I used to hike Greyrock Mountain a lot back in the day when my cousin went to CSU. It’s a fantastic loop, arguably one of the finest in the Front Range foothills and what Morrison is to Denver, Bear is to Boulder – Greyrock is to Fort Collins. I hadn’t been up it since 2009 at the least and figured it was time for a reunion. My toenail fungus, which I had ignored basically since college, finally got the best of me lately. After 12 straight weeks of oral Lamisil, the fungus was finally subsiding, but the nail of my right toe had become so deformed that it started to grow in to my toe (ingrown). It eventually became infected and required a minor surgical procedure. I’m usually good with novacaine, but this go around was a little different, as 2 shots of the stuff didn’t do much. Afraid he’d inject too much, the doc apologized in advance, gave me something to bite down on and basically dug out and yanked my toenail off. I hope to never experience that ever again. Keep reading…
Explosions in the distance were going off as I rolled out of bed at 1:00 AM on a Sunday. That might be the only time in my entire life I have been annoyed by the 4th of July. Much as I do not usually mind a bunch of high-schoolers lighting off fireworks in the middle of the night, it was an annoyance when trying to catch some sleep before a big day. The concert and midnight bedtime the night before were not helping either. Oops. I guess that one is on me. I silently reminded myself that if Andrew Hamilton can climb 58 peaks in 10 days on basically zero sleep (a record which was in progress during our climb), I could slog up Glacier Gorge for some rock fun on 1 hour of it. Keep Reading…
This past weekend we finally got around to skiing Mt. Guyot outside of Breckenridge. Up the northwest face and down the northeast line (aka the “Swan Dive”) we went, which made for a nice tour of the peak and another fun ski descent. Mt. Guyot sits on the Continental Divide 7 miles south of the Keystone Ski Area and 4 miles west of Jefferson Lake. The peak was named after Arnold Henry Guyot, a Swiss geologist who emigrated to the United States in 1848 and was eventually hired on as a professor of geography at Princeton University. Keep reading…
Because snow can be a tough commodity to come by in Rocky Mountain National Park, it pays to be patient and take advantage when conditions are right. A week ago the Longs massif was as stacked as we’d ever seen it, so Rick, Marc, Brian and I decided to go for the Dragon Egg Couloir on Mt. Meeker. Keep reading…
