The Hike
An exercise in creative writing.
Stones clattered down the rocky mountainside as the hiker pressed forward, rocks and dirt crunching under the worn down tread of his hiking boots. The ridge line stretched ahead of him, sparse boulders and the white patches of leftover snow from the winter dotted the sides of the mountain, reflecting the ambient light from what was left of the sinking full moon that had aided in illuminating the hike throughout the night. The summit was close, a dark silhouette rising ahead of him out of the dark valley below, standing out against the deep blue of the pre-dawn sky as a black monolith.
It was an aggressive goal to summit the 13er just before sunrise, and he had started the 8-mile hike with 6000 feet of elevation gain at 3AM. The thin air left his breathing ragged, and every push forward with the ever increasing altitude was more and more unforgiving. The summit was right there, just 400 more feet up and another mile and a half of this narrow stretch of stones that had forced its way into the sky above the world around it.
As the wind whipped across the ridge, billowing his hiking pants and finding every stretched open stitch of the jacket, the cold of the morning crept in. When he was clearly ascending, the exertion kept him warm, almost sweaty, but now that he was on a semi-level path, that light moisture under his jacket was a source of near constant, chilly discomfort.
For every 1000 feet of elevation change in the Rocky Mountains, the temperature drops 2 degrees. And after 11000 feet, trees and vegetation stop growing due to the harsh temperatures and strong winds. That means there was nothing to protect the hiker from the winds as they swept over the nearby mountain tops, down through the valleys and back up over the ridge that he was bit by bit moving along.
He inhaled deeply, willing his body along. Every exhale was visible in the light of his headlamp. “It’s just discomfort,” the hiker muttered under his breath to himself. “It’ll come to an end, it always does. It’s worth it. Take another step.” Along he went, steadying himself on larger rocks as he weaved through the small peaks and uneven rocks that made up the path.
The hiker had long ago chosen to summit a more common, but less visited, thirteener instead of the more popular 14ers that Colorado is known for - precisely because they weren’t over trodden trails clearly cut into the side of the mountains by thousands of hikers annually looking to “bag” another of the USA’s tallest mountain peaks. But it also meant a lot of time looking for tree blazes and cairns, small piles of stones that mark the way. It meant stepping off the trail in the dark and backtracking. And it also meant that he didn’t have a long line of other headlamps to follow in the night like so many other summer summit hikes in Colorado.
The hiker’s training had been inconsistent the prior winter, and it was never at altitude. This wasn’t a plan for this hiking season, with a new family to support and help raise, his hobbies had been sidelined for responsibilities. But by the time spring had rolled around, he knew he had to do at least one summit, so he had started logging a few more miles, climbing a few more stairs, and lifting more weights.
The sky to his east had started to fade a bit, and the deep blue of the twilight hours was slowly but surely being pushed west as the sun began to creep ever closer to the eastern horizon. Finally he reached the base of the final ascent. That 400 feet of elevation change was so minimal compared to the 5600 that he had already completed, but it looked like an impossible eternity. He couldn’t possibly make it to the top before sunrise. But that’s what he had come here to do and the hiker wasn’t about to give up.
He took one big deep breath, and then pressed forward. The grade was consistent and difficult but not extreme here - not until you were within 200 feet of the top. “This was doable. Just keep going until you reach the first of the switchbacks,” he said to himself, once again vocalizing his thoughts. Solo hiking wasn’t the safest option, but the solitude and peace is part of what this experience was about for him.
The sky had brightened significantly as he reached the first switchback, breathing heavily. He flicked his headlamp off and pulled it down off of his head, letting it dangle around his neck. They always drove him nuts when he had them on, so the moment he could see without it, he would always get rid of it.
His legs were burning from the sustained effort, every muscle screaming to stop as they starved for oxygen. He definitely hadn’t spent enough time at altitude, and he could feel the effects of the thinner air more and more with every step up the mountain that he took. To make it worse, he had overestimated his pace with his start time, so now he was on a time crunch, and every burst of effort was a trade off in time vs risking his objective and being struck down by AMS (acute mountain sickness, caused by overexertion and a lack of acclimation to altitudes above 8000 feet). At its best it meant a headache, dizziness, and nausea. At its worst, well, he didn’t want to think about it. He once was with a group where a guy almost slipped off of the edge of a mountain because he was so dizzy, and loopy and started behaving recklessly.
The hiker stopped to take a break, drinking water from his hydration bladder hose dangling off of his left shoulder strap before looking down at his watch. Tapping the light button, the Garmin GPS watch glowed entirely too brightly in the dark, causing him to blink a few times in rapid succession before his eyes adjusted - 5:34AM - and in small numbers and letters to the side, “Sunrise - 6:07AM). Thirty minutes to climb 300 feet and walk half a mile and get set up for the sunrise. Completely doable.
The switchbacks were steep, but they were quick. One foot in front of the other, march. Suddenly he was done with the first one, and he felt good. Far better than he anticipated, even with the 8 miles and literal one mile of previous elevation change fatiguing him. It may not last, but he was going to take every bit of it he could, so he turned and moved up the next one. As he took the steps up the rocks of the next turn, the thin air and exhaustion hit him. “Stop and breathe, take a minute, you’re fine on time.” He thought he heard panting, so he turned and looked out over the trail behind him and the valley below. Just stones and the distant appearance of monstrous pines that dotted the faded greens and browns of the mountain vegetation far below in the valley.
He took a breath and composed himself. “Go,” he said audibly and with an authoritative tone. He didn’t have time to take in the sights now, he had to get to the top. His watch read 5:41AM, and the altimeter had him at 13,486. The summit of this mountain was listed at 13,692. He was there, but he wasn’t. The lone hiker started marching again. The ruck on his back was acting like a heater now, and he could feel moisture creeping along his shirt outside of where the bag made contact with him. The wind was an ever present roar in his ears, flapping the sides of his windbreaker hood relentlessly. The stars in the east had all but vanished into the quickly brightening sky.
His mind rushed as he moved from switchback to switchback, taking short breaks at each one, counting the seconds in his mind. What if he didn’t make it, what if he sprained his ankle, what if he had timed this whole thing wrong? He’d check his watch every 3rd switchback. It was 5:55 now - and he was 75 feet of elevation from the summit. His breaks had been too long. They didn’t feel too long, but they had been. So this was it, push to the top and don’t stop. The hiker climbed, alarm bells screeching in his brain telling him that the pain was too much and that he needed to take a break. But like anyone who’s spent time in endurance sports knows, those aren’t real alarms - they’re just noise. Especially when you’re at the end.
His boots crunched with every deliberate, labored step forward. The wind whistled, rustling his jacket and keeping the heat from his exertion at bay. His heavy breathing sounded like an animal run ragged. His heart pounded in his chest, thumping so loud he could swear he could hear it over everything else. And he climbed, one foot in front of the other.
He turned at a switchback, reaching out to steady himself on a large boulder to his left and took 3 more steps, and there it was. The top. 6:02 AM. He stepped forward, legs wobbling as he reached a rock that he could sit down on. The last time he had come here was 8 years prior, with his dog who had just turned 2. It was her first big summit hike with him, the first of many. They had camped in the valley below at 11,000 feet, making their sunrise summit together easier for her first hike.
The hiker took a sip of water before taking off his bag and setting it on the ground before him. Looking to his left, he could almost see the memory of his beloved pup still jumping around, so stoked to be up there, if not a little alarmed by the sheer noise of the wind. He remembered how she had eventually calmed down and trotted over to his side, laying down and snuggling into him, hiding from the chill of the mountain winds. He reached into his bag, remembering pulling out her treats, but instead pulling out a small container of ashes with her name on it. His watch beeped, alerting him to the minute before sunrise.
He unlatched the top of the container, and watched as the sun peeked over the horizon ahead of him. The hiker stood up as quickly as his weary legs would allow, and threw his hands into the air, spreading her ashes into the gusting wind, watching as she vanished into the mountains she loved being a part of. She lived for adventure, and she would remain here in spirit forever, eternally exploring. A tear rolled down his right cheek, glistening in the golden light of dawn, and with a shaky breath in, he whispered, “Goodbye.”
Notes:
I actually didn’t write this as a story about loss. I think it just started because evoking the imagery of a sunrise hike felt beautiful, and because it’s something I love. But then as it went, I wondered what the point of the story would be - where would the payoff be for sticking around. I think that I have a propensity to focus on horror elements - too much Michael Crichton and Steven King as a kid I think. I didn’t want it to be a generic story about overcoming some injury or something either, like, did the hiker hurt himself, and have to get rescued, or anything like that. So as the story continued and I relayed the (dramatized) experiences of the few 14ers I’ve summited in Colorado, I had this thought that the purpose for the rush and the timing was based around a very specific event that the hiker needed to do, to perform. I remember sitting just below the ridge line on Challenger Peak in 2015, watching sunrise on the first 14er I summited and being so annoyed that we were 25 minutes late for it. It was a profound disappointment after such a grind of a hike, but it was also really beautiful. I’ve done a decent number of hikes or rucks or whatever since then based around timing the sunrise, and I’ve gotten pretty good at it, so I wanted to create a story that kind of redeemed that in my mind.
This short story specifically featured the theme of the ascent for that first 14er i bagged, but also sort of covered the feeling of the saddle between Gray’s and Torrey’s peaks. I highlighted it as a 13er that no one really visited because it’s a bad look to dump ashes on a tourist spot where the bits of bone never really go away. So you know, there were bits and pieces of inspiration from various places that went into how this story felt.
But then, I’m also dealing with the aging of my first dog that I’ve raised on my own. My family has lost 4+ dogs at this point, all with varying degrees of attachment. I’m intimately familiar with how bad the loss feels, and seeing the gray come in around my German shepherd's face, watching her slow down and become an old girl in her own right is really getting to me more than I think I should be allowing it to. When she was younger, she was my ride or die buddy - trail running, mountain biking, hiking, and taking road trips together. We did every†hing, including her joining me on a hike to the top of Gray’s Peak with my then girlfriend, now wife. And now that I have kids and the obligations that come with that, she’s taken a back seat to them, and I feel like I’ve just watched her age and haven’t given her the life of adventure I had always dreamed of. I find myself having to leave her behind even for slow runs around the neighborhood as arthritis takes it’s toll on her joints.
So I wrote this - a love letter to the idealized way that I would get to say goodbye to her when the moment comes. Honestly this was one of the only things I’ve ever written that has led to just a pure, uncontrolled emotional reaction for me. I didn’t go super deep into the emotions of what that experience would be like, but I did write it from the heart. And it felt like it was being pulled out of me and thrown into words on a screen. So there it is. Something a lot of us who are called to both dog ownership and the outdoors can probably relate to. Maybe a story about a hike to spread the ashes of a dog is a bit of engagement bait, but I dunno, it seems real enough to me to be worth posting.
-Nick