This is an old post yet I am reposting for fun-sies as I prepare for an adventure tomorrow: 9/4/25! Formatting and grammar is a bit off, forgive me.
Rocky Mountain National Park:
July 10 – July 14, 2019
Day 1 (Wednesday): 7.8 miles. About 6 hours. We began hiking at 8:20. Terrain was fairly easy. My body was pissed about wearing a pack…something wasn’t right with it. The campsite, named Sunset was beautiful and on the water. We had time to rest, nap and read since we arrived around 2:30. Thankfully we brought hammocks, so our evening became a chill in the hammock. Whaaa? Not like our normal hikes. The boys promised me this hike would be leisurely and not hurried.
Psalm 18, my go to verse for hiking, rang strong in my head as a struggled under the weight and feel of my pack. I also had the words to “Raise a Hallelujah” strong in my mind and I may have even sung when I got far behind where no one could hear.
I raise a hallelujah, in the presence of my enemies, I raise a hallelujah, louder than the unbelief
I raise a hallelujah, my weapon is a melody, I raise a hallelujah, Heaven comes to fight for me
I’m gonna sing, in the middle of the storm, Louder and louder, you’re gonna hear my praises roar
Up from the ashes, hope will arise, Death is defeated, the King is alive!
I raise a hallelujah, with everything inside of me, I raise a hallelujah, I will watch the darkness flee
I raise a hallelujah, in the middle of the mystery, I raise a hallelujah, fear you lost your hold on me!
Thoughts that ran through my head as I hiked…
My thoughts were on the idea that the Spirit of Christ is in everything that I see: ant, spider, tree, rock, lichen, moose, elk, horses, hikers. And that Spirit of Creator God is connecting us all whether we feel connected or not. We are.
Day 2 (Thursday): Everyone slept well, it was not too cold… thankfully. We left camp by 8:20. This is our shortest day, yay! Just 2-3 miles to Granite Falls campsite. The waterfalls are beautiful. We arrived at camp at 9:50, mileage said 3.7. Campsite is very nice and flat. By 10:30 the hammocks were up and the Dads were asleep. I am sunning on a rock. The boys took off to go climb the mountain just beyond the meadow. The rock I was on had very amazing spirit and it was very peaceful and healing to my slightly sore body (although I packed my pack much better and it didn’t hurt as much this day). We later went back to Granite Falls to take more pictures and explore. Amazing and refreshing – so much water. I could have stayed there. Currently, the boys are back and I have claimed the hammock – to read and pray. Tomorrow is supposed to be our hardest day.
My thoughts/words on Thursday while hiking:
Big water. Rushing. Birds far away. Breeze. Transcend.
Granite Falls words: Power. Refresh. Urgent. Run. Cool. Scent. Air.
Day 3: (Friday): My phone logged 10.6 miles. I have a word down to describe today, but I won’t add it here. We are fine, so that is good, what an adventure. I will never forget this day! We woke at 3 am to break camp. The stars were amazing.
Hiking in the pitch black (no moon) darkness was impossible for me until I found a headlamp! We didn’t get far and we had to fill and filter the 15 L of water we needed to hike up and over the mountain. The signs miles back warned the trail was impassable due to the avalanche debris, but other hikers had stated they crossed it and so did we. It was odd, since it was pitch dark. Snow beneath our feet. And downed trees everywhere. By the grace of God after just 10 min or so of careful climbing over and hoping to not break through the boys found the trail again. It would have been cool to see during the day, this was no small avalanche.
At 5:20, we came to our next challenge. A raging waterfall with a broken bridge and even if the bridge was passable there was raging water across it. We checked up and down stream until we realized, we were gonna have very wet feet the rest of this day. The only way across was through. So, we get soaked – for me – to just below my knees. I couldn’t look down or up, I just followed the exact steps of Dave in front of me. He carried my pack….thankfully.
Then, we had the climb. Up 2300 feet. That was a slow haul with stops to catch our breath, but at least by then light out. We must have changed our socks 3 times but with wet shoes it was only to pretend our feet were not freezing. We made it through snow fields and to the summit around 12:15. Somehow I thought this was the hard part….At the summit it was calm and flat and nice, but we could see storms on the way.
Yah, not so much.
So the trail down was steeper than the trail up, so there were more switchbacks and each switchback went across steep, dangerous snowfields. To the point where streams of snow melt were running just under our feet as we crossed them….and then the water ran straight down 100’s of feet. Oh, and it started raining.
The guys decided the risk was too great for one snowfield and we would be better off spider climbing backwards on all fours down the grassy, rocky sections and to just go straight down rather than switch back….so that is what we did.
I am not sure I have ever gripped dirt/rock so hard in my life. I mean, if I had no pack on it would have been different. We each had moment of shear sliding without control. I remember hoping a clump of grass would stop me and it was a baby tree.
Saved by a tree…that is always good. I became very tired quickly and a fatalist at this point, because it was 2 pm and we had been hiking over 10.5 hours. So, I decided we would never make it. I get this way on long days, my positive self just leaves.
Within 45 minutes though, we had found the July campsite. I was so tired I could have kissed the sign and didn’t even care that it was uphill. Up, up we went. Dave immediately set up the hammock and made me sit in it. I was so cold, I had never warmed up from the stream crossing. I felt okay and really not okay all at the same time. I hammocked, ate and was in my tent by 5 p.m. I read and slept and shivered and talked to God a lot that night. At some point Dave had to lay on me to warm me up and I slept.
Day 4 (Saturday): We got to sleep in this day, because it’s an easy hike. Yay! We were slow to break camp. I was to be a 2.5 mile day, but somehow we made it 4 miles. All downhill on a nice passable trail with little to no snow! We left camp at 10 and got to North Inlet Junction by 1 p.m. I am currently writing from my hammock.
Energy and words came to me today from a large Spruce tree and an enormous rock. The rock reminded me of something I had forgotten, it said. “You stop and soak up my spirit. Yet. YOU TOO HAVE A SPIRIT. Matter AND Spirit, that is what you are.”
This may seem, like DUH, to you reading but I totally forgot that. As I hiked, I thought a lot about that and I felt a great acceptance of myself.
I have a spirit.
I am connected to it all not because everything has what I need, but because we all have it.
The “it,” is the unbreakable bond: God.
God, says: I have you.
I wrote this that night:
Rock Spirit
speak
Breathe
into me
I breathe back
Together we LISTEN
To Christ who made us both
Day 5 (Sunday): While I was hiding in my tent reading and writing last night, they made a plan to hike out today. Originally, we were to be on the trail 6 days…so today will be long. I did not sleep well last night due to sciatic nerve pain acting up…so putting on a pack today was – ouch. We started at 8 am and it was almost all downhill or flat. We arrived to the car by 1:30. This was the hardest day for me cuz, I was in pain and only stopping and stretching could fix me. The views were amazing and I talked to my rocks along the way.
The night of day 4, I asked a rock about expectations. I am always beating myself up for having expectations. So I asked the spirit of the rock to heal me of expectations. Is that possible? And is it my heart that expects too much? Please, Spirit help me feel less. The rock did not burst forth with answers. I asked again: Is it possible to live from your heart and still have no expectations? I am just selfish, is that was an expectation is, selfishness?
Silence.
I went to my tent to sleep…but I couldn’t…I thought and thought and waited, I finally decided to ask again in the morning.
So, day 5 morning I walked to my rock, and heard this: “What you call expectations are actually blessings. Gifts. What you think should just happen or be…is really God providing for your every need. You, my dear, are blessed because everything is a gift. See today with those eyes.”
I leave you with another poem:
A thirsty soul steps foot on the mountain
Searching for a way to live…
Spirit rocks whisper
Spirit trees release
Spirit soil cleans
Spirit insects dance
Spirit logs protect
Spirit horses drink
Spirit elk freeze
Spirit Lichens Cling
A thirsty soul steps foot off the mountain
Breathing in hope.
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