I will be the first to admit that the boys’ adventure up Mt. Lemmon made me SUPER jealous. DOUBLE SUPER jealous even, because about a month ago we supported our buddy John in the Imogene Pass Run in Colorado, moral support, not physical. I wanted to run something too! I was suffering from a bad bad case of ROMO. Reality Of Missing Out (yep, made that one up. Much more severe than FOMO).
Well, I think I barely finished my sentence to Grit in throwing out there a little running adventure idea of our own before she was jumping up and down and we were hugging. Oh my goodness yes! Let’s run Tuolumne to the Valley! 17 miles! Up and over Clouds Rest! We’re doing it! And bonus idea by Grit herself: let’s have the boys run back up to fetch the car. Brilliant! Dang I love this gal.
15 years ago and exactly one year before Silas was born, we celebrated Manu’s birthday with a hike up to Piute Pass fueled by Schat’s Bakery’s pullaway bread. This birthday celebration shared similar themes. Silas and Manu started the day opening presents in a lovely campground outside Bishop near the Buttermilk Boulders. We tore down camp, headed into town for gas, water and a mechanic to help figure out why the tire on our behemoth kept losing air. Next was a stop at Schat’s for pullaway bread, which Manu very heroically waited to tear into while we drove north and then west into Yosemite National Park via Tuolumne Meadows. The pullaway was devoured at Tenaya Lake. We then meandered our way down to The Valley, set up camp in Upper Pines, and then hiked over to Curry for pizza and beer. Too stuffed and tired, we decided to save the cake for breakfast the next morning.
Yes, the “hike” for pizza wasn’t quite on par with Piute Pass, but just you wait. More hiking (and then some!) to come on this trip… 😉
Van is in the shop for waaaaay longer than expected. The trip must go on!!!
SO embarrassing
But on the bright side… will fit 4 people, 4 crashpads, a week’s worth of food and clothes, and all our totally not-optimized-for-car-camping camping gear (dumped directly from the van into this behemoth less than 12 hours before departure)
The big event that Paul and Manu have been training for all summer has come: Trail running from the desert base of Mt. Lemmon (Tucson) to it’s mountain forest summit, a 20 mile endeavor with around 7,000 over 8,000 feet of elevation gain.
Well folks, mission accomplished. The boys crushed it.
It’s been a heck of a summer. Somehow four months has whipped right past my eyes, a blur of house projects, play dates, teenage social life obligations, gymnastics, gymnastics and more gymnastics and way too much work. Plans to head up to the cool pines of Flagstaff for a day of bouldering kept getting canceled, or postponed. Tired and grumpy seemed to be tainting our usually psyched and happy household. We needed to get out, just the four of us. Needed to wake up in the van, hike out to some good boulders and pull hard, head back to camp and make some simple food, climb into our sleeping bags all sweaty and dirty, wake up and do it again. And if we really wanted to pamper ourselves, throw a big ‘ol epic hike on top of all that. Yes, this is exactly what this family needed.
That’s it. We’re going. And we’re leaving Friday. Or one of us will most definitely spontaneously combust.
Ivan sends! Unnamed v2 on Floorpie Roof at Priest Draw
Silas working out the beta on Bat Roof, v3
Planning out the pampering portion of the trip
Kids and I headed off for Plateau Point via Bright Angel Trail from the South Rim of the Grand Canyon
While Paul, in training mode for running up Mt. Lemmon FROM TUCSON with crazy German buddy Manu in about a month, runs down to the river from the South Rim via the South Kaibab trail and then up the Bright Angel trail to meet us
