Rogers Pass

Ran the Eldorado Springs 4-miler Thursday evening for the third straight year. Fun night race with good prizes and free beer. 28:13, good for 15th place

The wife wasn't able to run this year (but did take the free beer). She was ready to take this photo of me at the finish



Sunrise driving up Flagstaff



Hudson did his 14th & 15th Green summits this weekend. He also chased a wild turkey (which is not good, but the turkey easily got away)



Went up to Rollinsville today and ran from the East Portal TH to Rogers Pass. 11.5 miles RT with 2,700' - which seems like nothing on this major race weekend in the area - the Leadville 100 (100 miles with 18,000') and the Pike's Peak Marathon (26.2 miles with 7,600')

Driving in off the Peak-to-Peak highway



The Moffat Tunnel - an interesting part of Colorado's early history. David Moffat was an industrialist and railway man. The tunnel cost $24M back in the 1920s ($318M in 2013 dollars). 28 people died building it



Rogers Pass Lake



The final push up the Pass. This last section was a half mile and hard. The grade was generally over 20% and as steep as 30%. I saw an older lady and her dog coming down...it's impossible to brag in Colorado



The Pass. The sign seems a tad battered - was hoping for something more photogenic



Views. The final pic is looking down at Winter Park









If we do close on the house, it will be the end of this blog. We started it to have a record of what was going to be a 6-month cross-country trip that has now gone on for 4 years now - although the past 2 years has been spent mostly in Colorado, New Mexico or Seattle. It was also a fun way for our parents and friends to follow along

With trail running we see some amazing places but the iPhone camera doesn't quite capture what we see. We'll probably start a photo blog when we get a better camera. Plus, without this blog we would have lost all photos from the first year since we lost both cameras in the fire. It's a nice back-up system

Meadow Mountain

Hudson's 13th Green Mountain



View from South Boulder Peak



View from Bear - the toughest of the Boulder Peaks as these ladies would agree



Ran the Holy Cow 10K in Westminster Saturday. Started faster than I could sustain - a 6:56-mile pace after 3 miles. Finished 11th with a 7:10 pace - good for the coveted bronze cow bell!



Maureen & I hiked in Magnolia in the afternoon



Yikes! This was a big leg





We were startled by - and startled - a moose who was alongside the trail. It's hard to tell what he was thinking - he never took his eyes off us. We moved on and skipped the photo op

Sunday we headed to St. Vrain Mountain TH. After a mile Maureen's knee wasn't doing well with the rocky trails, so she went to Camp Dick to hike on Buchanan Pass. After I hit Meadow Mountain I would come down the south side into the the Indian Peaks Wilderness and meet up with her

Looking into the Rocky Mountain National Park





Headed down the St. Vrain Mountain trail but lost it after awhile - a lot of fallen trees. Got the compass out and figured as long as I kept going down and to the SE all would be OK. There is no cell coverage in the Wilderness areas. It was disorienting, coming down a few thousand feet off-trail in the woods over large fallen trees that cut the heck out of my legs. After an hour I didn't know where I was and all I could see were trees. I assumed I was close as I could here ATVs, but I was on top of a rocky ledge and wasn't keen on scrambling down with no one around. So with maybe an hour of phone battery left I decided to retrace my route back up using MapMyRun (GPS app). The battery died just as I made it back up top

Ran the 4 miles back to the St. Vrain Mountain TH and started running to the town of Allenspark. I was now 2 hours late and had run something like 17.5 miles with 4,600' of climbing with 10 miles to go - although I assumed hitch-hiking was a good option. Sure enough, after a mile or so a USFS Ranger was driving up so I flagged her down and hitched a ride to Camp Dick

Looking at the GPS later that evening on my computer, I was only 300' away and 700' above a trail. Sigh

Bought COSAR (Colorado Search & Rescue) cards for us later that night just in case...