The kids first 14er- Mount Sherman and Horseshoe Campground

With only 2 weeks of summer vacation left, I decided to fit in a 14er with my kids. They are in really good shape right now and I knew they could do it. I believed it would build their self-esteem to do something that not many kids or adults can do. I showed them a video of people hiking 14ers and they got really excited, and said, "Can we do it now?' So, I did some research and found the easiest 14er in Colorado is Mount Sherman. It is a 2 ½ hour drive from Castle Rock, so I decided that we would camp the night before. This allowed us to wake up super early the next morning and immediately start the hike.

Con solamente 2 semanas de vacaciones de verano, decidí hacer a 14,000 pies de caminata con mis hijos. Mis hijos son muy atléticos y sabía que podían hacerlo. Yo creí que podría ayudar a construir su autoestima y hacer algo que no muchos niños pueden hacer. Hice algunas investigaciones y encontré que lo más fácil de hacer en Colorado es el Montaje Sherman. Montaje de Sherman está a 2 ½ horas de nuestra casa. Decidí acampar así que podíamos salir temprano por la mañana. Mis hijos escalaron la montaña entera y estoy muy orgullosa de ellos.

We drove up to Horseshoe Campground in Hartsel, Colorado. The campsites are first come, first serve, so I let the kids pick out their favorite campsite. They have never been able to pick their site before and they thought it was so cool. Our site was among huge Engelmann spruce and Bristlecone pines in the San Isabel National Forest. The kids had so much room to explore!

The girls immediately made friends with a little girl and started making fairly houses with her.

Connor made friends with a 10 year old boy and they created lots of rock and stick games.

There was a fire ban, due to all of the wildfires. We were told that we could get a $1000 fine and tons of court costs if we started a fire. I wasn't going to take that risk!

It did get very cold at night, so instead of sitting around the fire, we read books and went to bed very early. I woke up the kids at 6am and we ate oatmeal and bacon. We then headed straight to the trailhead. The road was very rough and I was so thankful for my new Suburu that went over those rocks like a champ. The kids had so much fun bouncing around in the back of the Suburu.

(The trailhead)

The first section of trail is very steep, but not technical at all. The kids took the most breaks on this section. It was hard to breathe and very steep. Thankfully, I had let them pick out their own special candy at the store and this came in handy for this section.

Once we came to rocky sections and rock climbing, the kids got really excited. Connor ended up dropping his favorite Darth Vader sweatshirt somewhere in the rocks and we were never able to find it.

They even saw old mining equipment from the Old Dauntless Mine. They thought this was so cool! There was even a house that the kids got to explore a bit.

Then, we came to the hardest section of the 14er, a narrowing ridge with somewhat loose rock. I panicked and almost turned us back. The idea of my kids and dog climbing these rocks freaked me out! They were determined and we could see the flag at the summit.

There is no way we were turning back, so I just didn't look at their feet when they were climbing. Carly told me she had to poop and there obviously were not bathrooms, so we left a little surprise under a rock. I will never forget that!

Connor made it to the summit first and next was Carly. I got lots of comments about Carly such as, "That little one is sure something!" and "She looks a little small to be climbing such a big mountain" We hung out on the summit for about 30 minutes and the kids playing with the rocks and snow.

A man gave us a postcard of all the 14ers in Colorado and told us, "Congratulations!" Connor has decided that he is going to hike all of them.

Going back down was pretty fun. Connor ran into a geologist that explained many interesting things about the area and all of the other mountains. I am still in awe that these kids climbed 2,310 feet with no complaints. Connor talked about his chest hurting a couple times and my hands ballooned up at elevation, but it quickly went away.

We we were done, we were exhausted. We started to drive away from the trailhead and I noticed that Lola was still standing on the trail. Haha! We were so exhaused that we almost forgot our dog!