Tag: Placer Gulch

RT Length: 11.42 miles

Elevation Gain: 2913’

I parked at the Animas Forks Historic Site near Silverton.  A couple of notes:  the 4WD road in is 4WD, and it’s crowded!  The site however, is pretty cool.  Lots of stuff to see here, and you can go inside the structures (even the 2 story ones). 

There are plenty of spaces to park.  I chose one, and was on the trail at 3:20am

I followed the 4WD road that started to the northwest of the historic site, leading towards California Gulch

I followed this road west for 1.25 miles, to the Placer Gulch/California Gulch junction

At the junction (no signs) I turned left and headed south towards Placer Gulch

I followed this 4WD road south until I’d hiked a little over 4 miles.  It led me to Gold Prince Mine, zig-zagging up the hillside as it went (orange arrow).

This part was tricky in the dark, but at 12615’ of elevation, there’s a side road that goes further up to another mine.  I took that road southwest. 

Here’s an overview of the route I would take to the ridge, using mainly a mining road, then finding a grassy shelf that led to a short class 2+ gully.

Here are some step-by-step pictures of the route to the ridge.  Once I left the dirt road, I put on microspikes, and kept them on until I made it to the summit and back down to where I’d put them on.

Once on the ridge, I turned right and headed north towards the summit (eventually turning into northwest as I followed the ridge).  I was able to follow game trails to the summit (there are a few of them, pick your favorite depending on conditions and ability).

This was a bit loose, lots of chossy scree.   The actual summit is to the northwest, but going straight up this choss will get you to an easy ridge to traverse to the summit

I summited Hanson Peak at 5:45am, and got to watch the sunrise

Hansen Peak:

From Hanson Peak I could see my next objective, PT 13078, to the southeast.  Notice how the road goes very close to the peak?  I was going to need to get back to that road to summit.  I also didn’t summit this peak the way most people do, but instead took the NE slopes.  I found this to be much gentler terrain.  Here’s an overview of how I summited PT 13078

To get there, I was going to need to make my way back to the 4WD road, so I re-traced my steps back to the ridge

This is where I exited the ridge and descended back down to the mine.  I made myself a tiny cairn (seriously tiny, no more than 5 inches high, but I knew it was there) so I’d know the right gully to take.

Then it was back down to the mine, and back to the road

Back on the road, I turned right and followed it east until I was at 12750’  Here’s a visual of where I started my ascent up 13078

And some step-by-step pictures

From here I could see the actual summit of 13078.  I followed the ridge south to the actual summit. 

There was one short easy class 3 move, and there were three options to do this move to gain the summit.   

I chose to go straight up on the way in, but took a sideways route down.  Here are some of the available options, all easy class 3

Then it was a quick, class 2-rocky ridge walk to the summit

I summited PT 13078 at 6:50am

PT 13078:

Here’s an overview of the route from Hanson Peak, much of this done on mining roads

 I descended the same way I ascended, downclimbing that short class 3 section and heading back to the 4WD dirt road.

Back on the dirt road, I followed it back to the California Gulch/Placer Gulch Junction, past a lot of abandoned mines and mining equipment. 

I turned right at the junction, and headed east 1.25 miles back to my truck

I made it back to my truck at 8:20am, making this a 11.42 mile hike with 2913’ of elevation gain in 5 hours.

On to the next trailhead!