This weekend, I went camping at Olive Ridge Campground just outside Rocky Mountain National Park.  In the camping group was Paul B, so it was predetermined that we were going to try to get some karate in.

On Saturday, we ventured up Lily Mountain Trail on a hike with our gi’s in tow.  Unfortunately, the hike was somewhat more demanding than we expected and an incoming thunderstorm quickly caused everyone else in our group to head back down the trail.  Paul B and I really wanted to get to the summit, and since we were probably 3/4 of the way there we wanted to at least try.

We probably made it another 30 minutes down the trail before we came over a rise and saw dark, threatening clouds rolling in and at that moment a large streak of close lightning and gusting winds made us abort our attempt to make it up to the summit.  On the way up the trail, we had noticed a gravel clearing next to some large rocks that we thought would be ideal for kata and we decided that we would stop there and see what the weather looked like.

When we got there, rain was starting to fall but it was holding off just enough for Paul and I to decide that we couldn’t have come this far without doing at least a handful of Sochin, so we started in.  Around kata #5, the rain was starting to let up but the wind still persisted but by the time we made it (briskly) to kata #10 the sun burst through the clouds.

This gave us enough incentive to knock out 10 more kata, bringing the grand total to 20 Sochin at around 8900 feet.  Honestly, my body is still fairly conditioned to do Sochin and it felt like a rest compared to the jarring, knee-rattling hike that we had undergone up to that point.  A 45 minute descent down the trail wrapped up our minor karate adventure, and no one was worse for the wear.

If you want to know relatively where we were, we had made it up to the “Lily” in Lily Mountain Trail on this topographic map.  The Sochin location is around the sharp bend at the northernmost point on the trail.

I do have to say, doing Sochin on a mountain in a rainstorm felt pretty darned epic.

Tasha and I got back to Westminster after two days of camping at Great Sand Dunes National Park and Preserve.  It was my first camping experience and I had a great time!  Sleeping on the ground was pretty good for my back, I got to climb around on the highest sand dunes in North America, and we had some really great people to camp with.  Teddy had a good time too, he was very excited at all the new terrain to scope out.

As I write this, Tasha is preparing the pictures.  Hopefully I’ll have some of my favorite ones posted up soon, including the three of us guys at the top of the 750 ft tall dunes!

On the way back from the park we took the scenic drive back home which took us briefly through Fairplay, CO which contains a recreation of historic 1800’s South Park City, CO.  This was the inspiration for the South Park cartoon, so I had to at least get a picture of the sign!