Hiking Manitou Incline the Hard Way

The last few times I've done the Manitou Incline, I've taken Danielle along. She just turned 4 a couple weeks ago. Sometimes she hikes quite a long ways and other times she doesn't make it very far. The best she's done going up is to the Barr Trail cut-off which is about 2/3 of the way. I think that's quite impressive since that's a ways up the steep section. She might have made it a little farther but she cut her leg on a stake trying to pull herself up one of the really big steps. She has hiked all the way down Barr Trail from the top of the Incline but that time she had slept most of the way up.

As hard as it is, I'd rather carry her up in the Kelty pack than going down the trail. Between her and the pack, it's about 45 pounds and my knees get hammered on the way down. Last week she slept for a while on the way down. She was bouncing all over even though I was trying to walk carefully which strained my knees more than normal. See my post from a month ago to see her fast asleep in the pack.

The middle part of the Manitou Incline is owned by the Pikes Peak Cog Railway and they have a No Trespassing sign. They used to have it where it somewhat blocked the way but somebody kept destroying it.

Danielle stops for lots of drinks and snacks.

Some of the steps where ties are missing are nearly as high as Danielle.

The pasque flower is one of the sure signs of spring in the Pikes Peak region even though we still get snow storms. Each week we've been seeing flowers higher up Barr Trail.

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