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 That was amazingly easy! I've done the climb and am now at at altitude of just over 9000 feet. I've never been above about 7000 on the ground before, or above about 4000 in an unpressurised aircraft. Since the pressure in commercial airliners is normally similar to that which you would expect at about 8000 feet, this is probably the thinnest air I've ever encountered. I can't tell that there's anything unusual about it though, except that when I took the top off my bottle of lemonade half-way up to relieve th pressure inside, the result was a little more dramatic than I had expected. I normally try to stick to the low ground and have never cycled anywhere near this high before. In the past, whenever I've read of anybody riding over a mountain pass, I've never really believed it was possible but it turns out that it's a piece of cake. There are only two climbs to do today and the one I've just done was by far the bigger of them. I probably did more climbing than that riding from Gloucester to Salisbury. It was like taking a normal few hours of riding on moderately hilly ground and removing all the downhill parts. The result is that you end up at a fantastic altitude. It's very pretty up here. Not at all hot either. Here are some wild flowers. My map says that blue columbines and quaking aspen are common around these parts but I don't think there are any of those in this picture. UTC Time: 18:38, Wednesday 25 July 2007 Local Time: 12:38, Wednesday 25 July 2007 Estimate of longitude: 105° 16' 3.56" W = -105.267655° Estimate of latitude: 38° 9' 43.70" N = 38.162139° Possible error on position estimate: 1000 metres | |