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| Hank surveying his domain |
I guess I should preface this by explaining first what a block break is. My school is a bit different from the traditional semester schedule; we study according to what is known as the block plan, which has us taking only one class at a time for some three and a half weeks, meeting every morning from nine til noon. After this period of time, we have five or so days of grandeur, adventure, and folly, known as a block break. Block breaks are what CC (Colorado College) student's live for and are nothing short of epic. This post will detail my first block break, our "Welcome to the Rockies", and how we barely escaped with our hides (metaphorically speaking).
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| Cock-slapped in the face by the beauty of aspens in bloom |
The idea for this trip began when we realized the sad truth that none of us had a car. What do? Well, I've hitchhiked in Israel a bit (albeit to my program's chagrin), so we figured we'd just hitchhike out of town. Initially the plan was set so that anyone could come, and we'd all hitch across the state independently or in groups and meet up in the Sawatch mountains, hike some badass peak, and revel in our glory. Game day came around and it's just Hank and I with packs on our backs and our thumbs pointed west towards the mountains. Oh well, two's a much easier number for this sort of operation. We began going west out of town and have no trouble at all catching rides all the way down US Route 24, over Ute Pass, behind Pike's Peak, and into the mountains. Our last ride of the day gave us a lift a clear hour out of his way to drop us off at a remarkable beautiful campsite on the upper portion of the Arkansas River, a little north of Buena Vista.
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| Star Peak looms over Independence Pass |
Day two, moving a bit slower, we worked our way out of the Arkansas Valley and ascended the breathtaking Independence Pass—quite possibly the most beautiful drive in the world. Our ride dropped us off a little over 12,000 ft on the continental divide, as we ran into a group of kids from our school who were biking from Colorado Springs to Aspen. We got a lift into town with them, shot the shit for a bit, and then caught a bus to Snowmass. From there we caught a lift a few miles down a jeep road into the White River National Forest, to the trailhead for Snowmass Peak. Our initial plan was to hike in to a basecamp that night, summit the 14,000ft peak in the morning, and be out of there Saturday night. What actually happened was a bit different. Psilocybin hit us real hard, and within half an hour of taking off on our afternoon hike, I was convinced we were going to get eaten by grizzlies and Hank became a cocoon inside his sleeping bag, and that was that for the hike. Thank god I managed to rig up the tent...
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| Mt. Daly in the White River National Forest |
In the morning (felt like eternity), we packed out, caught a ride back to Aspen, and then caught a lift clear through to Red Rocks Amphitheater to hike the hills for Big Gigantic and set up a tent in our ride's yard. Next morning, we met up with some friends coming back from Boulder, and caught our final ride home to the beautiful Colorado College. I learned a lot that trip. Never before had I experienced something as truly terrifying as being bear fodder, and never before had I felt as free as I did working our way through the Rocky Mountains, one ride at a time.
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