Don’t be afraid. Just prepare yourself and try it.
Why Hiking Boundary Peak ?
In 2012 I made it to the summit of Boundary Peak. The highest peak in Nevada. But it wasn’t my intention to hike this peak. Why did I do it ? August 2012, just a few months after my divorce, I wanted to have som time for myself. It was the first time I went to a holiday without my childeren. My goal was to enjoy the whole holiday and hike Mount Charleston near Las Vegas, Nevada. I practice a lot. Hiking with a backpack with extra weight in it and with my hiking boots. But Boundary peak is almost 5 hours drive from Las Vegas, so who go there ?
I am a Hertz Gold member and I got some kind of SUV car which was very suitable for off road driving. So I was looking to have a nice off road trip and I went to Boundary Peak base. And while I was there I thought, well, I prepared myself to hike a mountain. Why not try the highest peak of Nevada ? I arrived in the evening and slept in my car. There we some others and it was nice at the bbq.
The Hike to the trail
In the morning we would get up at 5:00 and start walking at about 5:30 am. It took an hour walking before we were at the beginning of the trail ! if you have a four wheel drive you could drive, but we like the extra walk. 😉
What I learned several years ago from an elderly man, is that you hike your own pace and take it slow. As long as you can reach the summit, it doesn’t matter if it is a good time or not. You made it, that counts ! The begin of the trial is kinda flat, so it’s easy to walk and have a 5 minute break at least every hour.
Here we go.
We started with a group with 8 persons. The first hours were not that hard. Just a walk in the meadows. And then I saw the summit for the first time. It was impressive. Before the really nice climb, two persons stay behind. Slowly we walked to the summit. There was a lot of loose rocks and stones which made hiking difficult. There was a part were we had to scramble on top of loose rocks. Pretty Cool
Now it was time to walk your own pace. Sometimes I stopped often and sometimes I could walk a lot. Depending on my legs and oxygen in my lungs.
Yeah ! The summit.
At about 1:00pm we reached the summit and had a nice rest there. It is possible to reach another summit which was in California, but we passed. We were glad we made it to 4007 meter!
During the walk down I had a little bit of headache. The beginning of altitude sickness. Because we walked down, it was just a half hour I had some kind of headache.
Back at the grassland we saw some wild horses. Very nice to see those elegant animals in the wild.
At about 06:30pm I reached my car and said goodbye to the nice “strangers” which made it possible that I made it to the summit ! The walk up was hard and so is the walk down ! Don’t underestimate this.
What about my diabetes ?
Enough food and water are essential. For a “healthy” person and certainly for me. Drink a lot water (Almost a gallon) and I had 2 bottles with Gatorade. This drink got a lot of carbs, and because of the long walk you need it. My “food” was a lot of energy bars and trail mix. Due to the fact that you burn a lot of carbs, I had to make sure that my sugar level wasn’t too low. You need water and food for the way up and also for the way down. This is very important.
I informed the persons from the group that I had diabetes and what to do and what not to do when my sugar was too low or too high.
At that time I already had my Omnipod and I didn’t do any bolus during the day.