Thanks for the further information.
I hope you don’t mind if I ask one more question. (I googled around and now know what talus/scree is..watch out Jeopardy!)
My question...I keep seeing references to “14ers”. I see that it a group of climbers but also refers to the group of mountains that are 14,000 feet.
Is my assumption correct that 14ers doesn’t refer to the difficulty of the climb? That there are different levels on the same mountain?
I only ask because the OP at some point (on this thread or the other one) stated that the original owner had said Missy had completed 6 14er climbs. So she could have been on an easier climb?
Like I said, I’m not a climber and appreciate your knowledge. I have been to Wolf Creek. My car was not appreciative at all of the drive.:)
Here is a link that will provide you with answers. There are 55 peaks and the goal of many weekend climbers is to ascend all of them. For some, it may take as long as 20 years, doing several or more every summer.
http://climbing.about.com/od/mountainclimbing/a/Fourteeners1.htm
Living in NM in the 80’s and 90’s I hiked and climbed several high peaks, but NM does not have any 14,000 feet. The one fourteener I was going to climb in CO was a relatively short hike from a four-wheel drive road. Along with friends, I had my black lab/golden retriever cross with me which went well until the last hundred feet or so which required a rock scramble. He put up such a loud ruckus when I left him behind and started to scramble that I turned back and waited down below for the others to return.
Yes, 14er refers to both the mountains in Colorado that are over 14,000 feet in elevation and also refers to a loosely-affiliated group of people that hike them often. There is no direct correlation of 14er to difficulty (unless you are not used to the altitude) - this link - http://www.14ers.com/routes_2.php - sorts them by difficulty of climbing them. The most difficult ones may require some technical climbing with ropes. Also, there can be different routes - Longs Peak the easy way is still a long, strenouus hike, but if you climb the sheer east face known as the Diamond, you have some bigwall climbing to do at altitude.
Missy probably had previously been on Class 2 14er climbs that were all trail, there are many of those. But that might have been when she was younger as well. 10 years old is starting to get up there for a dog, and from the report from the rescuer that someone posted, her pads were not toughened up. A dog is like a human - if you don’t exercise it, it gets out of shape, and you just can’t drag it across Sawtooth without conditioning it first - and especially an older dog. The guy was probably just a self-centered idiot who was more driven to hike the route he wanted instead of noticing that the dog was not up to it.