Day 20, 13.7 miles, San Luis Peak!

Well helllo!!! I was cold this morning and I mean REAL cold!! Honestly, in my tent was fine, I love my warm sleeping bag. But the picture above was the view out my tent vestibule and man was it icy! Both Cheeseburgler and I have super poor circulation in our hands. It was painfully cold and took forever for us to pack up! I let him borrow my gloves on and off while we took turns handling our icy wet tents barehanded! How was Firecracker holding up? Well…

He sleeps with his pack outside and his water filter DEFINITLEY froze 😳 

My ice tent haha

Left blister still holding on for all its life. This is iteration 4 I think. I’m pretty sure it is pressing in my footbed which is one size too big for the shoe! Ughh! 

We got going later because of the cold, probably around 7:15 or so. The sun felt sooooo good when it finally hit! We continued to climb up what I’m calling “Frozen Valley”

These boys are cool

Two-Pack, Cheeseburgler, and Firecracker

We got up to the pass with the spur trail for San Luis Peak. Fire was going to head on 5 more miles to where he was meeting his family to head into Creede, and Cheese and I were both down to do Sam Luis Peak as a side trip! (The most remote 14er in Colorado). We set up our tents behind some bushes just below the pass, left everything in there except all our food and water and a few warm layers and started the climb! Prepare for waaaay too many pics!

The “trail” 😂 

Trail dog!!

The Summit! 

At the top we met another CT section hiker named Bradford and we chatted for a bit and took each others pictures. The view was amazing and the weather up top was PERFECT! The wind was way worse on the climb than actually hanging out on top! 

Our now completely dry tents at the bottom :)

The next 8.5 miles of trail were super exposed, luckily the weather held up! Bradford went in ahead as we gathered our tents back up but we met him at the next saddle. There was a lot of climbing to do today even in the short mileage day that it turned out to be. 

The trail was great!

The freshest of creeks!

Anytime you see no trees around, the trail is over 12,000 feet! Bad weather for this 8.5 miles would be skeeeeetchy! ⚡️ 

Me, Bradford, and Cheese

Mt. Sneffles is the far prominent background fin

Again, it was really cool to be hiking with someone all day! Cheeseburgler is great, we have shared some

Similar life experiences, he’s 37 and I’m 34. It’s really cool to discuss views and opinions and learn things from each other. Same goes for Bradford who we hiked with for about 4 miles. He’s in his 50’s and we had a lot to talk about/share with each other! Hiking with others is the best! 

We stopped at the only non, exposed area for 18 miles since the saddle of San Luis all the way to the drop off Snow Mesa, the next highly exposed area we’ll hit tomorrow. When we arrived at the creek and Meadow there were about 5 other hikers already here! 

Mamma moose and her calf! (Can’t see calf)

Digs, Bradford, and Cheesburgler 

I saw David (the 73 year old who is hiking the Colorado Trail this year for the 8th time!!) we also met three hikers named Digs, Big Pig, and Landslide, who all started one day after me on the 30th, and we’ve never seen each other until right now! We also met a hiker named Splat who started on the 4th, going 25-30 miles a day! I saw Prison Mike earlier in the day, and even Red popped up at about 7:15! I’ve never been around so many hikers on the whole trail! 

I just want to briefly show you what we’re working with for today and tomorrow, so the mileage makes sense. I am the orange dot in the middle, I am exactly at tree line. There are no trees above that dot. This is where I am currently camping in the meadow. The second blue dot from the far left is where we camped yesterday, right at tree line as well. The far right black circle with the two arrows is where we hitch into Lake City tomorrow. 

You can see how much of the trail is above tree line and how much is even above the 12,000 ft mark! Long story short, you don’t want to camp above tree line unless you are sure there are no thunderstorms. There is hard rain as I write this and lightning is striking about 5ish miles away. Much of the trail from this point to Durango will be like this! This is why this camping spot was so popular. It’s a good strategy to get into Lake City by about noon tomorrow!  

Thanks for reading!