Saturday, July 23, 2011

Hike & Bite, Bike & Wipe




On the Saturday before we returned home my dad and I went on a hike, while my mom and brother went trail biking. We went on the same trail my mom and brother hiked a few days previously. We had to take the gondola from Mountain Village to Station St. Sophia to get to the bottom of the trail. St. Sophia is perched at 10,540 feet above sea level. The trail is actually a ski slope called “See Forever”. The first hill of the trail was very steep, and we had to stop ten times for Dad to rest (and sometimes me, too). At that elevation, the oxygen level is 30% less than what we are used to down at 500 feet above sea level. After the first hill, there was a flat part where we took pictures of the beautiful scenery and meet some people from Tennessee who took our picture. Then, gasping, we struggled up an even steeper hill, only to be disappointed because we were not at the top of the mountain yet. After a while we finally got to the top of the mountain, which was at 11,925 feet. There, we saw a ski lift with a broken control panel and a destroyed control shack. We also saw a restaurant that was closed – it probably is only open during the ski season. My dad took quite a lot of pictures (probably too many). On the way back, I fell down and skinned my knee, because the pathway was really steep and had lots of loose rocks. It took half the time to go down that it took to go up. The hike took three hours. Once back at St. Sophia, we rode the gondola down to the town of Telluride, and had lunch at Smuggler’s restaurant. I got ice cream at the Sweet Life ice cream parlor. Back in Mountain Village, we met up with mom, Grammy and my brother. We learned that my mom fell off her bike and cut herself on her leg, ankle and arm. She had the accident while walking her bike down a hill. She is still sore from it. After all this excitement, we went back to the house and rested.

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