Long Round Trip on Pikes Peak

So….already a little behind with keeping up with the blog!  I'll try to be better once I get caught up:)  Pikes Peak was on the agenda today and it was the first longer hike of my sabbatical.  The day started early around 6:30 am.  The trail was nice, starting through the trees.

After making my way up through a clearing, the trail headed to Devil's Playground.

The entrance to Devil's Playground.

After passing through Devil's Playground, the trail passed by the paved road that leads up to the summit (yes, you can drive to the summit).  The trail actually ended up coming near the road a couple other times as I made my way up.  The final portion of the trail took me through some larger boulders, which is pretty normal on these mountains.

Making my way to the top.

The trail became a little harder to find from here...so the main goal was just to hike up.

The first view of the summit is somewhat disappointing....given that I had just hiked 4 hours and there were about 100 people up there that had just driven 20 minutes to be in the same place!  I spent a little time at the summit wondering through the gift shop and seeing all the views.  Definitely a different experience than most summits I have been on.

Parking at the summit, for all the non-hikers.

It was also at this time I realized I am still having problems with my Garmin eTrex.  It said that I had walked uphill 27 miles in the past 4 hours, which was clearly not true.  So I decided to give the Garmin a nickname...Sharptooth.  For those of you that don't know, Sharptooth is the name of the t-rex in Land Before Time.  Seemed fitting since Sharptooth (the t-rex) was super mean and annoying, and my Garmin was also now being super mean/annoying.  Plus the Garmin already has "t-rex" in its name (if Sharptooth ever decides to start working better, the nickname will likely change....to Chomper, the nice little t-rex in later Land Before Time shows).  I reset Sharptooth and made my way for the bottom.  The descent on this one seemed to take a long time since the trail had quite a bit of vertical distance to cover.  But all-in-all, another great day on the mountain.

Almost back to the car!

Hike Summary
Date:	Friday, June 21, 2013
Mountain:	Pikes Peak
Hike Start Time:	6:37 AM
Summit Time:	10:48 AM
Hike End Time:	2:41 PM
Miles:	13.80
Elevation Gain (feet):	4,022