snowshoes – Page 2 – Wild Wanderer

Atlantic Peak 13,856

RT Length:

Elevation Gain:

I really wanted to do Atlantic and Pacific together, but until April I have limited time schedules for hiking (I need to be back at my truck by noon to make it home in time to pick up my daughter from school, so it’s hikes under 8 miles until then). The weather indicated Atlantic Peak would be a good choice for today, so I went for it. This was only supposed to be a 4-6 mile hike and I wanted to break in my new winter hiking boots. They were supposed to be lighter and warmer than my Sorrels, but I was skeptical so I wanted to use them on a shorter hike before committing to longer distances.

I arrived at the Mayflower Gulch trailhead at 5:15am to 14* weather, much better than the -5* weather of last week in the San Juans. I was also pleasantly surprised to find it was right off the road: no off road driving for me today. There was one other vehicle (a Subaru) in the lot, and while the gate was open up to Boston Mine I decided to park my truck at the lower lot and hike in.

The lower lot was icy!!! I put on my microspikes in the truck and gathered my gear. I set out at 5:30am. It was very peaceful hiking at night. Silent. Very silent. No moon, but the stars were magnificent! The only sound was the snow falling off tree branches and onto the trail below. The trail was tightly packed down by other hikers, snowshoers and skiers.

A 4WD vehicle could have made the icy drive, but since this hike was so short it didn’t seem worth the extra mile and a half. I made it to the Boston Mine area before sunrise and put on my snowshoes in the dark. I was lazy so I kept my microspikes on and just put my snowshoes on over them. If I needed to take them off it would be a quick transition and maybe I could keep my gloves on the entire time (saving my fingers from the cold).

Oh, btw, this fence is not the height of a normal fence… it’s probably half the height (so the snow looks deeper than it actually is).

Snowshoes ended up being a great idea, because while the trail was packed down, as soon as I went off trail I started sinking to my knees, even while wearing my snowshoes. I looked for a trail across the gulch, but it looked like I was the first since the last snowfall so I broke my own trail.

The sun was beginning to rise, and Jacque Peak looked beautiful.

The snow was sugary and made snowshoeing difficult. I’d be fine for a few yards, and then plunge up to my waist. This was a serious problem in the willows, but I made it across the gulch and was surprised to exit and stumble upon a cairn! This was an unexpected treat! I found about 4 cairns on the entire route, always unexpected and sometimes on my way back down.

After crossing the gulch I was supposed to follow Mayflower Creek up to Atlantic’s west ridge, but the snow didn’t look stable and it looked really deep, so I stayed higher up on the hillside. This was great (early elevation gain) but there were times I was seriously worried about avalanche danger. It wouldn’t have been an intense avalanche, but I could see signs I should take an alternate route back once it warmed up. So I was slow in traversing the slope, but careful and ultimately safe.

Here’s the route I took

My next task was to hike Atlantic’s lower west ridge. This ended up being more difficult than anticipated: the snow here was very consolidated, unlike the sugary snow on the slopes and gullies. My snowshoes weren’t going to cut it. I took off one snowshoe and tried it with my microspikes. They became ice skates. Hmph. Ok, I was going to need to get creative. I put back on my snowshoes and got out my ice axe. This wouldn’t have been a problem with two ice axes or two ice picks and crampons, but I only had one ice axe and I hadn’t brought my crampons (I thought it was still too early). So I used my ice axe to drill a hole big enough for my left hand and then struck the snow with the axe and my right hand for support and lifted myself up. My snowshoes used the holds I’d made for my hands. This worked very well and I was able to gain the ridge in no time at all. (Note to self: It’s time for crampons).

Here’s a look back on the route

From here I was just supposed to follow the trail to the summit, but there wasn’t a trail, and in fact, at about 12,700’ I encountered some of the most difficult terrain of this hike.

This is where I wanted to turn back. I seriously considered it. The snow was intermittent and what snow there was was sugary and covering loose talus, so I couldn’t get a good grip on it in my snowshoes. I took them off again to try it with just spikes and it was even worse! My microspikes were of no use: I really needed the stability/flotation of snowshoes. Even though they weren’t perfect, they were a big help. This area took me much longer to navigate than it should have, but I didn’t quit and I didn’t turn back. I gained this ridge and was met with this:

Wow. That ridge didn’t look too difficult in normal conditions, but I could already see this would be a challenge due to the unpredictable snow. Maybe not a challenge for seasoned snow summiters, but I’m still new to this. There was snow, lots of cornices beginning to form, and a narrow ridge to navigate. I forged on ahead.

Luckily a mountain goat had been here last night and gave me some tracks to consider. There were times I didn’t feel safe following it’s tracks, but they did give me a good general direction to follow, which was directly on top on the ridge.

I’d reach one summit and find another, which was frustrating, but I knew everything I encountered was within my abilities and even a bit challenging. I came across a few sections that would have been class 2 if there hadn’t been snow, but with the snow (and instability of said snow) I decided it was safer just to go straight over the ridge. This turned the hike into a class 3 climb, and with snowshoes made me a bit clumsy (but safer than without).

This was one of those learning opportunities where I was scared at times but knew I could do it so I kept pushing forward, even though there were many times I wanted to quit and come back in the summer.

Here’s the route I took:

The trek wasn’t long, and I wasn’t tired when I reached the summit, but I was cold. Luckily my phone and camera were working, although my phone cut out halfway though the first video and I had to take another one and then it shut down. I plugged it into my portable charger and took pictures with my DSLR. I summited at 9am.

VIDEO:

While it was cold it wasn’t windy, so the cold was bearable. I stayed on the summit much longer than I normally do, taking pictures and marveling at the beauty of the mountains with snow.

I considered traversing Pacific Peak as well, but didn’t think I’d be able to do it successfully with my time constraints. The class 3 route looks doable now though, so I may be back in the next few weeks.

Here’s a look back at the route

The trek back was easier than the hike in because I just followed my tracks (and didn’t look down). Looking down would have caused unnecessary anxiety.

Those ridges were something else!

Of course I took a shadowselfie

I decided to follow the creek down because that was what I was supposed to do and I was seriously worried about avalanche danger on the route I’d taken up the mountain. I’m still learning about avalanches, but know some of the initial signs and what I was seeing wasn’t making me comfortable. So I took the creek, but this proved difficult as well, as out of nowhere I’d sink up to mu chest in soft snow and then have to work myself out. This happened many times and was frustrating, but I still felt safer than on the slope above.

Just before hitting Mayflower gulch my toes started to hurt: the new snow boots were fine, but the snowshoes and boots combination was cutting off circulation in my toes and trekking downhill was beginning to hurt. This hadn’t happened in my previous boots, and is something I need to consider.

Also, I lost my phone. It fell out of my pocket and I had to retrace my steps ¼ of a mile uphill to find it. That wasn’t fun. I found it buried in snow (but attached to my bright orange solar charger). I picked it up and trudged back down the hill and across Mayflower Gulch to Boston Mine.

It was a beautiful day! And warm! I took off my gloves but had to put them back on again once I made it back to the trail (and shade). Have I mentioned I love my new gloves!

My new winter books are ok, but despite my double tying them and folding them under my laces they still came undone while hiking, which isn’t an option for me since I can’t tie them wearing mittens. I may try safety pinning them next time.

I made it back to the trailhead at noon and looked at my STRAVA map. Hmph! This wasn’t right: It showed my trek to the summit, but it seems it stopped working there and picked up again where I found my phone in the snow after losing it (please don’t attempt to take that straight line: it’s not safe!!!). So while the elevation gain is most likely correct, the trek down and mileage definitely are not. My iPhone told me I’d hiked 6.8 miles, so I’m going with that for mileage. The hike was 5.5 hours.

Here’s my Relive map (which is also false since it did that straight line thing from the summit to where I lost my phone).

https://www.relive.cc/view/1968357714

Horseshoe Mountain A – 13,898 & Peerless Mountain 13,348

RT Length: 8.3 miles

Elevation Gain: 2500’

I needed a successful summit today. I mean I really needed one. The past two peaks I’ve attempted to summit have been thwarted by downed trees on the drive in or early season wind slab avalanche danger at treeline. If I didn’t get in a summit today I was ready to call off alpine hiking for the year. Maybe.

Last year I was new to alpine hiking and decided to take the winter off from 13ers and 14ers and instead map out the entire North Cheyenne Canyon area peaks, most of which do not have established routes. I was able to learn quite a bit about route finding and navigation below treeline, while still staying in the relative warmth of 8K to 12K peaks where I felt I couldn’t get ‘too lost’.

This winter I may choose to do the same in another area, depending on my success rate with hiking/climbing 13ers in winter conditions. But first, an ‘easy’ early season 13er with ‘perfect’ weather conditions (sunny at the summit and 35* with 5-10mph winds)

My alarm didn’t go off at 2am as planned, but fortuitously my internal alarm woke me up at 3am and I decided to still book it to the trailhead. Probably the most difficult part of this whole day was the 10 mile drive in on County Road 18. There was a 40% chance of snow last night, which I’ve found usually means if it does snow it’ll only be about an inch or so. Well, as soon as the road turned to dirt there was at least 4-6 inches of fresh snow on the road, which was unexpected. I’d been driving about 40 mph and quickly downgraded it to 10 mph (or slower).

Luckily there were fresh tire tracks ahead of me, so I knew someone must have made it down the road. I figured someone was attempting Sherman this morning and their alarm clock rang on time. From their tracks I could see where the snow became deeper in the road. At times the snow was a foot or more deep (from drifts) and at others it was non-existent. Unfortunately, the tire tracks abruptly turned off the road to the left after about a mile in, and I was now driving the road on my own.

I have a very capable 4WD Toyota Tundra that never says “no” to anything I’ve asked it to do, but I was still cautious: I knew this was a well maintained road but with all the snow I couldn’t tell how deep the snow actually was; and there were drifts. Multiple times I considered turning back, but my truck kept plowing through with no difficulties, so I kept driving on. Mental note: it’s now time to drive with a shovel in the back of my truck.

I drove too far. I made it all the way to the upper trailhead for Sherman, realized my mistake, and turned around and found the parking area after the Leavick Mine. I debated driving up the 4WD road to see how much further I could go, but decided against pushing my luck. I’d made it safely this far and didn’t want to chance my summit today by doing anything stupid. This ended up being a grand idea because less than a mile up the road there were several tracks in the snow indicating vehicles in the past few days had tried to continue further and failed. With the added snow from last night there’s no way I’d have made it. Here’s a picture from the drive on my way out. Most of the snow had melted or been packed down by this point.

I parked at the Silver Horseshoe Road junction and put on my snowshoes while sitting in my truck. I kept them on for the entire hike. I started at 6:25am. Here’s where I parked.

From the beginning the road was covered in snow. And it was dark. And silent. And beautiful. The first part of the hike was relatively easy: I just followed the snow covered dirt road.

Around 7am the sun began to rise. I slowed down to enjoy the experience. I love sunrises!

I got my first view of Horseshoe. What an amazing mountain!

And Peerless. It looked like there was wind up high, but the forecast said it was supposed to die down this morning, settling around 5-10mph. So I trudged on. Snowshoeing takes more energy than hiking!

Being the first one on the trail has it’s perks: I saw numerous animal tracks from the night before.

At 12,600’ I passed an old mine.

From here as I gained in elevation the road became more difficult to find. It was covered in snow drifts, making it blend in with the mountainside. I did my best to stay on route and probably didn’t, but could see my intended destination (the Peerless/Horseshoe saddle) and just kept aiming for that while avoiding pockets of soft snow.

I made it to the 13,200’ saddle and turned left (south). I had a great view of the route before me.

I did a physical check here. The hike thus far had been tiring but not difficult. I was sweating and could still feel my fingers. I wasn’t a popsicle yet. This was fantastic! I decided to keep hiking. On the ridge the trail was either covered in snow or held no snow at all. I kept my snowshoes on either way.

The only part that gave me pause was here. I wasn’t sure if the snow was consolidated or not. I continued on, knowing if I slipped I wouldn’t be falling too far. Second mental note of the day: Bring an ice axe from now on.

I followed the ridge and was surprised by a false summit. Well, surprised is the wrong word. I’ve come to expect them, but today it wasn’t appreciated because as soon as I made it to the top the wind picked up. Luckily, while it looked far it was actually an easy hike over to the true summit.

Here’s the route I took

I had fun here learning about different types of snow. I wasn’t able to always tell what was snow and what was ridge, so I traversed carefully. Luckily here the ridge was wide and most of the snow as consolidated.

I summited at 8:45am

18 Horseshoe Mountain A 13898

VIDEO:

Up until now I hadn’t been too cold, but on the summit the wind picked up. I took a few pictures of the amazing view

The summit cairn

And took a look at my route back down.

It had been my intention to summit Peerless as well (an unranked 13er) but my fingers were burning. I was clapping them together, putting them under my armpits, in my pockets, etc., but they just weren’t warming up. I needed the wind to settle down. I told myself I’d make the decision whether or not to climb Peerless when I made it back to the saddle.

Here’s my snowshoe tracks. I love snowshoe tracks!

And here’s my next target: Peerless

I made it back to the saddle and looked at the route back up to Horseshoe

And up to Peerless

It looked like a cornice was forming on Peerless, but there was an open path if I stayed to the left and avoided the snow. The wind had stopped, and while I couldn’t feel my fingers they were no longer burning, so I decided to go for it. It was a quick 150’ trek to the summit. I summited at 9:25am

27 Peerless Mountain 13348

VIDEO:

Here’s a look back at Horseshoe from Peerless. The only difficult part was deciding which snow was stable to hike on, and which was part of the cornice/loose snow. In other words, I wasn’t sure where the mountain ended and cornice began, especially as I got higher up.

The trek back down was very easy as there hadn’t been much wind and I could just follow my snowshoe tracks. I noticed a lot of new holes in the snow from critters who weren’t quite ready yet for winter.

The entire hike in the snow seemed to continually change. It would be consolidated for 10 steps or so, and then suddenly become soft and I’d sink to my shins. On my way back I was able to capture the experience in a photo

Here’s what the 4WD road looked like on my way back out

And I know a lot of people are wondering what Sherman looks like right now…

I made it back to my truck at 10:45am, making this an 8.3 mile hike with 2500’ of elevation gain in 4.5 hours.

Here’s my STRAVA route:

And Relive visual: https://www.relive.cc/view/1914862651

Today was a huge learning experience for me. I know this wasn’t a difficult peak, but I learned a lot about how to navigate different types of snow, drifts, snow stability, and winter route finding. And I stayed (relatively) warm. I’m considering today a success!

Snowmass Mountain – 14,092

RT Mileage: 22 miles

Elevation Gain: 5800’

It‘d been a long week at work, so I needed a quick nap before heading to the trailhead. I got all my gear together and packed it into my backpacking pack and loaded it into my truck so I’d just need to get up and go.

My backpacking pack looked excessive for a day hike, but I was darned tired of carrying those snowshoes in my hands all the way up the trail again. They don’t strap to my day pack, and they’re a bugger to carry, but they fit nicely into my backpacking pack. So today that’s where they went. At least the pack was light.

My plan was to get to the trailhead at 1am and make it to the lake around 3:30am. That meant I needed to leave at 9:30pm. That gave me 2.5 hours to rest if I fell asleep right now. I jumped into bed, checked my alarm one more time to make sure it was set for 9pm, pulled the covers over my head and fell asleep. Two seconds later I turned over and looked at my phone because I felt way too rested. AGH!!! 10:33pm! My alarm hadn’t gone off! Drat! I did the mental calculations: Was it to late to start? This is really a hike that needs to be started very early in the morning. Very early. Did I just miss my shot? I knew I could make up some of the time driving, and I was all packed, so…

I jumped out of bed, re-heated the morning’s coffee, and was out the door in 5 minutes.

Surprisingly there was no one on the road at 11pm on a Thursday night. I drove most of the way not seeing another vehicle. I couldn’t speed however, because there were a lot of animals out. Just after Buena Vista I saw about 20 deer trying to cross the road in front of me. I had to slow down very quickly to avoid hitting them. I’ll admit I was pretty close, but was able to stop in time. I’m guessing we had 3 inches to spare.

Just as my truck came to a full stop, Wham! I heard a big thump on the back passenger side of the vehicle. I’d just been hit by a deer! I thought that kind of thing only happened in Gilmore Girls? I didn’t want to get out of my truck because there were a bunch of deer around, so I slowly crept the vehicle forward and looked in my rear-view mirror to see if the deer was ok. It was. It had just gotten scared and done the prey thing where they try to zig and zag to confuse their predator into going the other way. She’d zigged when she should have zagged, but all the deer were up and walking around behind me, so I continued on. I’d look at the damage to my truck when I got to the trailhead.

My GPS stated I was making good time. I’d already cut off 30 minutes of drive time, making me only a little over an hour behind schedule. That was promising. Until I made it to the trailhead. Or, what I thought was the trailhead. Those of you familiar with the Maroon-Bells and Snowmass area might think this was a stupid mistake, but my GPS directions and the directions from the .com were pretty parallel, and after following them I ended up at the Maroon Bells Trailhead instead of the Snowmass Trailhead. Both are referred to as the Maroon-Snowmass trailhead (side note: there’s a sign at the park entrance saying the $10 fee to enter Maroon Bells starts June 10).

I was starting at the Maroon-Snowmass Trailhead, but apparently there are two of those?!?! Luckily I’d started the GPX file for the hike before leaving the house (something I learned to do dozens of 14ers ago for situations just like this) and saw where I needed to go to fix this problem.

It took me an hour, and just an FYI, when using the .com directions there is no Snowmass Creek Road: It’s now called Brush Creek, with no mention of Snowmass anywhere, even when it becomes a dirt road.

I made it to the correct trailhead (also named Maroon-Snowmass BTW) at 3am. I’d wanted to almost be at the lake by this point. Now I was mad at myself. The alarm thing was my fault (I’d accidentally set it for Friday at 9pm instead of Thursday at 9pm), and even though I’d found several different directions to the trailhead I messed that up too. So all the time I’d “made up” driving was lost, and then some.

I jumped out of my truck, threw on my pack, and was on my way. I had serious time to make up. Side note: there was a huge tent set up in the parking area with a generator running? That seemed a bit excessive. There were 2 other cars in the lot, one I assumed belonged to the tent people and the other to another hiker(s). The road in was a 2WD dirt road for some of the way. Here’s a picture from later in the day.

About a quarter mile in I realized I forgot to eat my bagel, and I wasn’t 100% sure I remembered to pack my gloves. I knew they’d made it to the truck, but I wasn’t sure they made it into my pack. I was only a little ways in, but I wasn’t turning back. I had food with me, and if my hands got cold I had an extra jacket. I’d improvise.

I passed several closed gates and great signs indicating the correct trail.

It was dark but I was hiking by the light of the moon. I could hear but not see the river, and was glad the path was so easy to follow.

The trail was very well maintained

There were several downed trees directly on the trail, but they were (mostly) easily avoided).

There was also evidence of avalanche activity in the area.

It stayed dark until 5:30am, just as I reached the log jam. (Note, there’s a video of my crossing the log jam later towards the end of this post for those interested in experiencing it with me). The log jam was much easier to cross than I’d anticipated! The only tricky part was all of the logs were floating on the top of the water, making them springy and not secure. The lake was about 8 feet deep in the middle, so I didn’t want to accidentally fall and be a swimmer. I just made sure I checked for stability with each step, and where possible used my trekking pole for balance.

Snowshoes were needed about ¼ mile from the lake. I pulled them out to put them on and woot! I had my gloves! Things were looking up!

I kept the snowshoes on to cross this short log bridge, which actually ended up being a great idea: they gave me extra stability.

I’d made it to Snowmass Lake. It was beautiful in the morning light!

I made it the 8 miles to the lake at 6:45am, when my original intention was to be there at 3:30am. I was over 3 hours later than I’d wanted to be at this point. I did a mental sigh, knowing it was unlikely I’d summit today because the sun would melt the snow to a point that made climbing impossible. Even knowing this I continued on, telling myself there were probably more unknowns ahead and I’d want to be more prepared next time I attempted Snowmass. I’d just keep trekking on and see how far I could get and how much I could learn about the route for next time.

There was no evidence anyone had camped at the lake, so I assumed the extra vehicle belonged to day hikers.

There was evidence of recent avalanche activity at the lake. It looked quite recent, and was coming from the east side. The left banks of the lake were covered in snow I was sure should have melted out by now, and attributed it to an avalanche. There were broken pieces of trees everywhere. I kept my snowshoes on to cross the banks, which was extremely helpful. It looked like others had postholed. There was still ice on some of the lake.

Even after I made it past the lake I kept my snowshoes on as I headed towards the scree slope gully. This was 600’ in elevation gain of pure torture. I don’t like gullies. As far as I’m concerned a gully should either be full of climbable snow or not on the route. It took me forever to climb this thing! It was full of scree and large, loose rocks and boulders. Nothing was stable. It was like a bad Paula Abdul song: two steps forward and two steps back. I actually kept on the snowshoes until I was about halfway up the gully because they gave me added stability (don’t try this at home!!!). I only took them off when the scree and rocks transitioned to boulders. It was apparent they were now doing more harm than good and I didn’t want to risk a broken ankle.

I made it to the top of that very instable gully at 8:30am. I put back on my snowshoes and helmet, thinking to myself it probably would have been a good idea to put my helmet on before the gully.

I looked at the rest of the route before me. Snowmass is best done with snow in the mass, and boy did it have snow!

I started forward and noticed a guy glissading down towards me. This really ticked me off. I was so mad at myself! I should have been where he was right now, on my descent, but instead I still had 3 miles of difficult terrain ahead of me. He made his way towards me and started some small talk about the climb, how many 14ers we’d done, and the generator at the trailhead. He hadn’t seen anyone else all day, and was pretty cheerful. I tried to make small talk, but it was hard for me to remain upbeat. The sun was shining, the snow was melting, and I was behind schedule. I’m sure I came across as rude, and while I regret that I couldn’t help it. If you’re reading this, I apologize for my bad manners!

He told me he’d started at 1am, and was just going lightweight today (he noted, looking at my excessive pack). He didn’t have snowshoes, so he’d postholed around the lake, having a miserable time of it. The snow up towards the top of the mountain was still pretty stable, so I shouldn’t have trouble summiting. I sat down and switched my snowshoes for crampons. This putting on and taking off my snowshoes/crampons was getting exhausting!

We said goodbye, and I looked at the route before me and the way I’d traveled thus far (with the hiker to the right).

I steeled myself: If the snow was indeed still stable as the glissader said there was a small chance I could summit today, and I was going to do my best to make it happen if it was safe to do so. It looked like a long trudge, but doable if I could get there before the snow melted out too much.

Because the trail is covered in snow (if there even is a trail underneath?) you just need to aim for the ridge and make your own route. This mountain is much bigger than it looks, and those rocks and cliffs you see are at least 20 feet in width, some much larger. I aimed for boulders in front of me and just kept going, making my way towards the ridge.

All was going pretty well and I was quite pleased with my progress. It looked like I was actually going to do this! The snow was getting noticeably softer, but I was so close! When I hit about 20 feet from the ridge I hit a big problem: the snow became extremely soft. Stepping on it was like what happens when grab a piece of cotton candy between your fingers and squash it, but slushy. This was not good. I tried to follow tracks made by others, but that ended up making things worse. I was now going parallel to the ridge, trying to find a safe way to summit. It just wasn’t happening, and I was making a mess of the mountain. I hadn’t realized it while I was doing it, but I’d chosen a path that got the most sun earliest in the day. Ugh! I wish I’d have angled toward the right more! Then I wouldn’t have been in this situation. Oh well, I’m a problem solver, so I kept at it until I found a stable route. OK, I actually just tramped down the 5 feet or so of snow until I hit rock and made my way up that way. I apologize to those following in my steps! If you want to avoid this just gain the ridge more to the right…

At 10:30am, despite everything I had going against me, I gained the ridge! I was elated, but I knew one thing: I did NOT want to go back down the way I’d come up. Not only had I pretty much ruined that line it just wasn’t safe. This meant I needed to look for a safer route down and I needed to summit asap because that wonderful sun wasn’t on my side. I sat down to take off my crampons and took a look at the way I’d come and the ridge before me:

It took me about half an hour to travel those .2 miles. Not because the terrain was difficult but because the wind was insane! It was much faster than the predicted 30mph, and COLD!!! I was a popsicle, and could barely move. I summited at 11am. Snowmass is a small summit, and I was frozen and in a hurry to beat the sun, so no great summit photo. Surprisingly, I wasn’t thrilled with this summit like I usually am when I make it to the top. I did get (one) selfie that would have to do and booked it back to the ridge.

19 Snowmass Mountain 14092

The snow came all the way up to the ridge in most areas, so finding a different route down wasn’t too challenging. What was challenging was the angle of the down climb!

This was much steeper than the way I’d taken on the way up. I was surprised at how much firmer the snow was in this area. The descent was easier than I’d anticipated (snow conditions wise) but it still took what seemed like forever! Here’s a photo of the route I took: I went to the left on the way up, and the right on the way down.

I finally made it back to a semi level area and sat down to glissade. Drat! I couldn’t! Because I was wearing my big pack! Oh well, I’d just hike out and enjoy the view while I did so.

The top of the gully had a great view.

The trek down the gully wasn’t any better than the way up. What little snow there was was too soft to traverse. The rocks were all unsable and it was impossible to get traction on the scree, so I had to carefully watch every step I took to avoid falling and creating a rockslide. It was very slow-going and I couldn’t get down fast enough. Have I mentioned I’m not a fan of gullies?

When I made it back down I got a quick video of the avalanche evidence. It looks pretty recent to me, with a lot of debris rolling on top of the snow in the wind.

23 Avalanche near lake

OK, here I was back at the lake.

To make up for my bad attitude I decided to follow the post-holes the glissader made on his way back and trench them with my snowshoes to create a nice path for the next hikers to follow. This was slow going, and took me over an hour. I was making a nice, solid trail though!

I was half way across the lake when it happened. The section I was trenching calved while I was crossing it, right into the lake.

You’re probably thinking: Wasn’t the lake icy cold? Honestly, I couldn’t tell you. It all occurred in slow motion, and luckily I realized what was happening while it was happening so I had some time to plan and prepare before hitting the water.

As the snow and ice disintegrated below me I took a deep breath, filled my lungs with air and steeled myself for the shock of landing in the ice water. I hit the water ready to spring up and stable myself. I was still wearing my snowshoes, and had on my helmet and pack. I stood up, made it as quickly as I could to the shore, climbed up the snow bank, threw off my pack, and rolled in the snow to dry off. I was making snow angels and checking to make sure I hadn’t hurt any part of my body.

After a few good rolls I took off my outer layers of clothing and stripped down to my moisture wicking under-layers. I rolled in the snow again. When I felt I’d absorbed as much water as possible I got up and did jumping jacks for 2 minutes, warming up my body. While doing the calisthenics I considered my options. The next course of action should have been to start a fire and dry out my socks/shoes, but I was pretty sure there was a fire ban, and besides, it would take longer to dry out my stuff than it would take to hike the 8 miles out. I needed to stay as warm as possible, and sitting in front of a fire would just take time and provide the opportunity for me to go into shock. The best way to prevent shock (for me) is to keep moving. My altruism was done for the day. No more trenching: I threw my wet clothes into my pack and began the long slog back to my truck in soaking wet socks and boots. My new priority was making it back to my truck and the dry socks I had sitting on my passenger seat.

I made it to the log jam and decided to take a video of the crossing

In case you’re wondering, these ponds have fish in them. I saw dozens of trout near the shore.

It was a very long 8 miles back to my truck. Those 8 miles out were not as pleasant as I’m sure they were intended to be.

Around mile 18 is when I really got tired. My feet were rubbing against my wet socks and drenched shoes, creating terrible blisters. They squished with every step, and at one point I felt my pinky toenail come off. That stung. My pack, now full of wet clothes, was heavy and eating into my shoulders. Every quarter of a mile or so I had to stop and bend over to release some of the tension and weight from my shoulders.

I was following the creek back, and as I was relieving the pressure from my shoulders I heard it: singing. I righted myself and looked around to see if anyone was there, but the forest was empty. Yet I could distinctly hear singing. I couldn’t make out the words, but it was a woman, singing softly and humming. It almost sounded like it was coming from a radio, faint in the distance. I’ve often heard what sounds like music from a creek/flowing body of water, but that’s not what this was.

I shook it off and kept going, but every time I came close to the creek I heard it again. At one point it sounded like it was coming from a jukebox or an old staticky radio. I looked over at the raging creek. Water was a good conductor, maybe that’s where it was coming from? I shook my head. Ugh, not a conductor of sound Laura.

I knew what was happening: I’d only gotten 3 hours of sleep last night, and while I had food I hadn’t eaten all day because I didn’t feel like stopping to take it out of my pack (I don’t get hungry when I hike, so I have to force myself to eat). I was in shock and suffering from low blood sugar, causing auditory hallucinations. Not eating combined with lots of physical exercise and the distress of falling into the lake was causing me to go into shock. That didn’t stop me from taking a video while I heard the singing to assess later (in case you’re wondering, no, you can’t hear the ‘singing’ in the video).

On the positive side, there were a lot of beautiful flowers.

I made it back to my truck at 6:30pm and assessed the deer damage: none!

It had been quite a day: 22 miles, 5800’ feet of elevation gain, and an unexpected dunk in Snowmass Lake in 15 hours. It was 26 hours door to door, and I was exhausted!

Mt Belford – 14,197, Mt Oxford 14,153

RT Length: 11 miles

Elevation Gain: 5967’

I’ve been saving this hike as a practice hike for winter conditions, since the route is relatively straightforward and it has a 2WD trailhead. Unfortunately I don’t have much time in the winter to actually hike, so it had to wait until early spring.

I woke up at 3am and drove to the Missouri Gulch trailhead. There were a few easily manageable mud puddles to avoid, but nothing anyone would get stuck driving through. I made it much faster than I thought, as I was honestly waiting for daylight for this hike. After seeing a herd of elk on 390 I made it to the trailhead at 5:45am. There was one other vehicle in the parking lot, and it looked like it hadn’t been there long (no frost on the windows, etc). This would make my family happy, knowing there was someone else out on the trail today. They hate that I hike alone.

I usually love hiking well before sunrise, but today for several reasons I decided to sit in my truck for a bit and wait:

I’m not a fan of hiking by graves in the dark. Does anyone else think it’s weird the baby’s grave is so far away from all the others? I mean, it’s across the street and up the hill and everything…
I really didn’t want to play ‘leapfrog’ with whoever was already hiking on the trail. I figured I’d give them some time to get far enough ahead of me so we wouldn’t need to pass each other/hike together the whole time.
I’ve heard reports there’s a mountain lion that frequents the area, and I’d rather not run into one in the dark. (side note: I’m not afraid of mountain lions, in fact I’d love to see one while hiking, I’d just rather it be in the daylight)
But seriously, that baby grave in the dark freaks me out.

I debated for a while which hiking boots to wear (my regular ones or my winter ones) and whether or not to bring my snowshoes. There wasn’t a recent conditions report in the past week or so, and the last one said none were needed. I left the snowshoes in the truck and headed out at 6:15am in my snow boots and winter gear. It was still dark.

I made it about .25 of a mile when something told me to turn around and go back and get those snowshoes. It’s tough to head back after you’ve already started, but the feeling was strong and I thought how mad I’d be at myself if I made it up the trail 3 or 4 miles and needed to turn back because I didn’t have the proper gear. So I hiked back to my truck, pulled them out, and was on my way again.

The trail was covered in slush that quickly turned to packed snow. As I looked on the ground I could see clearly defined mountain lion tracks (noted by size and lack of claw marks) on the trail. Cool! I also saw trails made in the snow that were obviously from a large animal (the mountain lion?) that detached from the main trail and went off into the hillside. The tracks were going the opposite direction, but that didn’t stop me from looking all over for signs of animal life/more tracks. After about 1.5 miles in the tracks disappeared.

20 minutes into my hike I passed the couple belonging to the truck. They didn’t look like they had snowshoes and I felt a bit foolish for carrying mine. The trail was pretty hard packed here, and snowshoes didn’t seem necessary. I briefly asked them if they’d seen the animal tracks, they had, and I was on my way. I never saw them again.

I crossed a small stream and decided the snow was thick enough to put on those snowshoes I’d been carrying.

The snow got thicker, but luckily others had been here in the past few days because there was a pretty good trench all the way to the cabin.

4 AM Trenches

I made it to the cabin much faster than I’d anticipated. I took this trail on my way to Missouri Mountain last summer, and from what I’d remembered it had been a long slog full of switchbacks. But for some reason today it didn’t seem to take me much time at all. The cabin was surrounded in snow.

From here on out snowshoes were mandatory. There was no trail from the cabin through the willows/gulch area, so I had to make my own trail. Luckily I kind of knew how the trail went, since I’d hiked this area before. It was really cool to be breaking my own trail, and doing so successfully! This was the first real time I’ve broken trail: I hiked Humboldt Friday and broke a little bit of trail, but mostly followed others’ tracks. In fact, this was only the second time I’ve ever been snowshoeing, and I kind of liked it! It was so cool to be 5 or more feet above the trail in the snow, traversing over willows instead of around them. There was no way I could have done this a year ago, and I was proud of my route finding.

When I turned around I saw the alpine glow of the sunrise

I stayed by the creek and headed towards the Elkhead Pass/Belford Summit Junction.

The sun was really starting to come up, and the view of Missouri Mountain was fantastic!

This is where the wind really started to pick up. It was relentless for the rest of the day, hovering around 35mph. It looked like all that snow in the gulch was directly blown down from the mountains.

I looked at the route before me up Belford, and as I was ascending thought not for the first time how grateful I was to have gone back for those snowshoes.

10 Belford AM

The hike up Belford took forever. It just kept going and going and going up, up, and up. And that wind! Without the sunlight that wind was chilling. I just kept moving, pretending it was the Manitou Incline, and trudged up that mountain wearing those snowshoes, breaking trail.

There were several false summits to Belford, which were a bit annoying but anticipated.

12 False Summits

Finally (and I mean finally, as I was exhausted) the real summit of Mt Belford came into view and I thought to myself: 4500’ in snowshoes for 4 miles was exhausting!

I was frozen, but set up my gorillapod and camera and took a summit photo.

14 Belford

and just because it was there (they usually aren’t) a photo of the summit marker

I took a look around. The view was magnificent!!!

I didn’t take out my instructions/map, but remembered the route to Mt. Oxford would be clearly visible from this location. It was just 1.5 miles away. I followed the clearly defined path with my eyes and my jaw dropped.

No way! There was no way I was doing that today in these conditions! That’s when I took a closer look, realized I was looking at Mt. Harvard (which I’ve already hiked), breathed a sigh of relief and looked east. There I saw the second summit I was after today: Mt. Oxford.

It looked doable in today’s conditions. That is until I made it to the ridge. The ridge down from Belford to Oxford was covered in snow. There weren’t any tracks to follow (either no one had taken this trail in the past few days or that relentless wind had covered the tracks with snow). As with any hiking/climbing challenge, I don’t make a decision to hike/climb until I’m right up next to the obstacle. I often find it’s easier than it looks when you’re up close. I decided to just take this ridge one obstacle at a time, and if I felt uncomfortable gave myself permission to turn back. This was supposed to be an easy winter 14er, so I should be able to do this, even in these conditions.

I looked for the areas with the least exposure and least snow, and began my descent. It was really cool making tracks! I carefully made each foothold by drawing a line with my trekking pole and stamping it down with my boot, making sure I had a firm stance before traversing.

20 Making Tracks

It was more than I’d anticipated running into today, but nothing I couldn’t handle. Microspikes/snowshoes weren’t needed.

I made it down to the saddle and looked back up at Belford, and then up at Oxford. Wow.

21 Back at Bel up at Ox

The saddle was dry and came with absolutely amazing views! I stowed my snowshoes and was off.

22 Saddle Views

To the north there was a small cornice that provided interesting views as well.

I looked ahead of me at the route up Oxford. Piece of cake. And it was.

The summit was actually closer than I’d anticipated (the first outcropping, not the second). I took a summit photo.

25 Oxford

And another one of the summit marker (because it had one too!)

I turned around to see what I’d accomplished thus far today. What a view of Belford!

I started back, ready to tackle that ridge again head on, and this time uphill. I gathered my snowshoes and kept an eye on the weather, since it was supposed to snow after 3pm (it was currently around noon). While all morning it had been windy and clear the clouds were now starting to form. I hiked back up the ridge using the footsteps I’d made on my way down. It took a while but I was successful!

At the summit of Belford the second time I stopped for a bit to really take in and enjoy the view. Since now the hardest part of the hike was behind me, I felt I could afford to rest for a bit. I sat down at the summit marker and took a deep breath.

After a grueling and extremely windy 6000 feet in elevation gain in 6 miles (in snowshoes) I sat at the summit of Mt Belford, my 3rd 14er Peak today (out and back, so 2nd time here today). Suddenly the wind stopped and all was still. This is what I saw.

28 IMG_5026

Immediately tears came to my eyes. It was like God knew I was the only person in the world with this view and he wanted to show off just for me. I was absolutely mesmerized by the intense beauty before me. It’s the closest thing to a religious experience I’ve ever had. All the hard work of the day and the frozen extremities that came with it was worth it! I sat there for 5 minutes before he picked up the wind again and reminded me to get my butt off that mountain: a storms coming in.

Of course I took another photo, trying and failing to capture the beauty around me.

I walked over the summit and took a look at the rest of the route down to the gulch. It looked like the sun had melted some of that earlier snow.

I was making good time, so I decided to have a little fun and use my remoteness from any other human being to practice some winter skills without embarrassment. Much of the earlier snow was gone, so I was able to safely practice glissading and running down the snow without worrying about sliding too far or out of control. I did this for most of the hike back down, laughing as I went.

Back down at the gulch, this was my view back down towards the cabin and back up at the route I’d come. As you can see, clouds were just beginning to form for that storm anticipated for tonight.

33 Missouri Gulch Front and Back

I put my snowshoes back on, crossed a frozen river of ice, and waiting for me on the other side was a ptarmigan. I knew he was a male because he had a red stripe over his eye. He just stood there, looking at me, and then slowly turned towards Missouri Mountain and looked over his shoulder, as if he was beckoning me to follow.

34 Ptarmigan

I took several pictures, thanked him for being so cooperative, and followed my snowshoe tracks back through the gulch and down the mountain. It looked like several people had actually hiked up to the gulch today, as around the cabin there were several new ski and snowshoe marks, but no people to be seen. The trench was also a bit more compact than it had been earlier.

The hike back down seemed longer than the hike up, and I kept my snowshoes on for most of it. Somewhere along the way I lost my beanie which was unfortunate (I’ll make another one). As I was nearing the end of my route I kept looking for signs of a mountain lion (nope) or any other form of wildlife (again, nope). As I approached the area with the grave in the daylight I realized I was ‘told’ to get those snowshoes exactly as I passed the grave… Hmmm.

I crossed clear creek and my days hike was over.

36 Clear Creek

On my drive home I thought about the details of today’s hike, and how this is something I wouldn’t have been able to accomplish a year ago. I was glad I’d saved these ‘easy’ 14ers for winter-like conditions, as it allowed me to apply the knowledge I’ve learned thus far (snowshoeing, traversing ridges covered in snow), while giving me time to practice more intense skills in a safe environment (glissading, self arrest, running down a snow field).

Here are some summit videos. The views were amazing!

Video of Mt. Oxford –

Mt Humboldt – 14,064′ – Second Summit

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Humboldt Peak – 14,064

9 miles RT (East Ridge)

5000’ Elevation Gain

I’ve been itching to do a 14er, but my schedule and the weather hasn’t been cooperating. My hiking days are typically Friday, and for some reason the weather in the high country’s great all week, but when Friday rolls around the temperatures drop, the winds picks up, and it starts to snow.

The weather didn’t look too great today, but I’d been following the weather surrounding Humboldt all week. Humboldt is the only 14er (out of 35) I haven’t hiked solo, and to make this whole thing official I figured I’d try it from the winter (East Ridge) route since I took the West Ridge last time. The weather wasn’t great, but I had noticed in the past few days the predicted snow levels had gone down consistently (from 4-7 inches to 2-6 and finally down to 1-3) so that was a plus. Unfortunately the wind levels were picking up (those rose to 55mph). The temperatures hovered around the low 30s, which was great except that meant post-holing.

I didn’t need to summit today. I’ve already summited this peak, so I figured I’d go into this as a learning experience. Kind of a way to test my skills and see how far I could go without needing to commit to summiting. I don’t have a ton of winter 14er experience and I wanted to see what a hike would be like in these conditions. I could always turn back when I felt I’d had enough or if I didn’t feel safe.

First of all, that drive to the trailhead: Insane! I have a Tundra, and that thing can handle a lot. I’ve done the South Colony Lakes 4WD trail in early June, and it was nothing compared to this! I put my truck in 4WD and tackled it head on. I wouldn’t recommend it an any time of year if you don’t have a high clearance 4WD, but particularly not now when the trail was covered in ice and mud and slush, and in the dark it was difficult to tell which was which. I’m pretty confident driving off road, but I’ve never done the whole off-roading in this much ice/mud/slush before, so I didn’t want to push it too far. I probably drove further than I should have, and parked about ¼ of a mile before the Rainbow Trail Trailhead. There were no tire marks after this point (note: I took most of these pictures on the way back because it was snowing too hard or too dark to take pictures in the morning).

I started at 6:45am. The trail at this point was pretty dry. I crossed South Colony Creek and turned right.

There were tons of downed trees on this trail!

4 Downed Trees

After hiking about a quarter mile I saw a cairn to the left. It’s small, and you really have to be looking for it. With more snow it’s most likely covered.

5 IMG_8600

This was my indication to start hiking northwest through the trees. This is what that looked like.

6 IMG_8601

Obviously I wasn’t hiking this trail in “winter enough” like conditions. I hiked up towards the ridge, and then followed the ridge southwest.

I was fighting putting on my snowshoes, but I was postholing. Each step put my boot at least a foot under the snow, and finally I said enough is enough! I’d paid for those snowshoes and hiked them in this far, I might as well put them on! So I did. Woot! This was great! I was still postholing, but only about 6 inches or so instead of a foot or more.

The snow on the ground got thicker and so did the snow falling. I made sure to step extra hard into the snow so it’d be easy to find my tracks on the way back down. I wasn’t necessarily breaking trail, but there wasn’t a clear trail to follow either. The last tracks were old and most of them had been covered by snow or melted. The snow was falling as predicted, but it wasn’t intense. It was actually kind of nice because it wasn’t freezing out. The snow cooled my face.

As I hit about 11,500’ the wind started picking up. I headed west until I made it to treeline. At this point the snow had been thick, but abruptly stopped here, so I took off those snowshoes and put on my balaclava and goggles.

From treeline there was no direct route to the top: you’re supposed to make your own trail. My directions said from here the rest of the route would be visible: Just look for the peak and head towards it. Um… not possible. This was my view:

The wind was really insane here and there was no visibility. Wind was blowing at a constant 35-40mph with many wind gusts (I’m guessing 55mph+, as predicted). I could feel the wind gusts approaching. After the second one knocked me down I decided to anticipate them and lie flat whenever I felt one approaching.

The only good part about those wind gusts was it cleared the visibility to about 50 feet in front of me for 2 or 3 seconds after it passed, so I’d hunker down, and then look up towards where I wanted to hike to see what was ahead of me. I never was able to see the top of any mountain. I took this selfie because I noticed everything about me was frozen and I thought that was pretty cool because I wasn’t that cold!

I couldn’t see where I was supposed to go, or even more than about 10 feet in front of me, so at this point I had a choice to make. Turn around and head back, wait out the weather (it was supposed to clear around noon and it was about 9:30am) or pull out my map and compass and practice those orienteering skills I teach to others for situations like this. You can guess which one I chose. (Note: I should have turned back).

I headed northwest up the ridge, being careful not to get too close to the edge of the ridge and trying to stay away from large areas of snow (I used those as landmarks). I kept trudging on, following the ridge. I’m 95% sure I made it to the summit, because when I pulled out my phone and looked at the GPX file it said I was there. You’d never guess though by the picture…

I went to get some pictures with my cell phone, and before I could do so noticed I was at 41% battery. Time to head down. Wait, 37%… 35%… 31%… all lost within about 10 seconds. Argh! No!!! This was insane! I turned off my phone and booked it down that ridge! I have a lot of great survival skills, but knowing my phone was going this fast made me start to worry. It’s like a safety blanket I didn’t want to lose. Yes, I know, I know, (I know!!!) but when it hits you as reality in these types of conditions your priorities change: you really do want that phone to work! (I’d left my portable charger in the truck because this was only a 9 mile hike: never again!).

That ridge lasted forever. Did I really hike all this way up? It felt like it would never end, and without visually being able to see how much route I had left I kept checking my compass to make sure I was headed in the right direction and my altimeter to see how much further I should have to go.

I made it back down to where I’d exited treeline and looked for the snowshoe tracks I’d so carefully made. They weren’t there. Drat. The wind had completely filled in those 6 inch post-holes with fresh snow! This is what I saw…

I quickly put on my snowshoes and started jogging as fast as I could carefully jog down. I wanted to get off that mountain. At this point the visibility was great… there just weren’t any tracks to follow. I headed towards the ridge, and when I made it I breathed a sigh of relief! Now all I had to do was follow the ridge until it ended and head southeast.

At this point my anxiety dropped because I could see where I was and I knew where I was headed. But I was also exhausted! I was wearing winter hiking boots, trudging through the snow in snowshoes that were postholing, and that wind took a lot out of me. I haven’t been this tired at the end of a hike in a very long time. And it wasn’t even that long of a hike! I’d guess it was less than 9 miles total, but in those conditions, it was insane!

I noticed a small dam at the bridge…

I learned so much from todays hike. I really tested my abilities, and I’m proud I was able to use the skills I have to stay safe in a not so safe situation. Also, I don’t think I’ll be purposely doing that again. Anyway, I’m back at it!

Oh, and the weather cleared up as I headed back down.

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