How the Tree Army Saved America

It was pitch dark, but no less a relief when alpinist Kelly Cordes and I finally stumbled onto the East Longs Peak trail in Colorado’s Rocky Mountain National Park. We had humped up this wide, well-maintained path eighteen hours earlier, at four a.m. Cutting onto the Chasm Lake trail at dawn, we had scrambled to the base of Chasm View Wall, climbed the Directissima route, hiked up to the Chasm View rappels, rapped down onto Broadway, then climbed the east face of Longs Peak. We would have been down before dark if we hadn’t been caught behind some slow climbers. Out of respect, we didn’t pass them. Instead, we shivered for a couple hours waiting, then moved left to another crack system and climbed to the top. We rapped the Diamond Face at dusk.

Kelly and I had done three wall routes in a day, but that was twenty years ago, and this time, after just two long climbs, I was