LAKE CITY, Colo. — There’s no such thing as an easy fourteener unless you drive to the top of Pikes Peak.

Even in the comfort and safety of your car, you can get altitude sickness if you aren’t adjusted to the rarified mountain air.

Of course, some of the 67 14,000-foot peaks in the contiguous United States are harder to reach than others. Six years ago, my wife and I summited California’s Mount Whitney, the highest peak in the lower 48 states at 14,505 feet.

John and Karen Werner at the summit of Redcloud, a popular peak located near Lake City in southwestern Colorado.

Climbing more than 6,000 feet from the trailhead, we got the most out of our 24-hour day permit by taking 20 hours to hike 22 miles. Too bad we had to waste the other four hours sleeping.

Maybe it took Karen and I six years to recover from that marathon, but we wanted to try another fourteener before we got too far into our 50s. We set our sights last weekend on Redcloud, a popular peak located near Lake City in southwestern Colorado.

Why Redcloud? We had always heard it was a beautiful hike featuring a long, flowing mountain stream, a wildflower-covered alpine valley and a challenging final ascent to the peak.

We had planned to hike the mountain in 2002, but on the day that we woke up in Lake City to start the climb, we were gasping for air because of forest fires covering the area. Like my friend Buddy Gilchrest always says, “the mountain will always be there.” So we decided to try it another time.

We’ve done enough high altitude hikes to know that you can’t drive from near sea level in Waco and climb a fourteener as soon as you set foot in Colorado. It usually takes us a week to adjust to the thin air for a successful hiking experience.

So we started with a short hike to the high dune at the Great Sand Dunes National Park. Then we drove to Pagosa Springs where I found three great hikes, including a six-mile round trip to beautiful Fourmile Falls, an eight-mile hike along a stretch of the Piedra River and a nine-mile round trip to Quartz Lake.

The hike to Quartz Lake was especially stunning as you climb through a mountain pass to an alpine ridge that opens up to surrounding mountain views of the Continental Divide.

During the early part of the hike, we ran into a guy sitting on top of a 15-foot rock.

“Just saw a cub with a mama bear,” he informed us. “What do I do next?”

“Sing camp songs,” Karen said.

So Karen and I marched through the woods loudly singing songs she learned in her 4-H days:

“The other day I met a bear, out in the woods away out there. He looked at me, I looked at him. He sized up me, I sized up him.”

The roughest part of the Redcloud hike is a half-mile stretch near the top that features switchbacks with loose rock.
John Werner / Waco Tribune-Herald

Bear got the message

Our singing was so obnoxious that we must have chased off the cub and mama bear. I think our ear-splitting singing on the trail has probably saved us from some bear encounters over the years.

With a big thunderstorm moving in, we had to turn around before we reached Quartz Lake. Lightning is one thing you don’t mess with above treeline, so we hiked back safely to our car before the storm hit.

Reaching near 12,000 feet on the Quartz Lake hike, we felt we were acclimated enough to try Redcloud a few days later. We just didn’t know how difficult it would be to get to the trailhead.

I read about the Redcloud hike in three different books, and none said the last five miles to the trailhead were too rocky for a car to travel on. So we woke up at 1:30 a.m. last Friday and got in our Altima to travel the eight miles from our campground to the trailhead.

The first three miles were fine, but then we had to maneuver across ruts and rocks that needed a high-clearance vehicle. Two miles from the trailhead, we finally reached a rock outcrop that was too high for our car, forcing us to turn back on that dark, cold night. Even turning around was dicey since it was a narrow, winding road with a 1,000-foot drop into a river on one side.

We made it back to our campsite about 4 a.m. disgusted that our plans had gone awry. Karen suggested renting a jeep and trying the road again the next morning.

“So we have to wake up at 1:30 again?” I grimaced.

I realized renting a jeep was our best option, so I slept off and on most of the day and rose early the next morning. The jeep easily made it up the rough road, and at 3:30 a.m. we were the first hikers on the trail that climbed about 3,600 feet to the summit.

Early start

Most people start the nine-mile round-trip hike to Redcloud Peak at the break of day, but Karen and I know we’re usually the slowest people on the trail. For two hours, we hiked with our headlamps through the forest along Silver Creek with a full moon illuminating the mountain ridges.

After a grueling ascent across loose rock, John Werner hikes the final stretch to Redcloud Peak.
John Werner / Waco Tribune-Herald

When daybreak came, we found ourselves in an alpine valley featuring an array of white, red, lavender and yellow flowers. It’s easy to see why Colorado picked the lavender Columbine as its state flower.

The first of many hikers — who were mostly in their 20s and 30s — passed us as we hiked through the alpine valley. It was a guy with a white shepherd who was trying to summit his 20th fourteener since he started four years ago.

“I’ve noticed people with dogs always move faster,” I told him later on the mountain.

As we moved toward the ridge of the alpine valley, an old hippie couple passed us. With his long, flowing white hair, the guy looked like might have seen Jimi Hendrix at Woodstock. They were obviously fit as they breezed by us with no problem.

When we reached the 13,000-foot ridge, we chatted with a young guy and a fit older guy who had combined for more than 40 fourteeners. I told them that everybody was passing us, but the young guy enouraged me, “It’s not a race.”

We had hiked nearly four miles, but the hardest stretch was in front of us. For the next half-mile, we had to switchback through loose rock along a steep side of the mountain. Parts of the trail veered only a few feet from a steep dropoff, so you had to watch your step the whole time.

Catching our breath

Karen kept thanking me for waiting for her to catch up, but truthfully I needed to stop about every 100 yards because of the steepness and altitude. We finally reached a false summit that had a little smoother surface before heading up the final stretch to 14,034-foot Redcloud Peak about 9:30 a.m.

I wish I could adequately describe the sweeping panoramic views from the summit. You could see the breadth of the snow-capped San Juan mountain range that included the 14,000-foot Uncompahgre and Wetterhorn peaks to the north and Mount Sneffels to the west.

To the east, Pyramid Peak in the Elk Range rose like an old Egyptian monument among the many surrounding mountains. It was almost too much beauty for your eyes to take in.

“You just can’t beat the San Juans,” one hiker said.

I felt so good that I thought I’d take a shot at summiting 14,001-foot Sunshine Peak, which was a little more than a mile south. I thought I could get to the summit and back in two hours, but it was a lot rockier than I expected. After hiking about 45 minutes toward Sunshine, I saw some dark clouds moving in as I headed to the final pitch toward the peak.

Playing it safe on mountain

It’s hard to judge exactly what mountain weather will do, but I decided to play it safe and get back to Karen at Redcloud. It’s always wise to start heading down from a mountain peak about noon to beat the afternoon thunderstorms. Before we left, the old hippie guy congratulated us for summiting the peak.

Pyramid Peak is one of the many 14,000-foot summits that can be seen from Redcloud Peak.
John Werner / Waco Tribune-Herald

We had to take it slow through the loose rock as we descended from the peak, but we made good time through the alpine valley. We ran into a couple of biologists who were doing a butterfly experiment, but the funniest moment of the hike was yet to come.

Two young guys who had started their hike at noon came bopping up the trail. One was carrying a pack and the other was armed with nothing but a sand wedge.

“We want to drive the ball off the peak and see how far it goes,” the guy with the pack said. “Eat your heart out, John Daly.”

We convinced the guys that the summit was still a long way, and they decided they’d try their golf experiment another day. Perhaps, they’ll bring a driver next time.

With a threatening sky above, we made it back to our car at 3 p.m. about 11 and a half hours after we had started. We were tired but felt a sense of accomplishment after finally summiting Redcloud.

Like the hiker told me, “You just can’t beat the San Juans.”

jwerner@wacotrib.com

757-5716