a lot more shakey if I’d seen the drop that was waiting if I had slipped. We then dropped down into a valley with an alpine lake before scaling the massive rock wall of Crestone Peak essentially on all fours. It felt like three steps forward, 10 second break. If it’s any indication, the entire track one way was around 2.5 miles, with 4600ft elevation gain. Gnarly grade.

We summitted around 12PM, after a final section of ‘if I don’t white knuckle this, I’m falling 3000ft.’ I didn’t tell Mum about that part at first.

After spending a bit of time at the summit, Julie and I doubled back and met the others at the saddle. At the base we went for a swim in the lower lake and chilled out a little more. We then decided to pack up and hike out so we wouldn’t have to do it the next day. The day was 22km total. The best part was the carpark campsite had a campfire, yipeeee!! I crashed out at 8PM though, so it didn’t mean much.

Now on a flight to Calgary, on the way to Iceland. Denver airport is insane, would absolutely recommend blasting AC/DC’s TNT while attempting to board the tram. Make life exciting, treat it like you’re in an action movie.

Catch up soon!