Rockies in July

[Or, Taking off last minute for an epic long weekend!]

Tomorrow Ryan and I are heading up to the motherland! My cousin is getting married on Saturday and we’re going up to my beloved Inglenook for a few days of hiking, family reunion-ing, and internet-free livin. Here’s me, last August, admiring a choice piece of mossy bark on top of the Mesa, the largest flat-top mountain in the world. A lovely place.

We’re also planning on climbing Longs Peak on Monday before heading back home to Texas. Longs is one of the 53 peaks in Colorado over 14,000 feet elevation, and part of my Life List – climbing all of the state’s fourteeners. I’m excited to attempt the ascent and I know it’ll be a grueling challenge, so I’m most excited to get on the mountain-side and take in the sheer beauty of it all. I’m working on staying in the present moment and not focusing too intently, tunnel-visioned, on simply completing an ascent. It’s so much bigger than that.