James Peak

I'm a terribly inconsistent blogger.  Well, so deal with it.  I'm back, at least for now.  Sue and I had a great adventure two weeks ago to James Peak (13,301) in the James Peak Wilderness.  We were dodging bad weather in the Springs, and there was the promise of better weather in the mountains (not the norm) so we headed up really early on a flex Friday (my extra day off).  As a bonus, the newlyweds Kate and Christian wanted to join us on the last day of their honeymoon.  What great kids!  We started at St. Mary's Lake, which has a great view of St. Mary's Glacier, which we would later walk up (and get a major sunburn on my face because my hat does not protect my face from sunlight coming UP from the ground).

(These pictures don't look so great really small, so click on them and make them big.  Then they're much better!)

Here are the happy newlyweds, with the lake kindly providing backdrop.

So we walked up the glacier, with Grizz running back and forth between us, and we were pretty spread out.

After the Glacier, you can just see our destination in the distance.  It looks like not so far away, but I learned later that the trail goes around the whole thing and up the BACK side!

We got closer, duh, and really the trail was lovely...rocky but lovely and not very steep.  Everyone was in great spirits and the day, as you can see, was gorgeous!

So we made our way around the left side of this massif, and came to a really cool overlook...This is the lower lake (check out that view in the distance)

...and the upper lake...there were waterfalls all over the place beneath this upper lake, and I loved the sound of the running water!

So, up around the back side we went.  Oh, did you notice those black clouds in the last picture?  They hailed on us for about 5 minutes, small, sneet-like hail, and then went away.  It was beautiful to watch the veils of hail wash over that lower lake.  Notice the REALLY BIG rock cairn.  This alpine tundra is a favorite place for Sue and me; we just love being up here.  It is quiet and peaceful and has a quality that words can't completely capture.  By this time the altitude was wearing on us.  It used to hit me around 13,000 feet, but now it seems to come on between 12,000 and 12,500.  As my Dad would say, that has nothing to do with age, just that I haven't been doing this as much as I used to.  Thanks Dad!

And we made the peak.  Not terribly dramatic in and of itself, but look at that view to the West!!!!  This is our playground...can you believe it?!  Come and play with us!

We had lunch on the peak, hung out behind a short rock wall to avoid the wind, and enjoyed being Rocky Mountain High!  We didn't have a "pie" to pass around (:-)), but that would have been a good idea. (Extra points if you comment about that reference.)

We had a lovely walk down, the kind where you're not at all in a hurry, and don't want the day to end.  We stopped at the lake on the way down and Grizz got to play fetch with a stick in the water.  He loves to swim.  But he was tired.  Running back and forth between us the whole time, he probably did the hike the equivalent of 4 times.  We went down the canyon and had dinner in a creek-side restaurant in Georgetown (not the DC one, thank goodness), and Grizz got to come onto the patio with us.  It was a great end to a wonderful day!!