I took on the incline...

So, today a friend and I went out to take a hike. One of the things we have talked about doing for the past few months is the Manitou Incline. When we discussed doing a hike today, we thought about doing another one when I thought about the Incline. We agreed that we would try it.

Then yesterday I started to do a lot of research and I started to fear the incline. I really did not think I could do it. I knew there was a bail out point but I didn't even think I could make it that far. When I talked to her last night, we thought we would go and check out the incline. We would decide if we wanted to try climbing to the bail out or look for a different hike in the area. We thought if we need to do so, we could start up and come back down the incline (not recommended by the "friends of the incline").

Well, we got there today and this is what we saw.

 

It didn't look too bad so we started up. I thought that we would make it up to the no trespassing sign (yes, part of the incline is on private property), which was about 600 steps up the incline. We walked...rested...walked....rested. We made it to the no trespassing sign and kept going. It was shortly after that point that I looked back down and thought that there was NO way I was going back down that way. It looked scarier going down that it was going up. 

We got a bit over half way to the bail out section and this is what it looked like when we looked back down the hill:

 

 It is actually a bit steeper than it looks in this photo.It was right after this point that we hit a section where I actually had to start crawl up some of the steps because they were so far apart and quite a big step between the rail road ties. It was also in quite rough shape as a lot of it has been washed away and then reset with rebar and big iron culverts.

The bail out look so far away. I had to stop looking down the hill and just look forward. It helped to count steps. More rest breaks were taken but we kept going. I felt sorry for my friend as I am sure I was slowing her down but finally the bail out was in sight.

This is the last shot on the incline that I took:

We had made it to the bail out section. We met that goal....the one I did not think we would do. Now it was just down the trail to get back to the car. Of course, the trail down was longer than straight down the incline but it wasn't as scary. Here is the Garmin report from the hike:

 

So it was long in distance but it was quite steep. This whole year has been able doing what I considered impossible. Next time I do the Incline I want to go to the top....maybe next year!