August 24, 2019. Our goal for the day was to summit Challenger Point and Kit Carson Peak. It’s morning, and the day’s first rays are starting to brighten the sky over the cold valley we had camped in north of Crestone. In a matter of mere minutes we went from wrapped in sleeping bags to […]
Read more "Trip Report: Ad Astra"For me, I usually spend less time adventuring when snow begins to fall. This is not because I dislike snow, rather, I merely don’t have a lot of experience dealing with it. An REI gift card recently reminded me “adventure has no off season.” With this lovely adage in mind, I decided to try an […]
Read more "Going Coastal"Maybe the depiction on my atlas was deceiving, or maybe we were just victims of my own foolishness, but I definitely thought that Gardner, Colorado—a town with multiple churches and an herb shop—would have a gas station. With a flickering gaslight, we, the Overcast Adventurers and Ty’s friend Seth, opted to purchase five gallons of […]
Read more "Orphans and Endorphins"The grimy and over-labored workers of the small mining camp of Buckskin Joe took solace in few things. The miners drudged to find the hidden treasures beneath the granite, the prospectors scoured the land for the promise of riches… but at the end of a hard day these men knew they could reconcile their struggles […]
Read more "Beyond the Veil"Missouri Mountain, Iowa Peak, and Emerald Peak Grand Slam ~15.5 miles round-trip; 6,300′ elevation gain. The turn to Chaffe County Road 390 and its subsequent vexatious washboard ruts felt all too familiar. Five months ago, I had kicked off the 14er season with ascents of Mt. Belford and Mt. Oxford—two of the three 14ers […]
Read more "Sawatch Me Do Three"El Diente Peak. A high mountain summit within the San Juan Range named for its tooth-like visage (El Diente translates to “The Tooth” in Spanish). If this peak is the tooth of the San Juans, then these mountains have clearly forgotten their oral hygiene. El Diente Peak, and its neighboring summits of Mt. Wilson and […]
Read more "Tooth Decay"East Slopes. 14.5 miles RT. 4,500′ gain. 6 hours. 20 minutes. High above the iconic Colorado mountain town of Leadville stands Mt. Massive—an aptly named wall of a mountain and several of its constituent sub-summits. It is the third highest peak in the contiguous United States, which is certainly not hard to believe when […]
Read more "Massive Aggressive"Summits always entice me, and Longs Peak is no exception. When I resumed my job in Denver, I became acutely aware of the fact that I could see Longs Peak and Mt. Meeker almost every day on my drive home. There it was, towering over Denver like a faithful guardian of the Front Range. Every […]
Read more "Longs Island Iced Peak"Every day was (and still is) the same routine: wake up, go to work, go home, check condition reports, and go to bed with slight summit fever. Fortunately, my wonderful manager has been scheduling my weekends on weekdays. I had requested this for more solitary 14er hiking and climbing. My “Friday” was a Monday and after […]
Read more "Trip Report: Bagels and BelOx"The Crestone Needle and Crestone Peak Standard Routes: The South Face of both. To begin, I’ll say despite a myriad of successful summits before this weekend, I’m not a particularly experienced climber. Sure, I’ve done Wetterhorn and the Sawtooth Ridge, but my experience on class three and four climbs is reasonably limited. How’d this all […]
Read more "Trip Report: Sangre De Crestones"
The Overcast Adventurers 