Mount Elbert – 14,433 ft. – ranked highest in Colorado, 2nd highest in the contiguous United States (highest is Mt. Whitney at 14,505 ft.)

I had originally planned on climbing Snowmass mountain with Terry this weekend, but my wife’s mother, Donna, asked me a few weeks ago if we could give a 14’er a shot. Donna has been reading my reports here for awhile and I think she was bitten by the 14’er bug. As she had never done a 14’er before, I did some research on the ‘easier’ 14’ers and figured that Elbert would be a good choice due to the gentle elevation gain and relatively high start. In retrospect, I probably should have chosen Sherman or Quandary.

We left Colorado Springs around 6 PM on Thursday 8/27/09 and arrived at the South Elbert Trailhead around 9 PM. We set-up camp and went to sleep. The alarm woke us up at 4 AM and we quickly got ready.

Hiking in the dark was no doubt an interesting and new experience for Donna. We started up the Colorado Trail and then up the South Elbert Trail. The start of this trail is pretty steep and took us by surprise. I did not anticipate the route to be this steep, but Donna took it in stride. As this was her very first climb, I gave her lots of time to rest and take-in water as needed. I stressed the importance of drinking lots of water to her and she definitely listened. We were able to reach tree-line before sunrise. I must admit, the view of Twin Lakes Reservoir was really impressive from this trail. Here’s a shot of Donna with Elbert behind her just before sunrise: 

Donna kept our pace nice and steady and we were able to get sweet views of Elbert and the surrounding area as the sun hit the tops of the peaks. Here’s a  pano looking east, south, and west: 

The sunrise was really beautiful. Twin Lakes really was an awesome sight: 

We continued up Elbert. 

Here’s Donna with the Lakes behind her: 

The trail was very clear. There seemed to be quite a bit of erosion and I would suggest that other hikers try to stick to one main trail so that the tundra can recover. We kept climbing and the views of the Lakes just got better and better.

Elbert is like a giant pile of rocks. It has very little in terms of distinguishing features other than its a really big, pile of rocks.

Unfortunately, the higher we got, the more ill Donna became. I thought that acute mountain sickness(AMS or altitude sickness) might happen, but had hoped that she could fight through it. She finally stopped climbing at 13,750 feet, an impressive first outing! I was really rooting for her, but I totally hate the nausea that AMS gives you, so I totally understood why she would want to stop.

Donna told me to go ahead without her, so I climbed the rest of Elbert quickly. Donna’s decision to stop proved to be a good one, as there was quite a bit more mountain to hike up than I originally thought. It took me about 30 minutes more to get to the summit, where I was greeted by two Austrian gentlemen, one smoking a cigarette, and the other drinking a Bud Light. They kindly took my picture: 
I was really excited to see the Maroon Bells in the distance, and took tons of pictures of them. They are very aesthetically pleasing to me, one of the coolest sets of mountains I have seen. 

I took quite a few photos from the top but did not stick around very long because I wanted to get back down to Donna. Here’s some panoramic shots of the view from the top. This one is looking east and south: 

And this one is looking east, south, and west: 

And then looking north, west, and south: 

I quickly hurried back down and found Donna down-climbing about a half-mile from where I had left her. We slowly went back down, which was very enjoyable – the colors were changing and the day was PERFECT – weather was awesome and the start of fall was in the air. Here’s some fun pictures I took of the early fall colors that were changing in the tundra on Elbert and the surrounding mountains: 

We made it back down to the Jeep successfully and I think Donna had a very good time on her first mountain climb. I really hope she tries again and is able to feel the great thrill that is the top of a high mountain in Colorado!  

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