A Short Recap of our Time in Colorado
Hops, King of the Savannah - Penitente Canyon
We started off our Colorado journey by going to Salida where we met up with one of Nate’s friends - we parked in his driveway and got to enjoy dinners with him and I spent lots of quiet time running on the trails and catching up with work I hadn’t gotten to while we were driving to Colorado. Oh! On the way to Colorado we had been searching for these hot springs that looked really cool - turns out they were packed so we didn’t end up going, but we did stay in the town of Dingle, Idaho - which just gave me a good smile every time we passed the signs.
From Salida, we ventured down to Penitente Canyon. We spent about two weeks there climbing, trail running, and enjoying the landscape. I loved Penitente climbing - and I lead my first 11a which felt so good! I can’t wait to go back there this fall and see how things feel when it’s cooler and I’ve had even more climbing experience under my belt. I also got to meet a few of Nate’s friends as they came to climb with us and I had the best time - and can’t wait to meet up with them again (hopefully for a lady’s backpacking adventure soon)!
Nate and Leila, Penitente Canyon
Nate photographing Wes on “Woman Thing”, God’s Crag
Some of my favorite things at God’s Crag:
Dog Beach! It wasn’t actually called that, but I lovingly named it that. I went there most days - it was just a quarter mile from our campsite and I always had it all to myself from other humans and dogs. To my delight, I got buzzed by a hummingbird. I spent hours practicing watercolors. I threw Cali an inordinate amount of sticks. I explored for wildflowers. I watched many sun sets and one really incredible sunrise. That spot was a perfect little quiet oasis.
Cali playing at “Dog Beach” out Engineer Pass
Long Runs into Town - Because Jambo wasn’t going up and down and since there was no service at all where we were parked. I ended up doing two long runs to get into Lake City in order to send files to some clients. I haven’t done an “adventure run” in a hot minute, and dang, it felt so so so good. It was about 15.5 miles round trip, I packed water, some snacks, my iPad, and charger. Before we went to Colorado I bought a new running pack that could fit my camera and it is one of my most favorite pieces of equipment already - if you’re looking for a running pack that doesn’t disappoint, grab the Distance 15. Not only was I able to fit everything I needed for my long run, I had plenty of room to grab some supplemental groceries while I was in town to bring back up too!
Cool Bugs & Amazing Wildflowers - Flowers! Bugs! Macrophotography! I’ll be posting more of these soon in future blog posts as I get to know more about the various organisms I took photos of - but holy biodiversity did I have a good time!
Bugs are cool - found this guy pollinating some flowers by the river bank
Friends - We got to see Leila & Chris and Bryce & Cora for the Fourth of July. It was a blast to hang out with those guys again, and while the weather was a bit finicky, I think everyone had a good time! Nate had a job creating a video with Jonathan, so we got to spend about a week with Jonathan and Shaina. I loved getting to know those guys better AND we played like…3 games of Catan. It was amazing.
We just got back into town after being in Colorado for the past month or so. It’s funny, I thought it would feel more like “coming home”, like I would have gotten all nostalgic. But I haven’t. I love Idaho, and I love this Valley, but I haven’t missed the place like I thought I would. I have missed the people though - and getting to see my friends has been filling up my soul points cup.
I’ve been finding I have a hard time trying to do large re-caps, so I’ll give you a short re-cap - then lots of photos. I still have quite the photo pile to sift through!
Leila, Enjoying a Nightime Cruise on the Colors Wall, Penitente Canyon
After Penitente, we went back to Salida for a couple days - we booked an AirBNB and enjoyed taking showers, doing laundry, and catching up on work with a wifi connection. Then back to Penitente to climb with Leila and Emily for a day (I enjoyed getting to try a couple of the routes I’d be trying before!). Then - off to God’s Crag! God’s Crag is about 7 miles up Engineer Pass from the Lake City side. Jambo rumbled up the dirt road like a champ - but once we got her up there we knew she was going to stay put until we were ready to leave again. We tucked her and Blanca (Nate’s house) into two side-by-side campsites right next to the river. Even though we were right by the road and had OHV’s (oh the OHVs - so so so many humans with trump flags that it broke my heart) flying by pretty dang often - it still felt rather tucked away.
Rocket at “Dog Beach” out Engineer Pass
God’s Crag - Hot damn. This place was amazing. The climbing started in the 5.11+ range which was tough for me, but even when I wasn’t climbing I was in awe of the place. It’s about a 20 minute hike up with about 600’ of elevation gain, you round the corner and BAM! Waterfall! Streaks of gorgeous color! Marmots! Breath taking views of multiple 13’ers. We explored an old mining cave. I watched baby marmots scuttle around. We drank from the stream. Nate did a shit ton of work on old routes (rebolting, putting in new anchords, etc) and created a new route! We made new friends (shout out to Jenny and Pete!). 10/10 would recommend.
Jenny and her pup, Iris, at God’s Crag