Vegas Baby!

Dec 1st – Dec 6th, 2010

I flew from Portland directly to Las Vegas, NV. I was there for a number of reasons: to run a marathon and tick another state off my list, try and PR and qualify for Boston (by running faster than a 3:15:59) catch up with my friend Angela I met while traveling through Spain in the spring of 2009. Angela and I stayed in contact for the past 18 months, and she had been inviting me to come out sometime for a visit, so when I found out the marathon was Dec. 5th I made a trip of it and combined it with my trip to Portland Oregon.

I arrived late Wednesday night and picked up a rental car and headed over to Angela’s only about 10 minutes away. When I arrived I met her father, brother, aunt and uncle. We spent the evening catching up. Since Angela was working until the weekend, I headed west for the mountains near Las Vegas (I mean what else I was going to do in Vegas for 2 days?). My goal was to climb to the top of Mount Charleston (11,918 ft or 3633m). I was on the trail head around 9AM, and began the steady ascent, because my boots had fallen apart on Mt. Hood I was left to climb with only my trail shoes. I did not think it would be too bad as it was the desert and there’s not much snow right? It’s an 8.5 mile hike each way; the weather was clear and cold. I was hoping to summit and then camp for the night and return back the next morning. During my climb I only saw one other person on the trail and he was planning to go only half way up. I continued on my way and the higher I got, the deeper the snow became. Eventually my feet got wet and the snow got deeper and deeper. There were some snow shoe tracks (that were probably 4 or 5 days old) I was following but eventually those stopped too and I could barely find the trail. At this point I was at around 10,600 ft and decided that if I kept going much longer I would get frostbite if I was not careful, so I decided to turn back, and setup camp around 10,000ft on a small landing that stuck out of the side of the trail. I crawled in my tent around 3:30PM and start to warm back up. I spent the next 16 hrs mostly in my tent crawling out on my frozen feet only a couple times to take photos and use the rest room. The wind was minimal; the views of the city were amazing. I had plenty of food and water and was starting to warm back up. I passed the time by sleeping, watch 7 or 8 episodes of “How I met Your Mother” on my PSP (Hey I never watch television at home so it’s OK) and reading. The next morning I had breakfast and put my shoes back on (luckily I had stuck them in my sleeping back so they would not freeze) packed up camp and headed back down. I was back at my car before 10 AM, so I headed for Red Rock Canyon.

From Red Rock I made my way back to Angela’s and met up with her. We went out for dinner that night with my friends Chad and Janice, from Spartanburg, SC who happened to be in town on business. Later n we went to a couple dance clubs and walked the strip a bit. The next day Angela and I visited the small town of Boulder City, it then onto Hoover Dam. Since I have visited the dam before we walked across the new Bridge that just opened in Oct 2010.

Bridge Wiki

Saturday night I made Angela dinner and got to bed early. Sunday morning was the marathon Angela woke up with me and drove me down to the start line. The race went well and I stayed on pace until around mile 19 or 20 when I started to slow down. I ended up finishing 3:19:24, still no Boston qualifier but a good time nonetheless and my 2nd fastest ever. Having finished my 3rdmarathon in 6 weeks I am ready for a break from marathons until at least January or February. Chad, Janice and Angela were all at the finish line waiting for me. We spent the rest of the day celebrating hitting the casinos and staying out late. Early the next morning I flew home. It was a great trip, with great friends and good fun. I look forward to returning to Las Vegas to see Angela and to climb Mount Charleston when I am better equipped.

Photos: Complete Album