Grays and Torreys

By Jesse Faith. The Continental Divide in Colorado runs over some of the tallest and roughest country in America and reaches it’s highest point as it crosses the 14,267 foot Grays and Torreys Peaks. Although we have been hiking up and down the Divide for months now, I had for some reason worked this peak day up in my mind to the point that I was fully convinced with the snowy conditions that I simply wouldn’t have the fortitude to make it. Silly to feel that way? Of course, seeing as how I have climbed eleven other fourteeners and have had years of backcountry preparation and experience, but nevertheless that’s how I felt. Fear doesn’t always make sense. Sometimes it just is there.

The night before the climb I reminded myself of the training and experience I have had in order to build more confidence. I reflected back to some of the specific preparation leading to this day. It began with the daddy daughter trips that Dad started with Cody and me when we were each 3 (Cody went to go explore canyon country with Dad each spring and I got to start walking the 500 mile Colorado Trail from east to west each fall). When we really started to grow the CDT idea we took a week long llama trip with the whole family along a section of the trail in Colorado (at that point we were considered using llamas for this trip but we realized that the disposition of a llama compared to that of a burro is like the contrast of a rattlesnake and a puppy so the burros got the nod). We also did four specific trips on the CDT in the year leading up to the departure date - we packed about 100 miles in the Wind River’s of Wyoming, then did two weeks over the winter on the CDT down in New Mexico, and finally did a section of the trail on a ski mountaineering slog. In all we probably backpacked 1000 miles in the few years prior to the CDT launch date. Also, in the months leading up to the trip we would do some sort of preparation activity every day after school ranging from soccer practice, to running 7 miles to town, to walking a six mile trail loop, to peaking the mountains behind the Ranches for a snowboard run down.

So with all that and the couple of thousand miles on the CDT we just hiked I should have felt ready, but I didn’t. I had in the days leading up to the peak day been struggling with a number of things. In the long days of high altitude I tired much more quickly than usual, my stomach was putting up a pretty strong complaint, and for some days I hadn’t been feeling particularly motivated about the whole CDT thing. Funny how sometimes even telling yourself why you should feel ready for something doesn’t quiet that voice shouting that you’re not fit enough, you weigh too much, and you’re in over your head.

I realized at that point that it was going to take more than a self help pep talk to get over what I was feeling and I started by asking my dad for some guidance. He suggested that I follow Jesus teaching to “watch and pray” until I found a sense of inner peace that was rooted in something greater than personal confidence. It took a little while but I came up with a number of passages from the Bible and ideas from Science & Health that I felt really applied to my situation, let them soak into my thought for awhile, and then wrote them down and put them in the pocket of my hiking skirt so I could reach them easily on the climb up.

The next morning when the climb began things were going reasonably well but then we really started working hard on the upper sections where you stop counting miles and start tracking thousands of vertical feet and the wheels came off for me. I felt exhausted. My legs were lead. My stomach was doing flips. My pace slowed considerably. Finally, I asked my dad to slow down. He turned to me with a considering look and after a moment said “we are already going slowly, for the safety of the group you need to go back down or suck it up and keep coming.” He then turned back around and kept hiking. That gave me pause for thought because I knew he was not being mean but was trying to help me and also take care of the family’s safety on a cold day up high. I also knew I didn’t want to go back down and be a quitter.

The notes came out of my pocket. I stopped dwelling on the fact that I was going slowly and decided to focus on the things that God gave me to express - strength, health, and courage were the three main things that I came up with. Almost every step I would repeat one of those words. In not too long, I found I was no longer was solely focusing on my self and my needs, but was paying more attention to the group and supporting others who were tired as well. I was keeping up with dad and the peaks were in sight. What a difference between trying to help yourself and asking God to help you.

We all summitted both peaks that morning and I felt a great sense of accomplishment as I looked down at our route on the Divide as it snaked south towards New Mexico. Accomplishment for making the peaks, yes, but even more so for conquering the fear in my thought and seeing what God intended me to see from the top – more of the truth about myself. “The King’s daughter is all glorious within.”

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 31st, 2006 at 2:10 pm and is filed under Family, Travel Blogs. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response.