Cocksure. It was with quite a bit of excitement that Torrey, Hoodoo, and I left our car at the parking lot of the Bierstadt trailhead on our final day of summitting mountains. We had hiked five 14,000 foot mountains in four days, and that morning was shaping up to be a perfect way to end our streak with the sixth mountain. We made fantastic time, flying across the trail at a pace faster than any other during the week. Sore muscles were nothing compared to the early morning stillness lit only by headlamps and the stars still shimmering above, illuminating the trail in front of us. We could see the headlamps of those already on the trail ahead bobbing along the shoulder of the mountain, little stars of their own. Of course, once we began to gain elevation our pace slowed, but not enough to resurect memories of miserable ascents from earlier in the week. We really were going to finish our week strong, our sixth mountain in five days, and us coming from flat land and all.
The trail up Bierstadt was one of the better ones of the week, right up until we reached the final push and began to scramble. That slowed us right down, as there didn't seem to be a single trail so much as a collection of carins marking any which way you wanted to take to get to the top. In the end, we just went up, testing our footing before placing our weight on the scree. Hoodoo seemed pretty content to let me do all the work, snuggling down against my neck as he dug his claws into my jacket to keep from sliding off. I didn't blame him, and was happy to let him ride given how many people and dogs were summitting around us; Hoodoo is a trooper and has a fantastic attitude about everything, with the exception of dogs (except my own). I'm sure they make him nervous, and to be honest they make me nervous for him too. So Hoodoo stayed up on my shoulder right up until we actually summitted and relaxed against a rock, soaking in the bright morning sunshine.
We stayed at the summit for quite a while as more and more people crested the ridge and joined us. Torrey and I snacked while Hoodoo lounged on a sunny rock that may as well have been a spotlight focused solely on him. At one point I had tried to keep count of how many people were taking pictures of my cat, but ended up losing track somewhere around twenty. He was being the most majestic thing ever, straight up posing for the cameras flashing in his direction, and when I finally scooped him up and placed him back on my shoulder for the descent, the picture requests kept coming. There was even a line of seven dudes who took a picture each in succession of me and my cat. I've never in my life had more strangers take a picture of me.
Torrey and I got separated in the crowd and she went on ahead, so I spent some time hiking as alone as is possible on a popular mountain. I ended up chatting with another hiker who, after no less than twelve different people asked to take a picture of my kitty, told me that I was bringing joy to the mutal suffering of summitting a 14'er. I'd noticed the looks of confused astonishment morphing into joy whenever people caught sight of my little orange kitten, and if I could help make someone's hike a little bit brighter because of my adventure kitten then who am I to deny them? Hoodoo spent most of his time on my shoulder, but in the quieter moments when there was no one around he jumped to the trail and walked alongside me, pausing to sniff at a flower or two as we went.
Perhaps I was a little too confident, brimming full of success after summitting all of the mountains that week, making me become careless. We hadn't had any injuries the entire week, so trust me to go ahead and fix that oversight. I stepped just a little too far close to the edge of a step covered with fine gravel and felt my foot slip out from under me, sending me down to one knee with the other leg stuck out at a weird angle behind me as I tried to not land on my cat. Of course, I had to do it in the middle of a group of people, all of whom stopped to help me up, asking if I was ok. I couldn't care less about myself, I just wanted to make sure I hadn't hurt Hoodoo, and only stopped to assess myself once I grabbed him and made sure he was uninjured. I'd scraped off a good chunk of skin on my right shin, blood pouring down my leg to soak into my sock. I grabbed my first aid kit out of the bottom of my pack and set about mopping myself up while Hoodoo played in the grass at the edge of the trail, not a care in the world. I went quite a bit slower after that, limping slightly and knowing I was going to bruise. I slipped a second time when I was almost to the car, cursing the whole time and once again banging my shins and knees on rough granite, resulting in Torrey waiting even longer for me than she normally would have at the trailhead. Even so, the injuries couldn't diminish the sense of giddy accomplishment of reaching our goal for the week, kicking off the next however many years it takes us to summit all the 14'ers in the state. If a couple of banged up shins and some bad weather are going to be the worst of our problems as we take on some of the roughest hikes in the country, I will welcome them with open arms. I absolutely cannot wait until we get back on the mountains next year, and you'd better believe my little adventure kitten with be right there with me as we take them on.
Read about the first five 14'ers here:
Pikes Peak
Quandary Peak
Grays and Torreys Peaks
Mount Evans
Interested in learning more about Hoodoo? Read about how I got him and chose him as my adventure partner here.
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