Questionable Decision Making

11,500 ft - WTF??Friday, July 4, Brother's back yard - There are moments when you shouldn't make life choices. At a barbecue in the sunshine while drinking several beers is one of them. Unfortunately, these are often the times when one makes decisions based solely on relaxed inhibitions and increased hubris.

So when my 24-year-old nephew, member of the US Army Rangers and just back from his tour of duty in Iraq suggests to me that I should go hiking with him and a couple of his army buddies, I undoubtedly ignored my subconscious as it screamed "are you out of your fucking mind!!", and said "sure!"

So Sunday morning comes along and we get ready to go. I am informed at this point that we're going to a trail called the 'Twin Sisters'. Undaunted, I get the boys to pile into my car and head for the mountains. We arrive at the trail, where the posted elevation is 8,500 ft. I walk over to the trail map to see what's in store.

I shouldn't have.

The picture of the trail shows it going up ... and up ... and up ... and then more up. Up to 11,500 ft over 4 miles.

My nephew pats me on the shoulder as he walks past and off we go. The best I can say about this is that I made it. I actually did better than one of the boys, who grew up at sea level in Florida. The view from the top was quite stunning. Unlike anything I had ever seen before because, frankly, I have never been stupid enough to climb above the treeline before. We would have stayed up there longer except, just after arriving at the summit, a thunderstorm headed our way.

As you can see in the picture there wasn't much cover, so we hightailed it back down to the treeline just before the torrential downpour. We cowered for a while under an overhang, waiting for the rain to slow down.

cute & cuddly, I think not!!This is when the sabertoothed marmots tried to corner us. One of them came at us from the front and another went around to flank us. Being brave army types, we all ran like little girls down the trail. I have since read that marmots tend to be curious and friendly, but we weren't taking chances. The trek back down was less taxing on the lungs but my knees, never good at the best of times, took a severe pounding. Of course, it was raining as well, so along with getting soaked, we got to descend across slippery rocks, with a long, painful-looking drop to our right. Yeah, pleasant.

I got back to my apartment (the walk from the parking lot to the apartment was one of the worst experiences of my life) and fell on the couch. somewhere around 8PM I crawled to the bedroom. Fortunately, 6 months of working out have made it so I am only slightly sore this morning.

Note to self: DON'T MAKE DECISIONS WHILE DRINKING!!!