At the beginning of the trip I was confident, I knew I could do it! We biked about a mile to the base of the mountain and already I was feeling beat down from the heat. Then we saw the pathway, it was incredibly steep, my heart stopped and I looked at my brothers expecting them to be as frightened as I was. But instead they just said “let’s do this!” We started biking, the beginning wasn’t too bad, if you changed to your lowest gear you could do it. But you would still go very slow, all of a sudden there was a hole in the trail, i tried to avoid it but instead I fell off the bike. 

I tried lowering the seat but I was never taught how to do it on these bikes. I just overheard the guide telling my parents about it. I couldn’t get on my bike, I was beyond frustrated, my brothers were far up ahead of me. It wasn’t until my dad came a few minutes later and he fixed the bike for me, he told me to not get frustrated, and just think of how fun going down it will be. I wanted to walk back down the mountain  I was so mad, but my body was just to tired to get angry. Instead in my mind there was only dirty thoughts. I walked the bike up to the stop in the trail, my mom, brothers and guide were waiting for us. 

I didn’t say anything I just followed them up the right path, this time I tried biking again. I did better than I did before and got up the mountain smoothly, but the last stretch was painful. It was steep uphill for 500 feet, I thought my legs were going to fall off. Finally we got there, I let my bike down and walked to the viewpoint, it was the best breeze I have ever felt.  The elevation was 6,220 feet. The view was beautiful we took a family photo and we all got incredible pictures.  It felt extraordinary to be at the top looking at all the mountains in the distance, it was one of the best summits I’ve ever seen.

The way down was a breeze, we zoomed down the mountain dodging rocks and holes, it was a blast. I learned that things can be hard sometimes, but you cant give up. At the beginning of the trip I was mad and grouchy, but after I heard some words of wisdom from my father. I conquered the mountain. It took us two and a half painful hours to get up the mountain, but only twenty easy minutes to get down.

This was a significantly hard mountain, and I’m eager to try more challenges.