Colorado Rocky Mountain High

Flowers in the Rocky Mountain National Park

Back in June I spent a weekend in search of that Rocky Mountain high. While exploring Denver, Boulder, and the local mountainous terrain, I believe I found it!

Here are a few photos and thoughts from my experiences in the city, the mountains, and enjoying life with friends, old and new.

Denver

I pulled into Denver not knowing where I was going, and stumbled upon the Denver Union Station just after a storm had passed through. I then wandered around the area, admiring the open construction sites, imagining the new structures to come.

Larimer Square in Denver

Flat Irons

I’ve climbed the direct route of the first Flat Iron several times, building up my confidence handling the exposure and runout nature of the 1000+ foot rock climb. One of my goals in the last 2 years was to climb the direct route solo. This isn’t a big accomplishment per modern climbing standards, but for me it was an amazing mental feat to undertake. As chance would have it, my old friend from WV, Matt Jones, was in the Colorado area with his girl friend at the same time I was, and we linked up to solo the First Flat Iron together.

It was one of the best days of my life, living in the now.

The forecast called for afternoon thunderstorms, which came early… It’s a little nerve-wracking being rained on while several hundred feet up a slabby rock face without a rope…

Luckily, I found a small alcove for shelter during the intense duration of the rain.

Matt and Olivia were a little ways behind me, being rained on as they climbed the slab. Twas a little hairy for them for a second, but they were in great spirits after making to the ledge, totally soaked.

Above, Olivia is pulling the crux of this 5.6R climb…an easy move, but super exposed and required the most climbing muscles of anything on the whole climb. Behind Matt and Olvia is Katie Boué. We met her at the base before starting up, and her and Jason Gebauer ended up soling most of the climb along side us. Katie runs a blog called The Morning Fresh, and Jason shoots photography in Colorado at Main Wall Collective.

The summit experience was glorious, especially having finished the climb hours quicker than had we setup belays for the 7 to 10 pitches up. Though, the summit experience was short lived, as thunder was booming overhead. Another climbing team at the summit let us catch a ride off using their rope. Right as we began to set up to repel off, Olvia’s hair stood on end (literally, as if touching a Van de Graaff Generator), and there wasn’t any wind…we all got down as flat to the rock as possible, and then there was a super loud crack of thunder directly overhead… needless to say, we rapped off in record time.

Boulder Dushanbe Tea House

After a great day of soling the flat irons, and still feeling the Rocky Mountain high, Matt took us to the Dushanbe Tea house for a relaxing early dinner. A very beautiful place with amazing architecture, fine ornamentation, terrific food, and exquisite teas.