Mount Evans 14er

I was so excited to have my family come to Colorado this year, and my whole family too!  Dad, mom, and sister!   They havent all come out together since our 2nd year here in Colorado.   It was great to have them here!  
Here are some photos of us hiking Mount Evans, 14,258 feet above sea level.  It was 69 in Denver and 39 at the base of the mountain, and much colder at the top.  It was one of the toughest hikes I have done, mostly due to the snow and very very cold wind, but we all forged onward and completed the 5 mile hike.  ( It felt much more than 5 miles, and technically we came down a steeper and shorter incline, making the hike less than 5 miles.  However, after many years of hiking and running and timing myself,  I felt this hike was probably longer than measured)

Here we are at the start of the hike.  It was pretty steep near the start and we were climbing and bouldering up some pretty steep & slippery areas.  It was a little treacherous. 
 

(lt to rt) Jess, Laura and me.  We are on the top of Mount Spalding (or what we thought was Mt. Spalding but maybe was another mountain) about 1/3 of the way into our hike.  Behind us is Mount Evans where we are heading. 

We are standing on the ledge here, taking a break, calling mom so she was not worried, and eating some.  We did not know we were standing this close to the cliff, dad took this pic from higher up on the mountain.  The cliff went straight down to a huge dropoff.  There were many places early on (and actually most of the hike really) that were very steep drops, sheer cliffs, and scary terrain. 



Wow, pretty beautiful right?  Dad took this while standing right in the gully between the 2 mountains.  Very cool!



The 5 of us on the top, with josh's great timer, camera skillz.  Pretty beautiful!


Here are josh and I on the top of the mountain. This is our 7th 14er!  


I love the blue sky!!!  Very tippy top of the mountain! 


Marker on the top of the peak. 


Deciding which route to take down.  It was my suggestion that we just go down the fast, steep route.  It was probably not the easiest route, and much farther than it looked too... We just went over the edge of this mountain here....whew!


HOW cutE!!!  Sleepy, tired, exhausted dogs, but they got the humans down from the mountain alright, their job is done :)


YAY we are done!!!!  wa hoo!!!