The mysterious disappearance of Michelle Vanek on the Mount of the Holy Cross

October 27, 2017 StrangeOutdoors.com

Michelle Rae Vanek disappeared September 24, 2005, Mount of the Holy Cross, Eagle County, Colorado.

Revised July 2024

On 24th September 2005, Michelle Rae Vanek, a 35-year-old mother of four, went to climb one of the famous Colorado "fourteeners" for the first time. She chose Mount of the Holy Cross, a relatively difficult hike with an elevation of 14,005 feet. But she was confident about climbing it as she was in very good physical shape, being a triathlete and marathoner. By the end of that day, it was the last time she or her possessions were ever seen again.

Many years later, Michelle remains missing on the Mount of the Holy Cross, and no clues have been discovered.

The fourteeners

There are fifty-four mountains in Colorado that are over 14,000 feet in height, and these are known as "fourteeners." Hiking these mountains can be challenging, given the possibility of acute mountain sickness (AMS) and the rapidly changing weather conditions above the treeline.

The mountains claim victims from falls, avalanches, and the rapidly changing and unpredictable weather each year. AMS can cause headaches, nausea, shortness of breath, and lethargy. Some fourteeners are relatively easy, but others are more technically challenging, requiring a good fitness level or technical climbing abilities.

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The Mount of the Holy Cross Hike

Michelle was so excited that she and her husband, Ben, went to Gart Sports and Costco the day before the Mount of the Holy Cross trip to buy more equipment for the hike.

Michelle was accompanied by Eric Sawyer, a friend who had hiked 38 fourteeners. The two of them had planned for more than a year to hike one of Colorado’s fourteeners, and Michelle left all the planning to Sawyer.

Michelle and Eric set off together on the hike at around 6.30 am.

Michelle wore a blue lightweight ski jacket with white stripes on the sleeves and pants, a hat, blue and white mittens, hiking poles, and a CamelBak backpack. She had blonde hair with blue eyes, was 5'8, and weighed 145 pounds.

Surprisingly, the two carried no maps, compass, GPS or personal locator beacon. If anything went wrong, they were asking for trouble.

Trouble on the trail

Things quickly started to go wrong on the hike. Michelle complained of a headache as they started from Half Moon Campground at 6.30 am, intending to approach Holy Cross from the north on Half Moon or North Ridge Trail. This could have been a sign of acute mountain sickness (AMS). After the events unfolded, Sawyer told the authorities that Michelle was moving slowly without any obvious problems.

The sign indicating the more accessible North Ridge Route and the more arduous Halo Route was reportedly being replaced by park services. Near the 13,000-foot plus Notch Mountain trail, Sawyer consulted his map and found they were on the wrong trail. The two were on the Halo Ridge route, a circuitous 9-mile route approaching Holy Cross from the southwest. The Halo Route can take up to 2 days to hike due to its length, distance above the treeline, and the last few miles' up-and-down path. The trail is only recommended for very experienced adventurers.

They soon realized that Eric had accidentally left their food and water purifier in the car. Unfortunately, the hike on Halo Ridge was too long to reduce without serious climbing or taking a very steep off-route slope down.

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The two of them were behind schedule, but Sawyer chose to push on, later telling police the two would not have time to summit the peak if they turned back to look for Half Moon Trail. A bad mistake in hindsight.

Soon, they came upon a hut, where they stopped for 10 to 15 minutes to shelter from the cold and wind. At any given time, Michelle was lagging behind Sawyer by up to 60 feet, and he had to help her keep up with him so they would not fall even further behind schedule.

By the time Eric and Michelle reached the top of Notch Mountain on the way to Holy Cross, Michelle was severely slowing down. By 1.25 pm, Michelle and Eric had run entirely out of water.

Within half a mile (and 500 feet of altitude gain) of the top of Mount of the Holy Cross, Michelle decided she couldn't finish the hike, and she told Eric to continue to the summit by himself, despite his apparent objections to her suggestion.

He told Michelle to traverse what he estimated to be about 600 feet to the North Ridge Route for an easier descent. The area was covered in large boulders, and it would have taken another 45 minutes to get off the mountain if Michelle hadn’t started toward the trail.

Eric hurried to the summit, arriving at 1.42 p.m., and then called his wife to say they were running late. According to witnesses Bill and Julia Taylor, he was there only about five minutes. “He just seemed to be rushed because he had to get back to his hiking partner,” Julia Taylor said.

Sawyer and the Taylors exchanged typical pleasantries and snapped each others’ pictures before he headed down towards the North Ridge Route to meet Michelle. A short time later, they heard Sawyer yelling what they thought were calls for “help” but were his shouts of “Michelle!”

Michelle Vanek’s disappearance and the search

When Sawyer got to the spot on the North Ridge route where Michelle was meant to be waiting for him, there was no sign of her.

He continued down the trail back towards Half Moon camp, looking for Michelle, but to no avail. He then reported her missing.

A small team of rescuers began looking for Michelle that evening. The route to the North Ridge is where rescuers speculated she had headed and might have fallen off the ridgeline into the Cross Creek drainage, where large pine trees could have blocked the view from search helicopters. The area consists of a series of steep, wooded cliffs that rescuers said would be too difficult to explore without some sign of where they should look.

A huge search and rescue effort, led by the Vail Mountain Search and Rescue team, was quickly started the following day, September 25, 2005, and involved around 700 searchers who combed the area the following week.

It was the largest search effort in Colorado's history. Dogs were used but the search was hampered by torrential rain. Tim Cochrane, head of the Vail SAR team, said: "It's truly a mystery as to where Michelle is. That's probably the most baffling thing. We've put five search dogs where we know she was, and they haven't found any.”

The possibility of foul play was explored, as a shotgun was found in a duffel bag on the mountain on Wednesday, September 26, 100 yards past the Cross Creek trailhead, and there were reports of a suspicious man in the area. Rescuer Brenda Parks and her partner ran into a man who refused to talk to them and hid behind a tree to hide his face. He ran down the hill away from them when they wanted to question him.

Later that day, a dog team spotted what appeared to be blood in the snow. No footprints were found, and teams could not follow up on the blood because of bad weather.

Rescuers confronted a suspicious person in a yellow tent with a light on inside. The individual refused to unzip the tent or respond. Later, rescuers and deputies found a man coming off the trail, who they believed to be the person in the tent. The man reluctantly told deputies after prodding that his name was Peter Martin. He offered vague details about where he lived and told deputies he had no identification. Unfortunately, he was never investigated further. Was he involved in Michell's strange disappearance?

Puzzling aspects of the Michelle Vanek case

Michelle's sudden disappearance from the Mount of the Holy Cross is baffling. Minutes before she vanished, she was with her hiking partner. Was the stranger in the tent, the man spotted hiding in the woods, gun in the bag and blood on the trail connected?

The foul play certainly seems possible; if not, altitude sickness may have been a big factor exacerbated by dehydration.

Finally, perhaps Eric was involved in some way. Some red flags relating to Sawyer have been mentioned by others online:

He forgot the food and water. It would be normal to check his gear before a major mountain hike, especially to make sure that water had been packed.
Eric had been planning the hike for a year and a half, yet apparently took the wrong trail just because the signs were being replaced.
Why did he leave Michelle behind without any water and arrange to meet after summiting?

Michelle was very fit and a star athlete, specifically in track and field, cross-country running, distance, and endurance racing. Prior to this hike, she had participated in marathons and triathlon competitions. Would someone who was in incredible shape be lagging behind and out of breath unless altitude sickness had gotten the better of her?

There were some reports that Eric was apparently infatuated with Michelle and sexually involved with her. Michelle had even told her friends that he was weird and obsessive about her, but she desperately wanted to do the climb anyway. Sawyer was also very envious of her husband, but their relationship was incredibly strong.

At the funeral, when Michelle was finally declared legally dead, Eric was present. However, it was said that he did not speak to anyone and was said to be tense, pale as a ghost, fidgety, and his eyes were very shifty. Why?

Did Eric Sawyer shoot Michelle with the shotgun that was found well below the drainage area they assume she 'fell' into, hide the body, and make a story up to divert the rescue efforts to avoid where she actually rested? Did he shove her into the drainage area without anyone looking and knew she wouldn't be found?

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