RT Length: 8.39 miles
Elevation Gain: 2744’
I’d spent the past few days dispersed camping at Red Mountain Pass, which is where I began my hike.
I was up and on the trail at 5am, hoping to beat today’s storms and make it to Independence Pass to join some friends camping that afternoon. I started our following the dirt road for .75 miles
Just before the Black Bear Pass / Porphyry Basin junction, I turned right onto a side trail. A 4WD vehicle can easily make it here. There’s room for one vehicle to park (yesterday I saw a full-sized Ford F250 parked here).
I was now on a “pack trail” that looks like it used to be a road. I followed this trail until I came to a mine.
This is where I left the “trail” and route finding became tricky in the dark. In the daylight, it’s pretty easy. There are a few game trails here, which I tried to pick up when I could find them.
Here’s the route I took after the mine
And some step-by-step pictures as I made my way northeast, hugging the mountainside
I crossed a mining area, then headed up the slope
I now had a view of how I wanted to gain the ridge. I was initially going to gain it to the left, and this would have worked as well, but I saw a small herd of deer grazing and I didn’t want to disturb them
This is how I gained the ridge, on easy, class 2 terrain
Once on the ridge, I followed it north towards the summit, as the tundra gave way to shale, which had game trails to follow
I summited PT 13509 at 7:20am
PT 13509:
I could see the town of Telluride to the west
Looking north, I could see Telluride Peak
To get there, I made my way northeast to the 13509/Telluride saddle, then northwest to the summit of Telluride. This was a chossy, class 2 ridge hike with a few game trails mixed in.
The easiest way to access the summit is from a class 2 ramp to the left of the summit boulder
I summited Telluride Peak at 8am
Telluride Peak:
Now to head back to the trailhead. I looked southeast, and could see Ptarmigan Lake. I didn’t want to descend that low, so instead I made my way back to the 13509/Telluride saddle
I then continued heading southeast to this point
Once there, I turned right and hugged the side of PT 13265 until I came to a gully
I descended the gully, and aimed for an old cabin I could see to my right
Here’s looking back at the gully I descended
At the cabin I turned left, and headed south through the basin
As I descended, I could see my route in, and decided to take the same route out of the basin. I could even see the game trail that picked up on the other side (it doesn’t last for long).
Back on the “trail” I followed it southeast as it hugged the mountainside
Then it was back down the drainage that led to the mine
Back at the mine, I picked up the trail that led me back to the 4WD road
Then I followed the road back down to Red Mountain Pass
I made it back to the trailhead at 9:30am, making this an 8.39 mile hike with 2744’ of elevation gain in 4.5 hours.
On to the next trailhead!
Wild Wanderer 