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PROVO — An Orem man who has hiked to the summit of Mount Timpanogos hundreds of times trekked through a torrential downpour to finally summit the mountain for the 1,000th time on Wednesday.
Benjiman Woolsey, 76, started hiking Utah County’s most famous peak in 1966, when he was 24. Since then, he’s hiked to the top hundreds of times, with 810 hikes since he turned 50.
“Part of the reason I do that is to encourage or show people that they don’t have to sit in a rocking chair when they retire,” he said. “There are a lot of things that they can be active doing.”
Early Wednesday morning, Woolsey and a group of 11 others set off from the Timpooneke trailhead. The group included Woolsey’s son, who was making his first Timp ascent since he was in Boy Scouts, Woolsey said.
It was cold and windy at the top of the mountain, Woolsey said. Toward the end of the hike, it started raining heavily, and there were lightning strikes for about 40 minutes, he said.
“Other than that, it was really a great hike,” he said. “It always is.”
Everyone in the group with Woolsey made it down safely, he said. He was focused on getting to the top, signing the log book at the summit and making it down before the lightning got too dangerous.
Woolsey was too focused on those things to notice if the milestone hike felt any different, he said.
To me, it’s new every day I go up there, and it’s a new challenge to reach my goals. I try to tell people to have a positive attitude that you can do it.
–Benjiman Woolsey
Woolsey, who lives in Orem, had hiked to the summit of Timp 190 times when he turned 50. After that, he decided to hike it ten more times to make it a round number, he said.
At that point, Woolsey thought he might quit, he said. He was mostly doing the hikes for exercise and wasn’t that into them, he said. Woolsey was also diagnosed with an arthritic hip, and a doctor told him he should stop hiking.
But Woolsey continued. He retired at 62 and made hiking his full-time job. Woolsey often hiked up Timp five or more times a week — sometimes twice in one day.
“That’s when I decided to see how far I could push this old body,” he said. “I seemed to get better every year.”
When he was 72, Woolsey set a goal to do a number of hikes equal to his age, and he met that goal. The next year, he thought he could do at least one more hike to be in line with his age. He ended up hiking 100 times.
This year, Woolsey’s completed 45 hikes on Timp to get to 1,000. His goal is to complete 31 more to get to 76, in line with his age.
In addition to hiking Mount Timpanogos, Woolsey has also hiked the Y Mountain in Provo 800 times. His new goal is to complete 200 hikes of that mountain to get to 1,000, so he will likely slow down on Timp hikes, he said.
73-year-old Utahn hikes Y 400 times in under 3 months
An Orem man accomplished a personal goal for hiking Y Mountain 400 times in less than three months.In his earlier hiking years, there were far fewer people on the trails, Woolsey said. When he was in his 30s, he was one of the only people running on the trail, but now there are lots of runners, he said.
It’s also not uncommon to see 400-600 people hiking Timp on any given Saturday, Woolsey said. It’s created some problems, especially with people taking shortcuts on the trail, he said. Some people hike through wildflower beds, which he discourages.
Though his interest for hiking waned in earlier years, now he enjoys seeing the variety in the flowers, animals and weather the hike brings.
“People say ‘isn’t it boring,’ but to me, it’s not boring at all,” Woolsey said. “I enjoy going up there. It’s different every day. … To me, it’s new every day I go up there, and it’s a new challenge to reach my goals. I try to tell people to have a positive attitude that you can do it.”
