Today I ran up Mount Lady Washington. I left the Longs Peak Trailhead at 7:00 and headed up the trail. That early it was already overcast and there was a slight chance of thunderstorms. I kept an eye and ear out for thunder, rain, and lightning, but I never saw or heard anything.
I got up to the Chasm Lake overlook (about 3.5 miles in) in just under an hour and a half. There were a couple people on the trail, but not many. I did pass some other trail runners already on their way down. Very cool!
I started to head up towards Granite Pass, as my plan was to run to the Boulderfield and summit Lady from the west slopes. However, due to the iffy weather, I decided the quickest way up would be to hightail it up the northeast slopes rather than running the extra mileage. I got to the summit at 9:15. There was lots of nice scrambling on class 2+ terrain to the top. Again, because of the iffy clouds, I took a couple of quick pictures and then began my descent.
I started going down the west slopes towards the Boulderfield because it was only 500 feet of scrambling as opposed to 1500 on the other side. I figured once I got to the trail I could run pretty fast back to treeline. I descended about 400 feet and then decided to contour along the base of the mountain to hit the trail higher up. After side-hilling for a bit, I scrambled down another 100-200 feet and met the trail right at Granite Pass.
From the pass, I decided not to summit Battle Mountain because the weather was still not clearing. I ran right back down the trail (stopped at the loo at the Chasm Lake Overlook -- what a luxury when spending an entire morning in the mountains!) and got back to the car at 11:00 on the dot. A fabulous day! Overall: 8-11 miles (wish I had the GPS), 3800', 3:56.
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