Belated Estes Trip Report

At this point, is a trip report really worth it? I was almost over the pain of having to come back to NE when I had to go and process the photos from my trip. I decided to try some new things and make Flash slideshows for the images and group them into categories. Kinda a nice presentation. Unfortunately, I have found that the photo quality is not as crisp as it should be. The contrast is lower and the darks saturation is not what it should be. Oh well.

Climbs from the weekend - Photos were few and far between. Just didn't work out too well to take pictures of climbing.

Flora - Mainly from the Lumpy area.

F-Stop Gear - Great gear. Have gear, will travel. Take photos of it along the way.

Estes Valley and Lumpy Ridge

Peoples - They let me take their picture.

Peoples Again - They still let me take pictures.

The Thumb - 4th of July evening fun. Not for the weak and queasy!

So any who, the majority of we climbers left on Thursday afternoon and when I say majority I will mention that there was a full contingency of us going. Chris, Nicole, Marydale, James, Bill, Ron, Rusty, Paul, Jesse, Jesse the Younger, Teddy and I. - Phew! Just count them, I know you won't! Somehow with all those faces, I didn't manage to even get photos of everyone. (Um. Does that really make sense?) Sorry about that. 

First night. The campground could not be found so 8 of us piled into a 2 bed hotel room (They were $160 a night!), but we were rewarded in the morning with breakfast at The Egg and I. Scrumptious. 

Friday, we hiked back to Sundance Buttress at Lumpy and went up Kor's Flake. 3 teams of 3, one of 2. It took all day but was a really nice climb. Recommended. That evening we found camp and Rusty went to work over the stove making a spicy chicken vindaloo. And since it was the 4th, a group this large could not be complete without a trip to the hospital. Marydale (MD) stepped up to the opportunity and decided to try and remove part of her thumb a camping knife (a sharp knife is a safe knife) while feathering kindling to make a fire. The hospital was a good amount of fun -- even MD had a good time. 

Saturday the group split up. Half went and did Spearhead while the other half half-assed the day and went social leisure. We took it easy in the morning, some bouldered with the legendary Seth and the rest of us headed to the Ironclads. We reconvened at Lane Ranch where Seth worked and had a late lunch and hung out during a afternoon shower. Pushing back up to Lumpy, Little Twin Owls was the destination. While Jesse worked it, I tried to get to the top via a supposed 5.0 on the back side. Maybe it was because I was still wearing a full pack and sandals that it felt harder or that it was probably more like a 5.6 or so, but it was not ideal and I was not enjoying this soloing venture. I topped out and anchored off to only find that I had no shot without a full rope and ascenders -- too much work at this point. I sat on the head of a owl and gazed at mountains thinking thoughts (tell me why I don't live here again?), and thinking about nothing while others worked the route on TR.  I eventually rapped down, with full pack on again, and cleaned Chris's gear. One of his C3s was a real doozie and it took me a long time to get out. We finished the night up at some little restaurant that turned out to be mediocre at best. Oh, it was my birthday too.

Sunday: Since the majority of the group was headed back to NE today, Chris and I hiked up the the Bookend area and did The Climb of the Ancient Mariner. Super sweet route with a nice little roof and 10a slab on P1 and probably around 125+ feet of slab making up P2. The final pitch left you saying. "Eh." P2 made it all worth it in the end. We topped out in a small downpour and headed back into town since the weather continued to lay down the law of wetness. We met up with Rusty and his friend Paul at Notch-top Cafe, even though it was not open. We had drank beer and ate chips and salsa while making plans for dinner. Dinner was awesome. Sausage, rolls, bell peppers with onions, and camp fries. We finished the night out prepping our gear to climb the diamond on Longs.

Monday: This was our big day. Longs Peak. Mentioning this to Chris would make his ears perk up like a teenage boy walking by Victoria's Secret. We woke at 0230 to find completely overcast skies. The Diamond was out, and Chris lost his chubby. We re-awoke at 0545, ate, coffee, and headed to the trail head to Petit Grepon -- and watched the clouds roll into the canyon like mashed potatoes. Back to Lumpy. We did J-Crack and George's Tree before calling it a day. Going back into Estes, we had coffee and then got groceries. During this time, the weather finally cleared over Longs and it was plainly apparent that it snowed up there today. Phew! With nothing left to do we made dinner plans. It was even more amazing. Camp french fries and fire grilled mini burgers were the cat's meow while being downed with an IPA from Stone Brewing out of CA. Any sort of surly attitude was subsided by rich food. 

Tuesday: We packed camp, and went to pick up James from Seth, which we almost forgot about since there is no way to communicate up there and we had not seen him since Sunday morning. Not being able to convince Chris to go to Eldo to do Yellow Spur, we headed home.  That car ride home gets more painful every time.