This one BEAUTIFUL hike!

Our original goal was to do 70 miles on segments 8, 9, 10, and 11, with 10 days on the trail. Unfortunately, one of the members of our party got some really bad blisters and couldn't see himself hiking another 40 miles. With that, we decided to cut the trip short and head home.

One good thing about the Colorado Trail is the availability of maps. The trail is very well known and there is even a foundation that works behind it. It made it very easy to plan our trip, knowing where water sources, camp spots, and resupply places were.

Our trip started Thursday morning (after spending the night with a former professor from preaching school). We hiked three days and took a break in Leadville, CO on Sunday. We worshiped with the church there and stayed with the preacher Saturday night. They were extremely hospitable (picking us up from the trail and everything). Sunday afternoon, we resumed the hike making it just pass the Tennessee Pass. The next morning we decided to turn back and catch a ride to Leadville from Tennessee Pass. We averaged about 7 miles a day, over some pretty rough terrain.

Some fun things that happened on the trip? Drew learned that he was inflicted with a disease (as he calls it) called AMS - Altitude Mountain Sickness. It was basically the result of driving from Pittsburgh (800 feet in altitude) to Denver (5,300 feet), beginning a hike the next morning at 9,800 feet, and then ascending to 12,300 feet by the second day of the hike. Yeah, I can see why your body would have a hard time adjusting. Luckily, it didn't get so bad we had to turn back, we just made sure to take lots of breaks.

Also, Drew brought his backpacking hammock as sleeping quarters for the trip. It seemed to work very nice, until (on the first night) he couldn't find any suitable trees to hang it from (yeah...remember we're in the middle of a forest). So, he decided to set it up as a bivy sack for the night. Well, that didn't last long, about an hour after everyone headed to bed, a gentle plead came from the bivy sack wondering if we could help set it up as a hammock again...it must have been some early states of AMS setting in.

Currently our plan is to return to the C.T. in 2009.