Amazing Views, A Whole Lotta Rocks... and I'm Still Sore!

Our latest adventure was the best one yet! I'm sure I'll say that about next weekend too though, lets all be honest. Friday Ion and I drove about 20 minutes south to the Columbia outlet to get some hiking and camping gear since we didn't exactly come to Colorado completely prepared for the great outdoors. Ion's exact words were "being outside is expensive." Oh. So. True. So we went to the outlets hoping to find some good deals. We lucked out and found some great deals, we each left with dri-fit shirts and hiking boots. Ion got a great hydration pack but it needed a bladder so we went out to REI to pick one up and I found a camelback for an ok deal but I've been needing one all summer so I sucked it up. Best. Purchase. Ever. Seriously.

You can see my awesome backpack in this shot taken not even half way to the top of our hike. Try to hide your jealousy. Or you could just go to REI and get one too. But that wouldn't be very original because, you know, I'm the first person ever to buy this not generic at all camelback and take it hiking.

Ok so on to the fun stuff. New hiking boots need to be broken in and what better way to do that than a seven mile hike? Not the brightest idea but we got lucky again and not a single blister. It's the small things in life, right? So Saturday morning started off like this...

Einstein's coffee and headed towards the mountains, perfect. We drove over to Boulder to pick up Kenny and tackle Bear Peak, the second highest peak in Boulder Mountain Parks at 8, 461 feet. This was by far our most challenging hike yet, but it was oh so worth it. It was rocky and STEEP! Pictures never seem to capture how steep or high something is but here is a photo I snapped coming back down. (Also please excuse the fact that my camera switched to back and white mode for half of the pictures. It was an accident, I wasn't just feeling nostalgic.)

This is looking straight down, you can kind of see Kenny and Juneau at the bottom for some perspective.

And here is Ion climbing down. I was last, because I'm slow going down rocky paths. I have a history of falling when just walking on the sidewalk so I tend to be extra cautious when walking down a steep incline where rocks can move out from under your feet.

And just so you get the point, a few more shots of the path.

The views on the hike and then at the top were just incredible. When you get to the summit, there are is a rocky peak that you scramble out onto and there are 360 degree views of Mountains and even Denver in the distance. Words don't describe, but not to worry I took a ton of pictures!

This is my favorite of us in awhile, so much fun and so beautiful!

Juneau enjoys the scenic views.

I was going to write something nice about Ion here but don't want to make anyone-myslef included-puke.

These were the rocks you climbed on to get to the summit

The only casualty of the day, my Higher Achievement water bottle with the best moose sticker (sorry Leslie).

I am currently in the market for a new cooler than life moose sticker so let me know your favorite locations for moose paraphernalia. Because who doesn't love moose. Especially tie dye ones.

The trip took about 6 hours and we were practically drooling when we sat down at a local brewery. Burgers and blackberry wheat beer were exactly what we needed! (I feel that Ion would want me to point out that I was the only one drinking blackberry beer. I don't remember what he and Kenny had but I'm sure it was something much more manly like a stout or porter. Their loss.) Either way there was red meat and beer so all was right with the world.

Next week we go about 6,000 feet higher than we did this hike, expect lots of pictures and overuse of the words awesome and amazing. Don't say you weren't warned.