Ahhh, Texas. There's so much more to the Lonestar State than the Dallas Cowboys, oppressive humidity, and frequent executions of the mentally retarded. It's also the home state of our good friends Brianna and Ryan Smith, who decided to take a break from their twice-weekly hurricane evacuations and spend Labor Day weekend in lovely Aspen, Colorado.
Bri holds a special place in my heart, as we ran our first marathon together back in 2001, and she was the first to encourage me that I had some potential as an endurance athlete. Ryan is a fantastic guy, LSU grad, and the current pilot of my old Cervelo P2K triathlon bike.
Early Saturday morning, we headed out to hike to Cathedral Lake, a 2,000 foot climb and 3.5 mile round trip. Here's the happy Texans' at the beginning of the climb, which started at an elevation of 9,800 feet.
The views, while not painted in their fall colors just yet, were still beautiful. A waterfall here, river there, valley bottom here, towering peaks there...
As we started to ascend above tree line, the surrounding valley opened up. I believe this is a view of one of our Elk Mountain 14ers, Castle Peak, which I skied back in June 2006. I could be mistaken, however.
There's one last steep climb before the trail flattens out and offers hikers a choice of heading to either Cathedral Lake or Electric Pass, named for its frequent and violent lightning storms. * Since the forecast was calling for storms after noon and the skies were already growing ominous, we decided Cathedral Lake was the better play.
Here's the happy couple posing before our well-earned destination, Cathedral Lake. Set in the shadow of Cathedral Peak at 11,800 feet, the water is clear as the Caribbean. Soon after this tranquil photo was taken, Ryan causally tossed several sticks of lit TNT into the lake, blew it to all hell, and harvested the now dead, floating fish from the surface one by one. He referred to it as fishing, "Texas Style." Good times.
With the water temp hovering around the mid-fifties, only one in our group was willing to make the leap.
After a rapid descent, we headed up Independence Pass for a quick tour of the Grottos, seen here in the first week after Lauren and I moved to the valley. A quick stop at the Devil's Punchbowl, a popular Aspen cliff-diving area, and we were on our way back downvalley for some well-deserved rest. Saturday evening we had a delightful dinner at the Riverside Grill, which as I explained to Bri, was founded by James Riverside in 1971, and has nothing to do with its location adjacent to the Fryingpan River. **
Sunday morning, we took the bus up to the Maroon Bells, the most photographed mountains in the United States. The morning was hazy and overcast, so we decided to get a closer look and go for a hike.
Here's my lovely bride and I enjoying a Sunday morning atop Maroon Lake.
After about an hour of hiking and with a steady rain developing, we reached our destination, Crater Lake, which was discovered by old man Crater in 1945.*** No pictures, sadly, as the weather quickly grew worse and we had to hightail it back to Maroon Lake. Monday morning, Bri and Ryan left us, and the Nitti family looked to catch up on some much-needed rest. I hopped on the couch, and Maci, as she'll do from time to time, climbed up as well. Only this time, she decided to make her bed in a rather, uh...uncomfortable manner.
* may not be accurate** most definitely not accurate
*** absolutely, without question not accurate
