It took two hours for Ben Schultz to make it to the top of Mount Marathon on his initial ascent of the iconic peak here.
Two hours and two years. Schultz, 30, is the Anchorage firefighter who nearly died when he fell more than 75 feet from the ladder of a fire truck while on duty at Station 5 on June 5, 2017.
He has fake cartilage in both ankles, which shattered when he landed. He’s had surgery 15 times, including six times on his ankles and three times on his brain. He relied on a feeding tube for weeks and had to learn how to walk again.
He spent a month at Providence Alaska Medical Center in a coma, eight months at Craig Hospital in Colorado and three months in an assisted-living home in Nebraska before returning home last May, nearly one year after his fall.
And here he was on a brilliantly sunny day in Seward -- hot, tired, thirsty, dusty and ecstatic.