Friday morning I started hiking at 7:30 am. There were quite a few people on the trail to Guadalupe Peak by then. The peak stands 8,751 feet tall and from the campground it’s approximately a 3,000 ft elevation gain and 8.4 miles round trip. I was pretty happy with my pace, arriving at the summit 3 hours later. It was a beautiful day, warm, sunny and no wind. I lingered on top, had lunch, scattered a little of Nancy, took photos and then finally headed down around noon. The summit is large and actually has lots of hang out space, so even though there were probably 20 people at any given moment, it didn’t seem crowded. While I was on the summit, I checked messages and learned that my Aunt JoJo, who is 100 years old, survived a hip surgery repair, to fix a previous hip surgery. So it was a great day. She had been on my mind hiking up and I was a little worried about her. But she’s a Chiuppi and were pretty tough.

There were tons of people heading up as I went down. As I was reaching the trailhead, just about 2:30 pm, a woman with 2 kids was just starting up. I asked her if she was planning to go to the top and she said yes. Unbelievable, even if she kept a good pace, 3 hours up and 2 hours down, which beats the park service estimate of 6-8 hours round trip, she’d be lucky to arrive back at the trailhead before dark. I told myself, it wasn’t my concern and moved on.

I hiked down with a young woman, Grace, who was a solo hiker from Austin. We met when she saw me trying to take a selfie and asked if I wanted her to take the photo for me. We had a nice time chatting. She was born in China, and came to the USA when she was 20 and eventually became a US citizen. So we had lots to talk about. She headed back to her Air B&B in Carlsbad and I settled in with a steak, mashed potatoes and a few glasses of wine, I was to lazy to cook vegetables.

Saturday morning I felt pretty good, so I decided to hike to Hunter’s Peak, 8,368 feet, and 8.5 miles round trip. I headed up the Tejas Trail at 9am. After the first couple of miles my legs started getting pretty fatigued. I didn’t make the summit of Hunter’s Peak, but found a nice, large flat clearing on the last shoulder, about a half mile from the peak, had lunch, laid down and took a short nap. The nap refreshed me mentally, but didn’t do much for my legs. I finally made it back to the trailhead around 3:30pm, just in time to see a rescue party form up and start up the Guadalupe Peak Trail with a stokes litter. A couple of hours later the team came down with the victim. From my distant vantage point she seemed to have some sort of ankle injury because she hopped up from the litter onto the bench seat in the parking lot and eventually hobbled into a car. 

Seeing the hoards of people, many who look like out of shape pedestrians, heading up the trail this morning, I’m not surprised. But at least it was not me in the basket. The campground is full tonight, but quiet. I’ll head out tomorrow, Sunday morning, drive to Junction, Texas, and stay in the city park there for free. Monday I’ll drive to Rainbow’s End in Livingston to vote on Election Day.

                                                     Me on the summit 10/30/2020

                                            Nancy & I on the summit January 30, 2005

The monument is dedicated to all the plane pilots that crashed into the mountain before radar was invented.

My nap spot, with the Hunter's Peak in the background

                                           

Happy Halloween and don’t forget to set your clocks back tonight

Tight lines and safe travels