PixRox (Shoreline Trail) = best backpack trail in the Middle West.Valesia wrote:From MI? Upper by chance? We do alot ALOT of backpacking up in Pictured rocks. Love it up there. Its not mountains but still a great place to spend time!DeTour wrote:Longs was my first 14er, coming from Michigan with no mountain experience of any kind. For my group, we chose Longs because my brother knew it and had climbed it twice while living in Longmont years ago. We had no idea or plans of hiking 14ers on an annual basis at the time. It was quite the experience. But it started my family (brother and daughter) on a tradition we now treasure.
Longs is certainly a tough mountain to do for your first, but it has one great advantage for a 14er rookie: the can't-go-wrong route markers. Valecia, don't underestimate how important route-finding is on 14ers. A little disorientation from the altitude mixed in with fatigue can turn a fun hike into a scary situation really quick. I would encourage the standard route for that reason alone. I haven't done the Loft yet, but I would be cautious about adding any routefinding challenge to the many other challenges already offered by Longs.
Besides, the Keyhole route has fabulous variety and unique features that are better enjoyed on the ascent - Boulder Field, passing through the Keyhole, the Ledges, Narrows, even the chockstone at the top of the Trough. It's also a very stable route, that is no loose rock other than a little inconsequential rubble in the Trough. That's an underestimated factor in the ease of a route, especially if you don't have experience on loose rock.
The death count on Longs (50+) is sobering, but in large part a natural result of the much higher traffic this mountain sees. Not just the hordes of people on the standard route, but the many technical routes the mountain offers, and the many years it has been very popular. If you filter out technical routes, winter ascents, etc., and look at it in terms of total number of people on the mountain over the years, I believe it doesn't seem as dangerous as the raw death count suggests.
And this thread is getting borderline preachy. It sounds like you have plenty of wherewithal to do Longs. Go for it!