Chased by Thunderstorms

...would be my Indian name if I was named after yesterday's hike. (By the way, the carnival was great! I'll be posting about it/uploading fb pics after I get a chance to sort through all the pics I took. Unfortunately I accidentally shot Whit flipping on the trampoline in 7fps in RAW instead of jpeg. Dumb. Anyways back to the hike...)Our plan was to hike to Chasm Lake, 4.2 miles, along the same trail as Long's Peak, a popular 14-er. We chose a hike that looked different than the previous ones, and it was. It was in a different area of the park (further south), which ended up being quite nice because we didn't have to pay $20 to get in the park, AND we got to park right at the trailhead instead of having to take a shuttle. This hike was much more woodsy (less views) the first half, and then the second half was all out in the open above the treeline with views in every direction. It was very steep - we were going up the entire way. It's cool the way all the hikes we did were so different. The first had a moderate number of people, winded through the woods, had views of the mountains at various times, and then the end was through a glacier. The second hike was packed with people, wasn't as steep, had views all along the way, and was basically on a glacier the whole way.I kind of wished we had switched this hike with the last one we did because before that one I had been swimming a lot and was in better shape (and it was really easy). We were thinking it would be our last one this summer though so we wanted it to be a little harder than our others. It was rated "moderate" online whereas the others were "easy," and it certainly lived up to its name. We were being pushed a lot, which was great, until later. (We did stop a few times to rest and take pictures.)
After this waterfall with a great view,we saw this sign that we were entering the area above the treeline. If a lightning storm comes, you are to head back immediately. Afternoon thunderstorms are quite common in Rocky Mountain National Park, and most people start their hikes earlier in the day to avoid them. We were lazy though and slept in a little bit and didn't choose our hike until after waking up, so we didn't make it to the trailhead until 1:30. We never saw anyone else going up the trail with us, we only passed people coming back down. We figured that was because they were hiking Long's Peak, which is longer than the one we were doing.

So, we were above the treeline. We popped out of the forest and out of nowhere VIEWS everywhere!! Mountains on every side and we could see the city down below! I wanted SO badly to take pictures, but once we emerged from the forest we could see dark clouds looming. We decided to push ourselves harder so we could make it to the lake before the rain/storms. We figured we were pretty close. We continued hiking and the trail got more difficult...and we started to feel raindrops and hear some thunder way in the distance. We tried harder to go fast and not take as many breaks. It was tough though because we had to walk up steps instead of a smooth upward-sloping trail. The rocks separating the steps were probably a foot and a half tall each, so each step was difficult. We realized we had only been about 2.5 miles! The weather was starting to get worse, and we kept seeing a lot of people come back down the mountain.Once we got to the top, we saw one last person - an old man who told us the view was just ahead. We could finally see the lake! The only problem was - we were on top of the mountain and the thunderstorms were imminent. I don't even know why we were on top of the mountain - we thought our hike would be low because it was supposed to end next to a lake. At the top we still had .7 miles to go to make it down to the edge of the lake. We rested a little, but not much because we were taking pictures and feeding chipmunks. We decided we needed to hurry up and decide whether we would try to go all the way to the lake or just go back because the storms were definitely headed our way, and no one else was up there with us.

We decided to forget the lake and head back down because that was the safer option. Whit was still putting stuff in his bag when we heard the loudest clap of thunder I've probably ever heard! I mean, we were on top of a mountain with nothing (no trees) around us - the thunder filled the entire sky, 360 degrees around us and from the sky to the ground. So loud and scary. If we hadn't decided we were heading back, we definitely were now!! We started running as fast as we could to try to make it below the treeline before we got struck by lightning. It was TOUGH! Those steps I mentioned earlier we were now JUMPING down, trying to avoid smaller and bigger rocks in the process. I tried to stay under control because it would be worse to fall and crack my head open or break my ankle than maybe get hit by lightning, but Whit realized the urgency of the situation and was going pretty fast.

After half a mile or so, I started feeling so sick. I had just hurried up a mountain (changing 2400 ft in elevation - that's a lot!), eaten a whole bag of trail mix, and not really rested because I was walking around taking pictures. Then it started to rain. By rain I mean it was starting to pour. I quickly took out a poncho and wrapped my camera in it. Whit was already wearing my rain jacket (hah) so I wore the other poncho we had brought. Then as we were running again I got the hiccups. Ohhh how I hate the hiccups. I get them all the time and I normally hate them, but this time was so. much. worse. I couldn't stop to hold my breath because we had to run down to the treeline before the lightning caught up to us! I felt so sick, but Whit made me keep going.

We finally made it back to the waterfall, but we still had 1.5 or 2 miles to go, still going downhill avoiding rocks but trying to run anyway - even though we were both exhausted. By the time we got to the bottom we were both so tired. I almost blacked out a couple of times and probably would have passed out once if I didn't find a rock to sit on just in time. The lightning kept getting closer and closer! You know how you can count between the lightning and thunder to see how far it is? The interval in-between was getting shorter and shorter! I really wished a park ranger was hanging out with us to tell us if it was a better idea to run TOWARDS the storm or just try to make it to our cars as fast as possible. Fortunately as we got lower we got further from the storm. Oh did I mention it was hailing, too?? When we got back to the parking lot we realized how hard it was raining. We were cold too so we just relaxed in the car and blasted the heat for a few minutes. It was a fun adventure but also a scary and exhausting one!