Last Saturday, my family and I drove almost 21 hours to Colorado. We spent the week doing anything from climbing, hiking, and mountain back riding to sight-seeing and shopping. Our third day there, we decided to get up early and try to hike up to the summit of Mt. Bierstadt, one of Colorado's many mountains reaching over 14,000 feet (called a "14er"). It was only a one day hike, actually only 3.5 miles each way, but it was one of the hardest and most miserable experiences of my entire life.
One of the different aspects of hiking up that high in the mountains is the weather. My entire family was decked out in thick socks, long underwear, winter coats, hats, and gloves- despite it being only October and nearly 70 degrees in Denver. The wind was bone-chilling and strong enough to knock someone of my size over. Later in the hike- once we got to about 12,000 feet- the wind became the worst past of the hike. It never ceased and continued to lash at you, stinging your face and cutting straight through your clothes.
Another major issue was the lack of oxygen. The higher altitude you are at, the thinner the air gets. It's not until much higher that an oxygen tank is necessary, but the difference is still noticeable. The entire state of Colorado is at a higher elevation than what I was used to back home in Indiana, but our campsite for the last two days was already at 9000 feet, so with a little water and food along the way we figured that the elevation wouldn't affect us very much.
Every person reacts differently to high altitudes. Some people barely notice the thinner air and don't react at all. On the other side of the scale, others can get nauseous and often are subject to throbbing migraines. It doesn't depend on your body type or fitness level, but instead, it seems to be somewhat random.
After only about a half a mile of the hike, I began to feel an something wrong with my stomach. Assuming it was just my (fairly common but minor) stomach problems I shrugged it off and focused on moving. The longer we hiked and the higher we got, the more the pain ate at my optimism. We still had almost an entire mile to go on the hike up when the cold, wind, and pain finally made me completely and utterly miserable.
At 12,500 feet, my mom turned around and started the hike back.
At about 13,000 feet- I was ready to do the same. Unfortunately, my dad didn't want me to go back down on my own. So, we found a rock that would help protect me from some of the wind. As my dad and sister discussed the rest of the hike, my brother decided that he wanted to stay with me. Not long after that, the remaining hikers set off again, promising to turn around in 45 minutes.
The rock didn't do much. Only about 15-20 minutes later, neither my brother or I could feel any of our toes or fingers, and legs had begun to go numb. In an attempt to save the last piece of feeling in my thighs, I had my brother sit on my lap. This helped, but not enough. We were miserable; we were freezing and bored and downright exhausted. At that point, I made a decision: we would head down on our own.
The next group of hikers that we passed were kind enough to relay the message to my dad when they saw him. With that way to ensure that my dad didn't worry himself to death, we were off.
Less than a minute later, I realized my stomach wasn't going to let it be that simple. When I bent over to throw up off the side of the trail, the wind caught hold of the barf and whipped it right back into my face. Several minutes of gagging and gasping and throwing up later, my stomach was empty enough to let me focus on the thought of getting back to the car. I set a fast pace, nearly running, only pausing to check behind me for my brother's safety every few seconds.
We made the trip down in less than an hour, and had about a half a mile of slightly uphill hiking to get back to the parking lot. My stomach did not like that. Almost every minute I would have to lay down (finally no snow on the ground!) and rest for a few seconds before getting up and trudging on. When we finally got back to the parking lot, I was so exhausted and in so much pain that I sat down there and fell asleep- not bothering to go to the car.
When I woke up, not that long later, I was treated with another session of throwing-up, this time just water as my stomach was still completely empty. Luckily for me, that was the last time I threw up, but unfortunately, it didn't stop the gnawing pain in my gut the entire hour and a half car ride back to the campsite.
As an athlete, I've had my fair share of injuries and hard workouts. I'm plenty familiar with pain, and I thought that I had a pretty good idea what misery was, but I couldn't have been more wrong. The 6 hours that I spent on Mt. Bierstadt completely reinvented my definition of "miserable". Somehow, if someone asked me to come try to hike a 14er with them, I would, of course, agree to it.
