He was living west of Denver with his wife, three kids, rabbit, cat, and dog. More about the Sam the dog in a bit. I had contacted Rob the previous year to see if he would be interested in hiking Elbert with me. He agreed, but New Mexico had to come first. Fortunately, he was still game a year later, but as we were approaching the last false summit, somewhere above 13,000 feet, he might have harbored a mild tinge of regret.

I had done smaller prep hikes for Elbert for months, including about 6,000 feet of elevation work in the two weeks prior to the climb, but in retrospect I think regular jogging served me as well as anything else. The hike is long and sometimes steep, but the pace is steady and the footing good, mitigating the kind of fatigue brought on by lunging over rocks, as in New Hampshire. The challenge is the altitude, and that’s where the jogging regime paid dividends.

Rob lived at about 7,500 feet. I spent Wednesday night at his house after my late flight to Denver and the next day we drove to Breckenridge, at about 10,000 feet, and stayed with friends of his. We got up at 3:45 AM, hit the trail by 5:05, and made the summit in about 3:45. Not bad for aging weekend warriors and one East Coast lowlander. Rob’s friend Rich joined us for the first part part but then peeled off to gather mushrooms.

We hiked below treeline by headlamp, and by the time we emerged from the brush and reached the log bench—a trail landmark where it smelled like everyone stopped to pee—dawn had broken and the colors were spectacular, as was the weather, since showers and thunderstorms had been forecast all week.

The pictures of the trail I saw online do not capture its steepness above treeline. You take your time and plod on. We spent about 15–20 minutes on the summit watching dogs play in the stale snowbanks and taking pictures: the things one does on summits.

It was a glorious moment, and the hardest hike I had ever done: 4,700 feet of elevation gain beginning at 10,000 feet. And I had made it up and down without ever feeling bad.

That night, as we toasted our accomplishments at a nearby pizza joint, Sam the dog found my bag of trail food and scarfed down a tin of salted almonds, my entire cache of green chile jerky, and a bar of 70% cocoa dark chocolate.

After a $350 trip to the emergency vet in Denver, Sam was fine. Sorry, Rob, and thanks hor hosting me. Go Monarchs. Wahoo-wa!