Max Swartzentruber joins annual trek to 14,000 feet

By Jeff Yoder
Posted 8/10/22

For 10 of the last 11 years, Andy Swartzentruber has spent a bit of each Labor Day weekend at an elevation of 14,000 feet. 

A trip to the summit of Gray’s Peak in Colorado with three …

This item is available in full to subscribers.

Please log in to continue

E-mail
Password
Log in

Max Swartzentruber joins annual trek to 14,000 feet

Posted

For 10 of the last 11 years, Andy Swartzentruber has spent a bit of each Labor Day weekend at an elevation of 14,000 feet. 

A trip to the summit of Gray’s Peak in Colorado with three friends in 2011 has turned into an annual tradition for Swartzentruber, who did his 15th “14er” hike this past September. 

“The views from the summit are amazing as is the scenery along the way,” Swartzentruber said. “I really enjoy the physical challenge. Pushing yourself mentally and physically can be extremely rewarding.”

Number 15 was a special one for Swartzentruber — his second climb with one of his sons. 

Max, who will be going into eighth grade at Mid-Prairie, made the trek up Mount Huron with Andy on September 5.

“It was harder than I thought it would be,” said Max, who would finish sixth out of 83 junior high boys at the RVC cross country meet the following month. “It was really hard on my quads, hamstrings and calves.”

The hike started early in the morning around 6:00 a.m., with a goal of reaching the summit before noon — to avoid any afternoon thunderstorms. 

Two miles were added to the typical hike in and the hike out, as the road to the trailhead was washed out and impassable. The group started out carrying plenty of snacks, gatorade and water.

“I had a CamelBak on,” Max said. It’s a pouch that’s like a backpack, but it has water in it — and every two minutes I took a sip.”

The air was cold when the journey began on Sunday morning. 

“We started off with a lot of layers,” Max said. “You want to think smart, because you can always peel off layers if it’s too hot. But you don’t know how cold it’s going to be, so I brought a coat, a jacket/sweatshirt, and I had shorts and tights on and sweatpants over that.”

As the day went on, a lot of those clothes ended up in Andy’s pack. 

“It was about 30 degrees when we started, but then it’s like 80 degrees by the time you summit,” Andy said. “The range in temperature is crazy.”

At the summit, Max didn’t have too much time to enjoy his accomplishment before the elevation started to affect him. 

“When I got to the top, I felt fine,” he said. “I was up there for like two minutes and then I got a little dizzy and lightheaded. Then I got nauseous and we knew I had to head down because that was a sign of the start of altitude sickness.”

After snapping a few pictures at the summit, Andy took Max back down about 1,500 feet where he had a snack and felt fine as they waited for the rest of the group.

At 14,003 feet, the Huron Peak is one of the shorter 14ers in Colorado. Andy has already taken on the highest of the 58, which is Mt. Elbert at 14,433. 

A trip to San Luis Peak in 2017 was a special one — with his son Emmett, who was just 10 years old at the time. Andy’s first 14er was Mount Sherman, with his wife Jane before they were married, along with her aunt and uncle who live in Colorado. 

He had climbed a pair of 14ers already when the Labor Day tradition began. There have been some years where the group has made a pair of summits in one week. 

“If the distance between the peaks and the elevation change between the two is enough, it qualifies as two summits,” Andy said. 

One year, they traveled the Sawtooth Ridge between Mt Evans and Bierstadt, which was the most difficult hike for the party to date. 

“It’s a jagged kind of knife’s edge that we had to navigate to get from one to the other,” he said. “That’s as difficult or as dangerous of an ascent as we’ve done. Typically you’re on pretty stable ground. It’s more of an endurance thing than feeling like you’re going to fall off the mountain — that’s typically not the feeling.”

Another year, his group attempted to summit Mt. Lincoln after conquering Mt. Democrat, but the weather would not cooperate. 

“We only ran into snow one time, and it was bad,” Andy said. “ It was at a point where we couldn’t see 15-20 feet in front of us, and at that point we turned back.”

This year may be the end of the Labor Day trips for the Swartzentrubers, as both Max and Emmett are busy with cross country in the fall. The hikes might move to the summer, some summits might be repeated, and soon nine-year old Leo will be ready for the challenge as well. 

But there will definitely be more Swartzentrubers on Colorado trails towards 14,000 feet.