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Is altitude a problem? Like, do you find yourself out of breath very easily?
by hwayern 10y ago
Is altitude a problem? Like, do you find yourself out of breath very easily?
- mikestew 10y agoMy experience says that 6000 feet will be noticeable, but you'll be able to, say, climb a flight of stairs and be a bit more winded than usual. As another example, the Paradise visitor's center at Mount Rainier sits at (IIRC) 7K feet. Plenty of fat people waddle out of their cars and make it across the parking lot just fine. They don't generally go very far up the mountain, but they make it. And the residents of Denver, CO seem to survive at 5200 feet. To me, "noticing altitude" starts at about 10K feet. For reference, life-long endurance athlete who still stays in pretty good shape in his middle-age.
- macintux 10y agoI tried to sprint to make a connecting flight in Denver (after waiting on the tarmac for 30 minutes to get a gate, grumble). What a mistake. I never had a chance. Sad part was it took me a few minutes to remember why I was suddenly an invalid.
- mikestew 10y agoAs always, YMMV. I can run a marathon in under 3:00, and making an airport connection in Denver probably wouldn't phase me much (I've run in Denver, but not to make a flight). OTOH, I distinctly remember going up Pike's Peak at >14K feet, and found the walk across the parking lot to be challenging. I can't imagine what climbing a >20K foot peak must be like given that humbling experience.
- monkmartinez 10y agoI get my ass kicked in Bogota every summer @ 9k feet. I live at 2.5k and run 24 to 30 miles a week almost 40yo, and it hits me HARD there...
- blackguardx 10y agoI live in Colorado. You get used to the altitude in a few weeks.
- Arcsech 10y agoColorado Springs is about the same altitude (~6000ft), Denver is only a little lower. By and large you don't notice unless you do something that makes you breathe hard, in which case it'll take you a while to catch your breath for the first few weeks. Honestly the biggest annoyance about living at altitude is baking recipes require adjustment pretty much all the time, you can't just use a bread recipe designed for sea level and expect it to work right.
- david-given 10y agoA British friend of mine lives in Colorado. He loves everything about the place, except for one thing: he can't get a decent cup of tea there for love nor money. (Because water boils at too low a temperature.)
- wnoise 10y agoNow I'm wondering about pressure-cooking tea...
- Arcsech 10y agoI think the problem you'd have is that good tea is a function of both time and temperature - you'd end up ruining the tea because of the time it takes to get the vessel to pressure. Unless you had some way of keeping the tea isolated until the vessel got to pressure...
- Arcsech 10y agoI just drink green or white tea mostly, which you steep at a lower temperature anyway. But yeah, water boils at 201F where I live, so I know this pain.
- jowiar 10y agoI was in Bogota earlier this month. We flew in from sea level, and felt some degree of crappy for a few days (and a bit scared that we were suffering mosquito-borne ailments from our previous adventure before we realized the altitude). We eventually settled in, but 8000 ft up is for real.
- monkmartinez 10y agoYep, I get sick almost every summer. It is 9K+ where we stay. I absolutely love the weather there, however the traffic is insane. Also, where my sister in law lives there is a really cool park where people work out, walk, and show off their dogs. I have never seen so many exoitc breeds of dogs. Also, Also, Andres carne de res!
- jowiar 10y agoAndres was crazy fun and delicious, and the tasting menu at Leo was one of the best five meals of my life.