Birthday Snowshoe Adventure

It’s been a while since I’ve gone snowshoeing. And when I say that, I don’t just mean a couple years. It’s been over 10 years since I went snowshoeing, and honestly, I barely remember the original hike. That was my first and only snowshoeing trip until the first of this year.

Being a New Year’s baby is always weird and kind of disappointing because no one is ever really free to do anything. I remember it being difficult to throw a party when I was younger, then I turned 21 and no one was in town (since I live in a college town and everyone would go home for the holidays. So I started going to Keystone – rented a condo, invited friends or my current SO to come hang up there and snowboard alongside me. I did that for 2 years and absolutely loved it. I said okay, this is how I want to continue to spend New Year’s Eve/Day/My birthday.

Then this year happened and I was too broke to afford a condo and snowboarding. That’s when the idea came up – all I wanted to do for my birthday was go hang out in the woods alone.

After countless hours of searching for an easy snowshoe trail that was easily accessible (all the roads to the trailheads are closed for the winter!), I finally settled on trekking a few miles north on the Sourdough trail from the Brainard Lake Recreation area.

Well of course, thanks to a few cocktails to celebrate ringing in the new year, I didn’t wake up quite as early as I planned. Whatever, it was worth it. I rang in the new year with a pint of porter and wearing my dog’s face on my shirt. I can’t really complain.

I didn’t actually reach the trailhead until about 10:30am, when the original plan was to be there around 9am. Oops.

If you’ve never been up to the Brainard Lake area – I highly recommend it. I’ve gone there both in the summer and winter, and both times it just blows me away. I hiked to Isabelle Glacier twice over the summer, and now I may try to make it to at least Lake Isabelle this winter. Below, there’s a photo from Lake Isabelle in the summer (left), the from the winter parking lot a few days ago (right). Mind blowingly gorgeous, right?

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We didn’t snowshoe very far, I think about 1.65 miles in, then back. Once I hit the first Wapiti trail loop split, I continued on a little bit so I could go into a clearing and enjoy myself. Why didn’t I go further? Because elevation starts to drop faster, and that uphill climb back (while only ~500 feet elevation gain) was going to be rough for someone who’s still new to snowshoeing. I was right, it sucked. If I could just never snowshoe uphill, that’d be fantastic.

But you know what? Who cares. It was my birthday, and if I only wanted to snowshoe ~3.5 miles, then that’s my own choice. I wasn’t going for distance or pushing myself – I wanted to wander alone (besides the few people I ran into on the trail) in the woods with my dog, surrounded by snow. I never understand why people make fun of others for doing short hikes. If you want to do a short hike to just take in the scenery, by all means, do it!

 

And honestly, it was the best birthday I’ve had.

First off, it was the most perfect, beautiful Colorado day for any outdoor adventure. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky, and I don’t think the temperature ever reach 20 F. Now, that sounds cold, but anyone who has hiked in the winter can tell you that the lower temps feel pretty good when you’re working up a sweat.

It started off with Joule not liking my snowshoes and poles, so she kept trying to fight me.

I kept trying to make her walk behind me, because otherwise she walked way too far ahead of me since she didn’t want to be near the shows/poles. What a goober. But when she walked behind me, she kept stepping on my snowshoes! So at one point, she bolted past me (because obviously the snowshoes were going to attack), tried bounding through a snowbank just to the side of the trail and ended up tripping and faceplanting into the snow. I laughed so hard that I really thought I was going to pee myself.

We kept hiking until I decided I wanted to just sit down in a clearing, soak up the sun and enjoy a beer while Joule explored around me.

It was relaxing, it was gorgeous out, and I had a beer in my hand.

Seriously, happy birthday to me on that one.

Next time I’d like to take the Wapiti trail around, although I’m having difficulties finding the length/elevation gain on that trail. Since I’m still so new to snowshoeing, it’s a real concern for me.

I topped off my birthday with some cocktails with a close friend, then went home and cuddled the dog.

Best birthday ever, by far.

 

Mount Bierstadt – My First 14er

So on Friday I hiked/scrambled my first 14er. I was pretty excited about it, even when my alarm went off at 3:30AM after I had gone to bed two hours previously….after some drinking in Denver with the Gociety crew. Needless to say, I had to pop a few Aleve before starting the drive to the trailhead.

The 14er we chose was Mt. Bierstadt, which is actually known to be one of the easier 14ers and is recommended to beginnings. If that beast is an easy 14er, I can’t imagine what others are like.

To put it simply – It kicked my ass.

But Joule was a champ. She was bouncing all around that mountain like it was a normal everyday walk.

We started around 6am, with the world around us still pretty dark. That’s my favorite though. If you’ve never done any night hiking, definitely try it. There were some coyotes howling in the distance which added to the whole “let’s go climb a mountain in the dark” scenario.

Probably 1.5-2 miles into our hike, the sun was finally starting to peak over the mountains and shine onto the tips of the opposite peaks.

Cue “Circle of Life” song intro for Lion King.

This was before hell happened, before shit hit the fan, before I regretted what I had agreed to do.

The remaining mile and a half was terrible. It was probably one of the worst sections of a hike that I have ever done. We were stopping like every 5 minutes to take a break, catch our breath, and let our muscles come back to life. It was that nuts.

At first I felt bad for all the stopping, but then all of us admitted that it was needed.

Once we made it to the saddle just below the summit, I was feeling good. I’m not the greatest at steep climbing, but I can scramble really well.

It took us roughly 3 hours total to summit Bierstadt, which I can’t tell if that’s good or bad.

The view was pretty spectacular though.

Although, I’m not sure how worth it it really was. If I climb/hike something crazy, I want something to do at the top. I’m a big fan of alpine lake hikes for this reason. Because at least I have a cool lake to hang out at.

This was just like “Oh, I did this difficult hike only so I could say I’ve been to a mountain whose peak is above 14,000 ft? That’s it?”

We hung out up top for a while, drinking some brews for #EarnYourBeer and taking awesome Gociety photos.

What cracks me up about Joule is that it doesn’t matter where we are – once we summit, she wants to lay down and enjoy the view.

Queen Joule Bug, Summit Master, Eater of Wild Thing’s Poop.

Majestic af.

I tried to take some selfies with Joule but she’s kind of difficult.

The descent didn’t take us nearly as long. Probably around an hour and a half total.

The views were absolutely gorgeous. Compared to the ascent when most of the mountains and the valley were still hidden in the shadows, we finally had the sun shining over everything.

For the entire hike, whenever we had to stop, Joule wasn’t very happy with it. For the ascent, she’d stand there crying because she wanted to keep going. On the descent, she just walked off without us.

That was when I stopped to get my camera out for a photo. Apparently that took too long so she nope’d right out of there.

She was a total goober for part of the hike too. Big fan of rolling around in the grass and getting extra dirty.

In fact, towards the end of the hike (this was when all of us were just wanting to get back to the cars so badly), she got the zoomies. For those non-dog owners out there, the zoomies consist of running around at top speed like a mad dog.

Well she got those, and then during the zoomies would dive bomb head first into the ground and flip/roll around in the grass.

I was giggling like an idiot while watching it.

Overall, the hike was fun. Sure, it’s cool to say that Bug and I summitted our first 14er together, but beyond that, I don’t think I’m going to directly try to summit another anytime soon. Now, if a friend wants me to join, I could probably be convinced.

But beyond that, I’m happy to stick to my other non-14er hikes.