Even though I had a whole day to myself at Spring Creek Pass (before our 23rd meetup), I felt an obligation to stick around for any Colorado Trail thru-hikers. What I hadn’t accounted for, was that many were resupplying in nearby Lake City and returning to trail after having binged in town. I’d still offer soda when they jumped out of their hitches, but the look they made was always a pained, “Oh, please, no…” with hand on belly. The next morning I took leave of my post and headed up to meet Dad on his way in. I reached him after about 3 miles, augmented his morning snack with a can of Squirt, and then we continued down the trail together. Colorado’s summer monsoons had spontaneously returned the prior two nights, so I opted to cook up burgers for lunch while the midday skies were clear. The decision was prescient, as that night a thunderstorm swept in and unleashed a barrage of pea-sized hail—which we observed from within the Jeep, pelting Dad’s tent for about an hour. It passed, dusky skies followed, and I managed a quick dinner of hotdogs and haloumi.
The first come, first served campsite I snagged near Twin Lakes, Colorado (just as the previous occupants were packing up) not only happened to be located right off the CDT (perfect for our 17th meetup), it was also right next to the “South Elbert Trailhead”. A Forest Service webpage described the trail leading up to Mount Elbert as “a great route and a relatively easy hike for someone in reasonable physical condition.” It wasn’t until I read through to the bottom of the page that I discovered that “Mount Elbert is Colorado’s highest peak and the second highest peak in the lower 48 states” (after Mount Whitney of course, which I summitted with my brother at the end of the JMT). At this point my curiosity meter had swung from “might check out” to “must do”. Given my late start—it was noon—I treated the hike as reconnaissance for the following day, but the farther I got, the more I wanted to keep going. The weather held, and I reached the summit around 3:30pm, after climbing over 4,800 feet. Dad arrived the next afternoon in good spirits, we made carnitas tacos for dinner, and then, ominously, ash from a nearby forest fire started falling from the sky.
I was hiking with Dad when we finally learned how to pronounce Berthoud Pass. A backpacking family of 5 informed us with a chuckle, “It’s BIRTH-ed”. The next day, after hiking back to the Jeep while Dad continued onward, I drove ahead to Berthoud Pass, essentially a parking lot at 11,307 feet that would become my home for the next three nights. The following morning, the day Dad was set to arrive for our 13th meetup, I hiked from the parking lot up to Mount Flora—at 13,146 feet, it was a strenuous climb. I went over the top and nestled myself within a rocky windbreak to wait for Dad. He showed up not 15 minutes later, much appreciating the soda I brought, and then we both hiked up to the peak and all the way down to the parking lot. For lunch I whipped up something Dad deemed “casserole-esque”: roasted chicken with rice bound together with one of his poblano corn chowder backpacker meals. (I think he has one set aside in hopes of a repeat performance!) After 26 days on the trail, Dad decided that the following day would be his first zero, so that we could meet up with old friends Casey, Kyle, and their son Tam who drove up from Denver for a short dayhike and picnic. As they placated Tam with the promise of ice cream on the way home, I cribbed the idea and suggested the same for Dad, which we expanded to include a take-out BBQ lunch in Winter Park, not to mention a brief respite from the trail and the busy Berthoud Pass parking lot.
“Are you keeping track of all the dinners you’ve cooked?” Dad asked, both impressed and somewhat overwhelmed by the meals I’d been whipping up. Sure, though it’s usually one of the last things I jot down in my journal, recounting the details of the day, e.g. “Cooked brats w/ tortilla, must[ard], pickles.” During our 7th meetup—the first in Colorado—I wanted to introduce Dad to carnitas. As I slowly coaxed the large, hard chunks of precooked pork shoulder into soft, shreddy goodness with little crispy bits, I got the sense that this was something he was unfamiliar with. I’d already made quesadillas two ways, chicken and “pizza”, so I thought tacos would be a novel vehicle—until remembering that I’d replenished our mobile pantry with burrito-size flour tortillas. Rather than reverting to quesadillas (for which the large tortillas would have been well-suited), I suggested burritos. I’m pretty sure he envisioned me wrapping the carnitas in a “raw” tortilla and callin’ it a day, but that’s not what I had in mind. I set aside the cooked carnitas and wiped the griddle clean. Onto the tortilla went a schmear of refried beans (from the small cans of bean dip that Dad had recently taken a shine to), a handful of grated cheese, two spoonfuls of carnitas, and some cherry tomatoes that Dad had sliced. I semi-successfully wrapped our over-provisioned burritos (realizing after the fact that the tortillas would have been far more pliable had I gently warmed them first) and then plopped them onto the hot griddle to toast the outside, warm the inside, and (I hoped) ensure that they’d maintain their tubular shape. They were amazing. And whether it was his growing “hiker hunger” or simply a newfound recognition of carnitas’s awesomeness, Dad picked away at the leftovers until there was none left over.
Dad told me during our 2nd meetup that he had been trying to figure out some way we could hike together for one of his 2 or 3-day segments between meetups. At that moment, I was not so receptive to the idea because I was still trying to balance all the responsibilities as his “support team”: grocery shopping, cooking during meetups (and feeding myself the rest of the time), seeking out various bits of gear, exploring and hiking on my own, and getting to our pre-arranged meetup locations—on-time. All of which I thoroughly enjoyed, but I had yet to really establish a rhythm or catch my breath. That, and the terrain through which the CDT wove between South Pass and Rawlins was, frankly, pretty underwhelming.
