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I typed this in the shoutbox when we got home, but thought I'd post it here, too.
The night before, when we got back to our campsite, the first people we saw were Joshua and Daniel! Errrr.... They were supposed to be at the Boulderfield, ready to summit Longs Peak in the morning.
Daniel told us the story........ Just before they had made it to July camp (I think they may have gone too fast. They made it from the trailhead to July camp in less than 4 hours... That's 10 miles in the mountains on their first day. Maybe that was the problem, maybe not. We will probably never know.), Joshua started to feel really sick... headachy, upset to his stomach, etc. Daniel offered to set up the tent by himself, and Joshua accepted the offer. That's a clue to how miserable he was feeling. Daniel wanted to explore the area.. Lake Nakoni, Lake Nanita, etc. Joshua just felt like ... well.. doing absolutely nothing. Daniel went off exploring while Joshua lay in the tent throwing up for most of the afternoon and evening. (Which raises the question..... They knew they had to pack all their food and anything with odors in the bear canister and store it away from the tent. What do you do when you are sick and throwing up? I know it has an odor..and so did they. But Joshua needed to lay down... and it would hit too fast for him to get away from the tent very far before... well.. you get the picture.. sorry.)
By the time it was dark, Joshua was feeling a little better and got a pretty good night's sleep. Next morning, he was feeling quite a bit better. The boys ate breakfast and headed over Flattop. Unfortunately, before they started down, it hit again, and worse this time. Joshua couldn't keep anything down, not even sips of water. He was feeling too weak to walk, and terribly dizzy. He felt as if "the world was turning green", like it does before he passes out. Daniel took both packs and headed down towards Bear Lake for help... but then he thought better of leaving his brother alone on the mountain feeling as sick as he was... He met another hiker, left the packs, and they both headed back up toward Joshua. Joshua had felt a little better after resting and started to come down on his own, but didn't know if he could make it much further. This other hiker had a cell phone.. WITH RECEPTION.. (the boys had cell phones, but neither one had reception)... and the rangers' phone number programmed into it. He called the rangers who talked with the boys and got an idea of what was going on. Daniel started to help Joshua down Flattop and they met the rangers about a mile above Bear Lake. The female ranger (Joshua thought her name was Melissa) asked Joshua if he had any objection to her giving him IV fluids. She gave him one bag quickly, then another bag slowly. When Joshua tried to get up afterwards.. he felt MUCH better. The rangers helped him down to Bear Lake where an ambulance waited to take him to the hospital. The EMT checked him out and agreed that he probably didn't need to go to the hospital at that point, so the rangers just gave him a ride back to our campsite just outside of Estes Park. By the time we got back from Black Lake, Joshua had had a nap was was feeling fine.. back to normal! It had to have been the altitude, but this was not the first time they had hiked in the mountains. They have always pushed themselves from the first day on... Why this happened on this trip, we don't know.
Daniel still wanted to summit Longs the next morning, but I didn't think Joshua should try it after his experience the day before. We dropped Daniel off at the Longs Peak trailhead just before 7:00, and I took Joshua and Dave to Ute Crossing and was going to pick them up at Upper Beaver Meadows. Joshua had NO problem, and felt really bad that he missed summiting Longs. Dave, on the other hand, really struggled to keep up with Joshua on the way down.
I walked around up on top for a little while, turned around and went back to the car to drive down to pick them up. I had a wonderful time crocheting while waiting for them.
The views from the little ways I got (probably a little less than a mile) were incredible.
Feel free to play "Name that Mountain" if you want. I'm terrible at everything except Longs Peak.
This picture would have Longs Peak!
...so would this one!
This is..... NOT Longs Peak.
