Per usual, the rain had stopped by morning but the clouds hadn’t quite cleared. By the time we finished breakfast though, we could see the sun was out from behind the trees. After a short planning conference, the boys were happy to follow my lead and do a short hike in the forest before heading up to Pikes Peak. I think part of me was keen for the hike because I was procrastinating the drive up to 14,000 feet, worried that perhaps the Astro wouldn’t make it considering her recent struggles.
Not in a hurry, we broke camp then the boys followed me out of the forest. When I got cell service, I found out I was going the wrong way so we turned around and went back into the forest until we were parked at the Rainbow Gulch trailhead. This had been recommended to me by someone and so was on my list of things to visit. It was only to be a short hike so we carried small packs and I wore my rain jacket in anticipation.
Cleo was happy to out on the trails again, this time at a slower pace. She got lots of comments from the few people that we passed but she didn’t pay them any mind, she was too busy looking for squirrels. The trail was wide and flat so definitely nothing challenging. We were all pretty impressed when we came up to an outlet that was gushing water into the gulch. Being the professional tubers that we are, Dan and I sussed it out as a potential tube but soon decided it would have been too narrow and shallow to navigate.
We continued our walk along the raging waters until a short while later we came to the lake fed by the water. It was pretty big with a few kayakers on its flat waters and a family on the banks. Anthony and I sat by the bank a while as we watched Dan and Cleo go in for a dip, Cleo as enthusiastic as ever and Dan enjoying his hair flick as much as he ever has.
We were back on the trail soon enough, it hadn’t been an exciting hike, but you never know if you don’t go! No more procrastinating now, it was time to head to the big hill.
The views we got of the peak as we drove towards it showed that its tip was shrouded in cloud, but we were doing it anyway. We drove in formation along the highway until we reached the turnoff and I saw a carpark. We pulled in there and Dan parked his car. It would have been senseless to take all three cars but it was absolutely imperative that I drove the Astro and Anthony was more than happy to take his car as well. It was definitely nice to have the support! We’d figured out earlier that it was going to cost us $15 a person to go up the hill so in true dirtbag fashion, Dan hid underneath the covers on my bed as I drove up to the entrance gate. With the curtains closed, it was no problem, the cheery lady at the entry gate even gave me a dog treat for Cleo who was sitting full of importance in my front seat.
Time to climb Pikes Peak!
I parked just past the entrance so Dan could get out of his hiding spot and he made himself comfortable sitting on his esky in the living room so he didn’t have to look backwards in the front seat the whole way. He played photographer as the Astro started to climb. We took it steady but she was purring. It was twenty miles to the top, but only the top 13 miles formed the hill climb event that had been on only two weeks ago. This was the appeal of Pikes Peak for me. For years, people and machines have been ascending the mountain as fast as possible in a single-run attempt motorsport event. Everything from motorbikes to trophy trucks attempt the climb every year. The record for the climb is held by Sebastian Loeb and sits at 8min 13secs. With that in mind and no one behind me, I stopped at the official start line and let the Astro rip (by putting my foot gently on the throttle).
Dan took plenty of photos as we climbed and rightly so because the scenery was absolutely gorgeous. I can proudly report that as I ripped through the twists and turns I was passed by no one and even had people pulling off the side of the road in fear to let me by, so fierce was the Astro’s roar. In reality, when I wasn’t looking at the beautiful views, I was constantly glancing at my dash for an engine light or irregular movement of the gauges.
The views below were clear for the first half of the ride up the mountain and the valley was stunning in all of its colour. We could see reservoirs and forest that stretched for miles, all in the most brilliant shades of green.
The road twisted, then turned as we climbed past 11,500 feet, the highest the Astro had ever been before. In new territory, I barely made it past 30 mph as we crawled ever higher and higher.
Soon enough, we were out of the clear views and into the clouds. The white puffs of humidity played with us at first, barely touching the mountain we were climbing, then shrouding us in a complete seat of white. Dan felt like he could have been looking out the window of a plane sitting in the back on his esky.
Not far past the 12,000 ft mark, we came upon patched of snow in the mountain. When the 12,000 ft mountains of Crested Butte were still plenty covered in snow, it was hard to believe the peak of this mighty mountain wasn’t the same. The snow looked compact sitting amongst the green mountain side and we even saw a distinct snowboard line tracing an infinite “S” down one of the snowy slopes.
The going got a little slower towards the top, not because of the Astro, but because of the tight switchbacks. We were doing u-turn after u-turn now and we couldn’t believe the lack of guard rails where people would surely venture should their brakes give out on them.
We were really in the clouds now and could barely see the people in their brightly coloured clothes playing on the rocks nearby to the road. Cleo was loving every minute of the ride as much as we were, I think she liked the slow pace.
When we breached the 14,000 ft mark, I was ecstatic, the Astro was going to make it! 115 vertical feet later and we were at the peak. Dan had been timing me through the course and I am happy to report that the Astro climbed the famous Pikes Peak route in 33 minutes, 25.18 seconds. Just over four times slower than the fastest man in the world, I was pretty happy with that!
I could barely contain my excitement now that we were at the cloud covered top, I wasn’t the slightest bit bothered that we couldn’t see a view. Anthony was a happy man too, not so much because his car made it (he was driving a modern Mazda CX-5), but that he had now been beyond 14,000 feet! Out of the four of us, I was the only one to have been past the 14’er threshold before. For Cleo, Dan and Anthony, it was their first time at such a great height. Anthony had come close when we hiked Mt. Whitney together, but had come up just shy of 14,000 ft so I was happy he’d made it to this great elevation.
Dan got out and felt the light-headedness that comes from elevation and we joined Anthony who’d parked in front of us. First things first, we all had a puff of weed. Getting high while at heights. While Dan visited the bathroom when he felt the sudden urge to pee (a symptom I’d also experienced at elevation), I heated up leftovers for lunch, putting it all into tortillas. The warm food was a nice treat after we’d all donned our jackets to brave the cold at the top of the mountain.
Now that food was done, we cracked the beers. Dan hadn’t been sitting on an empty esky! The beers were cold and had all our hands numb in minutes, but we thoroughly enjoyed our brews.
We went for an explore around the top of the mountain which was pretty bare except for the weather towers, antennas and a hospitality centre that sold way over-priced goods and food that we didn’t partake in.
The view came and went as the clouds parted briefly, but we were mostly in a thick fog for the time we were at the peak. When we came around a military building, Dan noticed a yellow-bellied marmot just sitting in the middle of an open space. Cleo was chomping at the bit to get to it, but Dan kept her tightly on the leash. A pitbull against a slow-moving marmot wouldn’t have been a fair fight in the best of conditions.
We followed the marmot as he walked off and found he had plenty of friends frolicking around in the rocks, much to Cleo’s dismay. We watched a while as they hopped from rock to rock, not seeming overly bothered by humans, obviously used to the interaction. Cleo sat, poised to attack the entire time but her want was ultimately denied.
We rushed to the side of the mountain that suddenly cleared from the clouds and got snapshots of the valley below. I can imagine that the views are clear only a few days out of the year all the way up here.
We wandered our way all the back to the cars where we played a round of Frisbee between the three of us, just to check the aerodynamics of the disc at such a great height. I was throwing like crap so I’ll blame it on the elevation.
A marmot watched us as we played and I pondered whether Cleo had the ability to break her leash in trying to get to it. She was tied to my roof rack as we played.
The only other thing necessary to do before heading back down the mountain was to get a photo of my beautiful Astro at this height. I drove it around to an advantageous spot and in the spur of the moment, decided it would be most appropriate to get naked for a photo with my baby. Dan snapped away as I took my clothes off amid the fog and posed with my girl. If the fog hadn’t been around, many a child would have seen the inappropriateness of it all, but the heavy cloud kept me discreet.
I love my van. I couldn’t be prouder that she took me to such a great height.
Back in our cars, we started our descent down the mountain. We only got views towards the top thanks to the storm clouds that were rolling in. I don’t think our timing could have been more perfect, it seems we’d got to the top just when there’d been a window of opportunity.
I put the Astro into first gear and we slowly navigated the switchbacks to get down the mountain. My brakes were being saved, but it meant it was slow going. I really need another gear between 1st and 2nd, but it worked out ok. I stopped to let a lot of people by this time.
The drive down was nearly as enjoyable as the drive up, but much more of a chore thanks to having to concentrate on gear shifting and braking. At the halfway mark, there was a mandatory stop sign where a man with a laser temperature gun would read your brake temperature. The sign read that if brake temps were above 300*F, you had to go to the naughty corner and park your car until they cooled down. My brakes were happily at only 118*F so I was allowed to continue.
The storm clouds soon turned to rain as we drove the bottom half of the mountain and soon enough, there were rivers flowing across the tarmac. Timing!! My speakers lit up with a siren when I received a weather alert from the National Weather Service of tornadoes in the area suggesting I should take cover immediately! TIMING!!!! Dan and I were super excited at the prospect of seeing our first tornado and scanned the tip of the clouds. It certainly looked like the type of conditions typically seen before a tornado appears. We weren’t so (un)lucky, it was just rain.
At the bottom, Dan got back into his car and we decided we should find our camp for the night considering the time. We drove into Manitou Springs which looked like a very cute but busy touristy town and parked when we all had cell service. There weren’t any free camp options in the area, but I found that the road we’d parked on last night in Woodland Park continued all the way into Manitou Springs so I figured we’d be able to follow it back towards Woodland and find something on the side of the forest road. The boys were happy with that so they followed me out of town.
When we first got onto the road, I found we were driving through The Garden of the Gods, an area with some impressive rock formations. We found the first one in Balanced Rock, right on the side of the road with tourists in abundance. We crept through the narrow cavity between a couple of rock walls to drive around it and onto our forest road.
We climbed up the red dirt road and all of the pullouts that had looked good on Google satellite turned out to be landslides or otherwise inappropriate camp spots. A little disheartened, we carried on in the hopes of finding something. We must have gone 5 miles and switched leaders three times before Anthony had turned around and met us. We’d passed parking area that was super-exposed but looked like our best bet. Anthony made off in the opposite direction while I had one last look at Google maps. There looked to be a good spot just a few hundred meters up the road and, sure enough, a short drive later, there was a pullout that we could make work. It had a bit more shelter than the exposed parking spot but the ground wasn’t quite level and had a few big puddles. Whatever, sometimes you have to work for it. I got onto Anthony and he came right back up the hill and we set about setting up camp. The access was tight for the three cars, but after some faffing around, we’d tetris’d our cars into the space so that they were all level and we had enough room for a tent and a tarp.
I got on the phone to Dad, no longer able to contain my excitement at the fact that I’d climbed the peak that he so much wanted to climb himself. He was happy for me but also incredibly jealous. I got to talk to Mum briefly too before the sprinkling rain that had been falling soon turned into pissing down status and I had to go set up the tarp.
Rain jackets on to battle the rain, the three of us tied the tarp up between the two vans for some shelter. Turns out we’d parked our cars perfectly for the setup. While I cooked dinner for all of us, the boys attempted a fire. The wood was wet, the ground was wet, the air was wet, but they stuck at it. They tried many different methods and while there were sometimes flames, it mostly turned into just smoke. I watched on with not much optimism until they got the jerry can out. With little splashes of fuel, they managed to breathe life into the fire. Using more big bits of wood, they covered the fire from the rain by placing them on top of the already burning bits. Although it didn’t really provide much warmth since we were all huddled under the tarp, it had been the challenge that mattered I think.
After fried rice for dinner, with nothing left to fiddle with, Dan thought he could improve the tarp situation and so I assisted as we adjusted the tie points between the van. It ended up in a turn out with the pole holding up one corner falling down and the inside of my van getting wet. No matter, we were laughing as we were out in the rain trying to set things right and I wondered out loud if Dan had ever heard the saying, “if it ain’t broken, don’t fit it”.
The rain was easing but still persistent so I offered Anthony my van for the night. There was no way anyone would find pleasure in pitching a tent in this weather so he happily accepted. We called it an early night since we were sick of standing out in the rain and had yet another night of falling asleep to the sound of rain. The only one that really minded was Cleo who didn’t like water in any form and was shit scared of thunder so chose to spend the night huddled up in the front seat, fearing for her life.
