Colorado: a lesson in how bad my lungs are

Clear Creek Canyon: Yellow Dog Dingo

The day before our Sharkstooth attempt, on the way to where we were staying before RMNP, we stopped by Clear Creek Canyon and climbed Yellow Dog Dingo, a nice 3/4 pitch 5.6 (depending on if you link a pitch). We climbed it as a 3 pitch, linking the third and fourth pitches.

 We probably would have climbed some more routes too, but it started to rain as we were gearing up to start climbing. Luckily it was just a little shower, but it also rained again when I was deciding whether to do the top out hornpipe variation, so that killed any potential to do more routes. 

Here's us hiding from the rain in the alcove at the top of pitch 3. It was a very easy route and bolting is ridiculously close a lot of times. A nice little climb as a prelude for what we thought would be a nice long day of trad climbing. We did hit a little snag on the rappel, where the rope got caught on something as we were pulling it, so I had to ascend back up to free it. Oh, Colton also rapped past the rappel station and ended up just going in direct to a bolt while I rappelled down. That bode really well for the next day. 

Rocky Mountain Naitonal Park: The Sharkstooth attempt

The main climbing goal for my Colorado trip was to climb the Sharkstooth, via Northeast Ridge, a 5-6 pitch 5.6. Well, we never even made it to the base of the climb because we severely underestimated the approach, and also because I generally was in way worse cardio shape than I realized. 

The day didn't start off great because we left a little later than we anticipated from the random cabin Colton found to drive to RMNP, but we did see a nice sunrise on the way there. 

It got worse because the parking lot at the Glacier Gorge Trailhead was full (the trail you start on), so we had to park higher up at the Bear Lake parking lot which added probably another hour in total. We started our hike around 7am, behind our intended start, so already we were behind (ideally, and for any potential future attempt, we would be starting our hike 530-6am). 

The trail is the Andrews Tarn and Andrews Glacier Trail, up until you hit the gash, which you then take up to the base of Sharkstooth. To the Gash, it is about 4 miles with about 1500 feet of elevation gain. Then it is about a half a mile through the gash, with about another 800-1000 feet of elevation gain. In half a mile. And the trail starts at about 9100 feet of elevation, and the gash starts around 10700 feet of elevation. Let me remind you that this week I spent in Colorado was my first time being not at sea level for an extended amount of time. 

Needless to say, we did not make good time to the Gash. It took us about 3 hours to make it the 4 miles to the Gash, we got there around 1015am. Luckily, RMNP is absolutely gorgeous, and the trail takes you by a nice lake called The Loch (shown below). Otherwise, the trail up until you break the treeline into the gash is standard pretty for RMNP. 

After the treeline, there is still a little bit of hiking before you reach the Gash. I enjoyed this part of the hike a lot because you can see so much more without the trees hiding things. 

Once we hiked up a little bit more, we were greeted with the Gash and Sharkstooth peaking out to the left. 

So what exactly is the Gash? The Gash is this massive boulder field (and by boulders, they are big boulders) that run all the way up through the valley. We were scrambling up and jumping down the boulders, and we definitely went the hard way through which slowed us down even more. After 30 minutes of scrambling, we were approaching the first pretty steep bit, seen below. 

We got up the ledge and realized we were still probably 30 minutes to an hour away from the start of the climb, at 1210. At this point, we decided to give up, and eat our lunch before hiking back. My italian sandwhich became very flat from where it ended up in Colton's pack. 

The only notable thing that happened on the hike back was an F-16 (I'm pretty sure that's what they were) flying over. At first I thought it was severe rockfall and thought we were going to die, but instead we got to see a jet. 

Overall, it was a nice first experience at how much elevation can really affect you. I didn't have the best cardio coming into this, but man did it suck having to take a break every like 10 feet. I do hope to reattempt sharkstooth one day, after I have actually properly trained for it.