La Plata 4

The Basin

Target: The Lip of the Basin
We gained enough altitude to see the lip of the basin but La Plata was still not in view. We pick a notch in the lip as our target, it is still a long way away and up. The steepness and duration of this climb was beginning to wear on me. There were portions that were so steep that my middle-aged south Texas legs would only carry me five or six steps, then I would stop for a brief 30 second rest. And resting was really no rest at all because of the energy expended to maintain my balance on the steep side hill...

We trudge on and finally make it to the final pitch of our target - the lip of the basin. I took this picture right before climbing the final pitch. The Colorado wildflowers above the treeline rival those of the springtime in Texas.

Wildflowers along the creek...

As we make it up and over the lip of the basin, we realize it is not the real lip of the basin. The real lip was a little higher up. We also realize that rocky ridge that is now in view does NOT look like the Southwest Ridge of La Plata. No panic yet because sometimes the two dimensional pictures do a poor job of representing what mountains really look like, there may be hope for us yet.

A picture of my feet, too tired to walk any higher, but...

Here is a video that I shot between the "false" lip and the "true" lip of the basin. I've mentioned it before and I'll mention it again, this is one of the most beautiful hikes I have been on. Every direction is stunning!

We make it to the crest of the real lip to find this beautiful mountain lake!

Beautiful Alan Lake!

The only problem with this beautiful lake is that there is no lake in the basin of La Plata's Southwest Ridge, we hit the wrong target...If you watch the video closely you will see two men. Turns out the hikers that we were following were no hikers at all but fishermen...

La Plata 3

"Where's the trail?!?!?"

Nic, Josh, Caleb on Democrat

One of the most pathetic, heart-wrenching, and funny things I've heard as a parent happened on the hike to the top of Mount Democrat a few years back. Nic, Josh, Caleb, and I were doing this one together, it turned out to be 12 year old Caleb's first 14er summit! This warm summer day was fairly cool for us South Texans and the wind was howling up on the mountain. As we made our way up the steep talus, Caleb wandered off the trail a few feet to wipe away the fluids that were pouring out of his eyes and nose. He leaned over with his hands on his knees gasping for air (we are accustomed to rich, thick gulf coast air). He looked up and was a little disoriented and said with a combination moan/wail/cry,  

"Where's the trail?" 

My heart broke for him, I have ruined his young mountain climbing career and probably have scarred him for life. A mere two seconds after his lament, he eyes the trail and nonchalantly says,  

"Oh, there it is..."  

My how things turned.

Back to this day...As we watched our leaders struggle up the steep shoulder that hopefully leads to the basin below the southwest ridge AND as we realize that there was no trail marker at their point of entry, Nic and I began to lament,

"Where's the trail?!?!?"

We decide to stay in the valley for a while hoping that we come across a trail marker and/or a view of La Plata Peak. We walk west another quarter of a mile...

The unavoidable ascent...
It became clear that we were not going to find the trail marker AND that we were moving farther away from the La Plata. Our next decision - we must go up, hoping that our trailblazing skills will get us in view of La Plata. If we could see it, we could salvage the trip.

So up we went, rapidly. This turned out to be the longest steepest thing I have ever climbed. After about 500 feet of elevation gain we stopped for a break. My thighs and calves were already cramping and we were only a third of the way up.

Like all mountain pics, 2D doesn't really depict the scene...

 Despite legs and lungs that were struggling mightily, this was an incredible place to be!

View to the east from the treeline...

View due south from our spot at the treeline...

After 15 minutes of basking in this beauty, it was onward and upward! Easier said than done...

La Plata 2

The North Fork of Clear Creek Trail

Old School Navigation
Most hikers these days use a Smart Phone with GPS capabilities or a specific APP to plan and execute the adventure. Take four steps to the WNW, turn slightly to the right at these coordinates - 9°25'N 98°30'W - and pause for 23 seconds before taking 47 steps to the ESE. Of course, the Smart Phone delivers the instructions via a sultry female android voice. The technology of today is pretty amazing and leaves nothing to chance.

We don't navigate this way...we study paper maps, read multiple trail reports, collect data in our minds, memorize pictures of cairns and trails, and then fly by the seat of our pants. Nic says it best in his thick Algerian accent, "I see the top of the mountain and I walk towards it." To date this has worked out well.

Following...
the two guys from the truck seemed perfectly logical. Their truck was parked at the beginning of a clearly defined trail AND we could see them in the distance hiking towards the southwest. They HAD to be going up La Plata via the Southwest Ridge. We discarded all of the data previously collected and followed...

The North Fork of Clear Creek Trail...
is one of the most ruggedly beautiful places I have tread upon. The trail meanders through the valley between
the creek and forest, jagged peaks tower above us on all sides. We enjoyed soaking in the beauty on this stroll for about a mile. And though we enjoyed the leisurely stroll, there was a nagging feeling inside each of us that something was not quite right. The data previously collected and recently discarded mentioned that very early in the hike there is a steep ascent, the data never mentioned a leisurely stroll...

Questioning Our Leaders
We eventually lost sight of our leaders. Not a problem though because of the well marked trail and the certainty that La Plata Peak would soon be in view. Our leaders reappeared, not on the trail ahead of us but up and to our right, struggling up a steep hill (see photo below). The nagging feeling intensified as we began to wonder if our leaders were lost...

Click to enlarge

La Plata 1

From the Winfield Cemetery

Decision

Guys having fun on Democrat!!!

One of our family rituals/traditions is to vacation each summer in Colorado. This started in 2009 and has happened every year since in one form or another. And each year, the guys (Josh, Caleb, Nic, myself) try to climb a mountain or two. I have developed a criteria for selecting each year's mountain:

1. proximity to our vacation spot (normally Salida)
2. June (still snow up high) or July (afternoon storms)?
3. my personal physical condition at the time of vacation
4. length of the trip to and fro, or for the less poetically inclined, up and down

This year, as in year's past, we are staying in Salida. From Salida we have easy access to most of the Sawatch Range and we haven't climbed most of the Sawatch. Check #1. We are traveling in the third week of July, afternoons storms almost a certainty. Check #2. For a number of reasons, I am only in mediocre condition this season.  Check #3. So because of the afternoon storms and my sedentary lifestyle in the months preceding, we need a mountain with a short round trip.

And the winner is, La Plata Peak from the Southwest Ridge!

Once the decision is made, time to do the research on the mountain. Reading route descriptions, trail reports, and studying pictures...more on this later.

Anticipation...
sets in after reading dozens of trail reports and viewing hundreds of pictures! The thrill of hiking in the back country - the testing of mind and body and the experience of seeing rugged and expansive beauty - is unmatched for me. It appears that the steepness of this trail and the beauty of the North Fork Clear Creek Valley will satisfy both!

Anxiety...
tempers our enthusiasm...Tuesday night's weather report predicted a 60% chance of storms for Buena Vista and Leadville, La Plata lies right in between. Also, as we stargazed on the deck of Silver Ridge, Nic mentioned that he had a very uneasy feeling about Wednesday's adventure. Nothing specific just an ominous feeling. To make things more ominous, he said he was going to tag the summit regardless of rain, sleet, snow, lightning or thunder...hoping that there is not a repeat of last year's Tabeguache's stormy adventure.

Winfield Cemetery
Our climbing team was reduced to Nic and I this year, Josh had to work in San Antonio and Caleb's in-grown toenails were bothering him.

Our diminished team left Salida at 5:15 Wednesday morning, headed north through Buena Vista towards Leadville and turning west on Chaffee County 390 Road. We were on this road a few years ago going towards Huron, this morning we drove past the left fork that goes to the Huron Trail Head and continued on to the Winfield Cemetery and the La Plata Trail.

We park the car in the pines just below the Cemetery. Reading the memorial sign reminds us that, though beautiful, this country is very inhospitable.

At 6:15am, we began our two mile march to the official Trail Head. About a mile in, a 4WD truck carrying what appears to be two hikers passes on the rugged road. About a mile and a half in, we make note of a curious fork in the road that meanders to the right...

Sermon on the Mount Prayer List

- 5.3 – help me to be humble today

- 5.4 – help me to be aware and mournful about the condition of the world today

- 5.5 – help me to be meek today

    5.6 – help me to crave true righteousness and help me to learn what this is

- 5.7 – give me an opportunity to be merciful towards someone today

- 5.8 – help me to be pure in heart and mind today

- 5.9 – give me an opportunity to be a peacemaker today

- 5.10-12 – help me to live in these ways today; give me peace and patience as I experience the inevitable disfavor.

- 5.13 – remind me of the usefulness of salt, remind that salt must come into intimate contact with what it is to affect, and remind me that you call US the salt of the earth!

- 5.14-16 – help me to live in these ways today and remind me that I represent YOU!

- 5.17-20 – help me to better understand your ways, bring someone into my life to guide me, and help move about today in harmony with your kingdom

- 5.21-22 – help me to curb my anger in all situations and help me to not use my words to destroy

- 5.23-26 – I confess that there are broken relationships in my life, help me to make reconciling these my number 1 priority

- 5.27 – help me not to lust today

- 5.29-30 – help me to take my failings seriously and not rationalize them away

- 5.33-37 – help me to simply be a man of my word and help me to live consistently so that my word has credibility

- 5.38-42 – help to forsake the normal ways of the world – revenge, protecting what “is” mine, and giving just enough to stay out of trouble. Rather, give me strength to NOT seek revenge; help me to NOT go to painful measures to protect what “is” mine because I want to believe that everything is yours anyway; and help me to love and serve others extravagantly today.

- 5.43-48 – give me an opportunity to love an enemy today, real or perceived

- 6.1-4 – give me the humility to serve others without an agenda and to deflect all glory to YOU

- 6.5-7 – help me NOT be a religious showboat

- 6.10 – help me to be COMPLETELY subservient to YOUR will

- 6.11 – help me to be CONTENT with what I have today

- 6.12 – forgive me of my sins and give me an opportunity to forgive someone that has sinned against me

- 6.13 – give me the wisdom to recognize temptation and flee from it instead of flirting with it

- 6.24 – help me to worship YOU only today and not the false of god of the economy

- 6.25-34 – help me NOT to worry today; rather, help me to appreciate the sustenance YOU give – use the birds of the air and the flowers of the field to remind me of this

- 7.1-5 – help me to NOT judge others today; rather, remind me to use the energy that I consume in doing something reserved for YOU to work on the sins of my own life

- 7.7-8 – give me strength, wisdom, and reminders to ask, seek, and knock!

- 7.12 – help me to take the Golden Rule seriously, and let it rule all of my interactions with others

- 7.13-14 – give me courage to NOT follow the crowd but to pursue life found on the narrow road and through the small gate

- 7.24-27 – give me wisdom, strength, and courage as I build my foundation

Fear

September 6, 2012
frightened to the point of paralysis...

not me, but a friend...

The most frightened I have ever been in my life was standing on top of this cliff. This cliff is a few miles north of Buena Vista, Colorado, not far from the Arkansas River. The top of this cliff is roughly 120 feet from the base. The wall of this cliff is mostly concave so what one sees is 120 feet of air, no wall, and a hard rock base. I stood on the top of this cliff, near the edge, for at least 20 minutes. My knees "smote one against the other," my stomach was high in my throat, and my mind raced with the possibilities.

There was a guy at the top of this cliff with me, he encouraged me with trite sayings like, "just jump," "it's all good," "I've got you," etc. I could not jump, I was paralyzed with fear. This fear caused me to ignore the words of this guy...this fear caused me to imagine a 120 ft. plummet to my death...this fear caused me to ignore the reality of the equipment securely in place...this fear caused me to imagine only failure, despite the fact that several of my friends had successfully jumped off of this cliff.

not me, another friend...and the guy, and the gear

I finally jumped...and I don't know what the catalyst was but I jumped off of this cliff. And it proceeded just like the guy on top said it would. And it went by so fast that the things that caused the fear were completely absent from my mind. And it was the most exhilarating experience of my life. And as soon as I landed on terra firma, I disconnected from the ropes and immediately headed back up to the top of this cliff to do it again. The second time on this cliff was better than the first because my fear had been conquered. I wish I  could remember what caused me to jump that first time...

Knowing...

My favorite epistle (everybody has one, right?) in the New Testament is 1 John. I have read and studied, studied and read 1 John many times. There are a couple of things of note about 1 John:

1. It was probably written to the church(es) in Ephesus, a very polytheistic city in the first century. I'll tell you why I think this is of note later on.
2. In the TNIV translation, the English word "know" or "known" appears 41 times.

There are two Greek words in 1 John that are translated "know" or "known:

• Ginosko (25 times) - basically means to come to know, not just intellectual ascent but knowing something intimately...in fact, the same word is used for the union of a man & a woman in a sexual way. Check out Matthew 1.25 & Luke 1.34, it is used this way in the story of Mary. KJV fans may remember the Genesis 4 use of this concept - "And Adam knew Eve his wife; and she conceived..."
• Oida (the other word translated know) - basically means to perceive, or to have seen...here's an Adam and Eve example (I made this up): Adam was standing in the garden and he noticed (knew-oida) someone was there with him, this someone was similar to him but much more attractive. One thing leads to another and Adam eventually "knows" (or ginosko) Eve...

There it is; one word basically means a growing, intimate knowledge and the other means to perceive or see. I have wanted to teach or explain this for some time now but could never figure how to teach it without usual the sexual idea of knowing. Through an unfortunate series of events, I have come up with the perfect example...

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I know (oida) that my car has a cooling system...a bunch of parts and liquid that are intended to keep the engine at a functional temperature. I have even looked under the hood and seen some of the parts that are components of this cooling system. One day I noticed (oida) that the temperature gauge was pegged out on the hot side, not a good thing. I knew (oida) that something was wrong. I decided to repair it myself to save some money. This decision would require me to "ginosko" my cooling system.

Now four days later, I have disassembled and assembled my cooling system three times with one more on the way. And I am proud to say I know (ginosko) my cooling system - the radiator, the water pump, the belts, the hoses, the thermostat, the thermostat housing, and all of the peripheral parts that must be removed to get to the parts that I need to know. I might even try to do it blindfolded because I know it so well...

This knowing was a process though...it required me to get under the hood, to get close, to take apart, test, tighten, adjust, get my hands dirty, and go back to square one more than once. In this process of knowing my cooling system there have been a few failures and a few successes with the ultimate success yet to come. But now I have an intimate, experiential knowledge of my car.

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Here are the things John wants the Ephesian church to know (ginosko):

• from chapter 2 - we can "know" him if we keep his commands; we can "know" we are in him if we live as Jesus lived; we can "know" him who is from the beginning; we can "know" the Father; we can "know" it is the last hour; we "know" that everyone who does what is right has been born of him.
• from chapter 3 -  the world does not "know" us; the world did not "know" him; we "know" we will be like him; we can "know" what love is; we can "know" how we belong to the truth; we "know" God is greater than us; God "knows" everything; we can "know" he lives in us.
• from chapter 4 - we can "know" God, or not; we can "know" that we live in him; we "know" the love God has for us.
• from chapter 5 - we can "know" that we love the children of God; we may "know" him who is true

We can know. We can have this growing, experiential, intimate knowledge of God; of life in him. This is important to know - in a 1st century, polytheistic world where there were many things offering grace and peace, blessing and security. It is no less important in a 21st century world where there are many things offering grace and peace, blessing and security. 

What do you know? And how do you know you know it?