I was looking for another quick summit this week, and was halfway to the trailhead before I remembered the road to Mosquito pass would most likely be snowed in, adding about 5 miles to the hike. Oh well, I should still be able to make it an early day. I made it to where the road for Mosquito Pass and 12 meet and due to previous experience with this road in winter decided to park at this junction. I could have driven about a mile up Mosquito Pass road, but eventually the drifts would have made it necessary to find a place to park. By parking below I’d be getting in some extra mileage (if not much elevation gain).
I parked, gathered my gear, and headed up Mosquito Pass road at 6am.
I was excited to try out my new camera. I tend to go through cameras quickly, as I put them through a ton of use in extreme conditions. The last time I purchased a camera I bought one that was less expensive, reasoning since I buy them so often I’d like to spend less money. I found out the hard way cameras that are point and shoot don’t operate well when it’s less than 30 degrees outside.
The past few weeks I’ve been using a stylus with my iPhone, but I’ve found when it’s extremely cold out even the stylus doesn’t work (although warming the stylus up in my mouth sometimes helps). After my climbing accident at Garden of the Gods last week where I not only came out road-rashed and bruised but also I crushed my stylus, I decided to just purchase another DSLR. Yes, they’re heavy, but they withstand the cold.
I hiked along the dirt road for 2.5 miles. The conditions were varying, and I was glad to have worn my microspikes.
About a mile in was the furthest anyone has been able to drive recently
I passed North London Mill
After passing North London Mill I turned left at the junction
It was here the sun began to rise and I started trying out my new camera
It was also here I started postholing more than I could stand. I decided to put on my snowshoes, and wore them until I made it to the Mosquito/London saddle
I followed the road up to London Mine
At times the road was completely covered in drifts
The road was covered in snow as I got closer to the mine, so I just had to kind of wing it.
The moon was just going behind the ridge as I reached the mine
I continued past the mine, heading west
And followed the road to the saddle. From a distance this road looks mild, but I’ve taken this route in winter before, and the drifts can get pretty steep and go down quite a ways into the drainage (the pictures don’t do the drop offs justice). It’s a good idea to have traction and an ice axe for this part in winter
I made it to the London/Mosquito saddle and took off my snowshoes, turned left, and followed London’s ridge southeast.
This ridge goes for almost exactly a mile. After initially skirting to the right, I was able to stick to the ridge proper the entire time, and only postholed a few times in the snow. This is all class 2, with the snow making it an easy class 3 in just a few areas. Also, I didn’t remember it until I got back home and looked at my pictures, but the one drawback of this camera are the sun spots when directly facing the sun. I know what causes them, I just need to be more diligent in the future against preventing them. Here’s the ridge route, with a bunch of false summits:
About halfway along the ridge I heard a loud buzzing, looked around, and saw a biplane flying very low. I watched it go around the mountains and through the passes. So cool! I wanted to wave, but didn’t think they could see me, and also worried they might think I needed help if I did.
Here’s the final trek to the summit
I summited London Mountain at 8:30am
London Mountain Summit
I had a good view of Monday’s summit: Pennsylvania Mountain
Here’s the trek back down the ridge
Yes, this is all class 2/easy class 3 to avoid snow
And back towards the mine
Here I heard another loud buzzing and saw a helicopter fly overhead. It didn’t look like a rescue helicopter.
Here’s the path the road takes back down
I made it back to where I’d put on my snowshoes, took them off, and turned right onto 12 and followed it back to my truck. About halfway back my microspikes broke, both of them, so I guess it’s time to get out the needle nose pliers again. I made echoing clanking sounds as the chains scraped the dirt as I walked the rest of the way back.
I made it back to my truck at 10:45am, making this a 10.63 mile hike with 2305’ of elevation gain in 4 hours, 45 minutes
I had a lot of work to get done today, but the weather was really nice and I was itching to get out and hike something above 10K, so I picked a peak I could do relatively quickly. In fact, I think the drive to the trailhead was longer than the hike. I arrived at the Pennsylvania Mountain Trailhead at 6am and got out my gear. There are a few turns to navigate to get too the trailhead. Pro tip: When I’m unsure if I’ll have cell service on my drive out (thus being able to pull up Google Maps, etc.) I create a road map using CalTopo and add it to my GPX coordinates for the day. This way I can follow a GPX track back to the main road when I’m done with my hike and don’t need to worry about memorizing or printing out directions.
I parked at the end of a plowed dirt road in a residential area. The trail starts to the right
I began with my snowshoes on, and kept them on until making it out of the trees. I’m sure there’s a trail here in summer, but in winter there wasn’t a solid trail (but there were a lot of ski tracks). I headed northwest through the trees and willows to treeline.
Once at treeline the route was obvious. I started climbing the east ridge
The only downside? There were a few false summits
This was the last one however, and included a small decrease in elevation and a plateau before increasing in elevation again. Here’s the overall route. It’s really more of a hill at this point than a peak
It’s best to stick to the ridge so you don’t lose too much elevation. Here I saw a small herd of elk. They’re in the photos, but too far away to really make out. I headed northwest towards a mining claim and rock outcropping
Here’s the final push to the summit
The summit was relatively flat. It was difficult to determine exactly where the true summit was. There was a wind break and a cairns, but they didn’t seem to be at the true high point. I decided to just walk around all over the summit.
Summit Selfie
Summit of Pennsylvania Mountain
This had been a quick hike so far, and the day was beautiful. I wanted to stay longer on the summit, but I had to get to work. I turned around and headed back the way I’d hiked in
I stopped by the mine on the way back. There wasn’t much left of the structure
Then I aimed for the knob in the ridge
And then headed back down all those small, false summits
There were numbered markers scattered all over the hillside. I think they have something to do with the mining claims
Back near treeline I put my snowshoes back on and headed through the trees and willows to the parking area.
Here’s a look at the road out
I made it back to my truck at 8am, making this a 5.35 mile hike with 1509’ of elevation gain in 2 hours.
It had been less than a week since the accident at Garden of the Gods, and I was still quite sore, but when Tim asked me if I wanted to go climbing I said yes. I had bruises all over my body, my knees and elbows were scraped up, and my neck was still sore, but I needed to get back in the saddle ASAP, with someone I could trust.
We met in the morning and all drove together (Emily, Tim, and I) to shelf road. This was my first time there: shocking! I know, but I’m more of a solo climber, and if it’s a nice day I’m in the mountains.
There’s a bathroom at the trailhead and lots of loose dogs running around. This seems to be a popular place to bring your pooch. When we arrived it was cold and windy, so we brought extra gloves and jackets and hiked down the dirt road to The Piggy Bank
There were a lot of people climbing, but still plenty of spots. We found an empty area, set down our gear, and got ready. Tim asked me to belay him, but Emily wanted the practice, so she belayed while Tim set up the first route.
Then it was Emily’s turn to climb. I let her wear my climbing shoes.
Here’s a video of her on her way down (the people next us were noisy)
I was up next. I put on my helmet and winced: I had a bruise from wearing it when I fell and every place my helmet touched my forehead was tender. However, I’m proud to say I made it to the top, and back down, without incident!
After my fall earlier in the week I was a bit scared to do this again so soon, but also knew it was necessary. In all, we each got in 3 runs for the day. Tim belayed Emily and I, and Emily belayed Tim (and I helped anchor her while he came back down). It was a great day, warming up as the afternoon went on. I was really glad we made it out! Here are some more picture highlights (the last run was the hardest, but they were all about 5.8).
I was even able to take my jacket off for the last run, which always makes for a great day. Thanks Tim for bringing us out today!
I was still sore from the fall a few days ago, but needed to get out, so I made a reservation to hike the Manitou Springs Incline first thing in the morning. I’ve done this route several times, so I’m just going to show you how beautiful it was that day.
At the top I got some lensball photos of the incline and hikers. There seemed to be a lot of regulars here today.
Then I continued on to Rocky Mountain. I broke trail here, and got another lensball photo of Pikes Peak from the summit
I once again broke trail to Mt Manitou, and then took the Barr Trail down. It was icy everywhere!
Here’s a look at the Incline from later in the day
I’m writing up this accident report to analyze what went wrong and what steps I need to take in the future to make sure it doesn’t happen again.
The day before Eric asked me if I’d like to go climbing so he could get some adveture photos. The weather was great, so of course I said yes. I got to the parking area about 10 minutes early so I could put on my gear, but those plans changed when I saw the bighorn sheep. They were quite sociable today, sitting/standing/grazing just off the trail. I quickly called Eric and told him to meet me at the sheep.
I noticed while the Bighorn Sheep were fine with humans, they tensed every time someone walked by with a dog. There were park rangers there to make sure no one got too close. I think it’s funny how when you’re at Waterton Canyon or Garden of the Gods the sheep will stand 10 feet away from you as if you aren’t even there, but if you see one while on a mountaintop they bound away as soon as they see you.
We didn’t stay long because we had some climbing to do. We went back to our cars (we’d unknowingly parked right next to each other) and got out our gear. Eric told me all I needed was a harness and my rope. I asked him if my 60-meter rope was enough? Oh, more than enough he assured me.
Together we walked through the pathways towards West Point Crack. Here’s the entrance
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
On the south side there’s a gully to climb up
Here’s looking back from the top of the gully
At the top of the gully is a class 4 climb of about 8 feet
Eric went up first and took a picture of me upclimbing
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
From here we staged our gear. There were two bolts in the wall we were going to use to do the first rappel. Eric told me we’d rap onto a rock, then again to the bottom. He wanted to counterbalance each others weight and have each of us go down on one side of the rope. I’d never done this before, but he assured me it was quick and easy and we were only rappelling about 10 feet or so onto a ledge the size of a kitchen table (it ended up being more like 20 feet). From there we’d clip in, retrieve the ropes, and rappel the rest of the way down.
Here’s Eric setting up the gear
It was a beautiful day, so I took a selfie
I went over first and Eric stayed at the top (even though we were going to go together?). We rapped off the back side so our ropes wouldn’t get stuck. Here’s looking down
All was going well, until I realized there was a gap in between the rock I was rappelling off and the one I was supposed to land on (which was really more of a spire). Also, the wind picked up and started swinging me around. I ended up rapping further into the gap than I’d intended and more to the west, and since I was only on one side of rope I couldn’t tie off to climb back up. I needed my breaking hand to make sure I didn’t fall, yet I needed two hands to climb.
At this point I knew I had to manage my adrenaline, because if I didn’t I was going to fall and die, and I wasn’t going to allow that to be an option: The rope didn’t go all the way to the ground. It took me a solid 5 minutes (which felt like an hour), but I was able to get a slight grip on the rock (with my street shoes: my climbing shoes I’d been assured hadn’t been necessary were in my pack on my back). I managed to turn myself around and upclimb about 6 feet to the top of the rock and clip myself in. This rock was the size of a small dining room table. I’m guessing 4 feet across. There was snow where I needed to clip in.
I clipped in and calmed my nerves as Eric rapped down, easily pushing himself off the rock and landing on the spire. I was a little jealous: He had the advantage of height and he knew the route. Eric didn’t overshoot the ledge.
Here I am sitting on the ledge; in front of me, past the rope, is where I’d originally rapped too far and had to upclimb.
Here’s looking up from the ledge
Eric was practicing ghost anchors, and using paracord to retrieve the rope. This ended up getting messy, and I wouldn’t recommend this technique. We retrieved the rope and set it again, to rap off the back side of the rock again. Eric threw the ropes, and they looked a bit jumbled. He asked me to untie them when I got down to them and throw them down again. I couldn’t see around the spire below, so I asked if he was sure the rope was long enough? (not like there was much we could do about it now) and he assured me they were. I tied knots in the ends. Eric looked at me like I was crazy.
Once again, I went first, but this time with both strands of rope. I immediately felt safer. Eric got some pictures of me on my way down. Unfortunately, his go-pro stopped working (which was kind of the reason we were doing this in the first place) so we don’t have a lot of pictures.
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
As I went down, I noticed the ropes were tangled more than I’d anticipated. I came to a place I could sit and untangle the ropes. I didn’t need to re-throw them, as their weight drew them downward.
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
I continued my decent. That paracord was kind of a nuisance, but at least the ropes were straight
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
As I rounded the spire I now had a good look at the rest of the route, and to my shock, the roped did not go!!! I wanted to scream! I did notice however, that they landed just even with a very thin ledge (we’re talking maybe 6 inches wide). I was so glad I’d tied knots in the end of the rope!!! I rapped down as far as the ropes would allow, then unclipped and hugged the wall. There wasn’t room for both Eric and I on this ledge, or to be attached to the rope at the same time. I looked around and noticed a goat trail to the left that went up; That route looked a bit sketchy, but safer than where I was. I told Eric I was going to climb to the ledge while he rapped down, then we’d re-secure the ropes for a third time behind the rock I was aiming for and rap down a final time to the bottom. The circle is where the ropes ended, and the line is where I climbed for safety
Here’s looking back from my perch. I felt safe with this plan, because we’d rapped in this area before (after upclimbing to this spot).
Eric made his way down, and started to bring down the rope, but it got caught on something. He spent some time going back and forth on the ledge, trying to dislodge the rope.
It wasn’t working. The rope was stuck, but one side of the rope went all the way to the ground, so we decided to brainstorm.
In the end we decided to have me rap down first, with Eric belaying me from above on the one piece of rope we had. Then I’d fireman belay him down. We had about 25 feet or so below us to get to the ground. Afterwards we’d go back to the car, get another rope, and retrieve the one that was stuck. Eric wrapped the stuck rope around his waist and shoulder for good measure, and after saying “You’re sure you’ve got me?” and Eric replying “Yes” I went over backwards.
Almost immediately we started tumbling. As soon as I said “I thought you said you had me?!?!?” I noticed he was falling too. We fell together, tumbling and sliding the 25 feet to the ground. Here’s a picture of the line we fell
It all happened very quickly, and as soon as we stopped we both got up and did a head to toe check. Nothing broken, but a lot of scrapes and what were going to be bruises. I looked around, hopeful someone had seen our fall and tell us what had happened, but none of the dozens of park visitors so much as looked our way.
We both thanked God it hadn’t been worse, then talked about what had happened: the rope that Eric couldn’t get unstuck by himself had dislodged under our combined weight.
I’m writing this to process what happened, and to try to prevent it from happening again. Here are some of the things I did wrong:
I didn’t ask enough questions, instead relying on Eric’s experience. I should have asked for more clarification on what we were doing before we started. Had I done so, I would have seen the spire from below I’d be rapping onto, and noted the gap. I most likely would have worn my climbing shoes (they were in my pack, after all).
I wouldn’t have rapped on both sides of the rope for the first rappel. I still have no idea when he wanted each of us on different sides of the rope, since we never rapped together.
I should have put on my climbing shoes from the beginning, but definitely after the first rappel.
I also would have brought two 60-meter ropes and tied them together, instead of relying on one rope and rapping several times. Two ropes tied together would have made it from the top to the bottom, and we only would have needed to rappel once. We had the ropes in the car, but I had only asked if one rope was enough, not if two would have been better (you need to be specific with Eric: I didn’t realize we were rapping 3 times until we were done with the second).
When the rope had gotten stuck, I should have tried to dislodge it. Instead, I never touched the rope and relied on Eric telling me it was stuck. Maybe I could have found a different angle?
I should have insisted the ropes been thrown again, instead of untangling them myself. If I had been solo, I’d have thrown them as many times as it took to get a straight line. Also, the paracord thing stunk. It just made things tangle. Seems too risky to me.
Instead of rappelling down the last time with Eric standing I should have had him sit to belay me, or I should have put on my climbing shoes and downclimbed carefully (although, to be fair, I thought the rope was the safer option because I believed it to be stuck).
I’m sure I’ll be adding to this list.
In the end, I figure I’m better solo because I do my research and go over safety over and over again. When I go with someone, I rely too much on them being the expert, forgetting not everyone is as detail oriented as I am.
I’ve hiked Mays Peak and Kineo Mountain several times, but always through North Cheyenne Canyon. They’re currently working on the road to North Cheyenne Canyon, so I decided to hike these peaks via Bear Creek. I’ve ever been to Bear Creek before, so I thought this would be fun.
I parked at pull off 3 and was on the trail at 6:15am.
I passed through a gate and followed the road
I came to a second gate, and continued on the road
The trail follows High Drive, a dirt road, for 2.6 miles. It had recently snowed, but it seemed yesterday several skiers packed it down after the snow had subsided.
After hiking 2.6 miles I came to the saddle of Mays Peak and Mt Buckhorn (unranked). Here I turned left and was pleasantly surprised to find a boot pack on the trail to Mays Peak
This trail didn’t go all the way to the summit, but instead wound around the mountain. At the southernmost point I left the trail and made my own trail to the summit, heading north up the hillside.
This is an easy summit, especially if you’ve summited before. No one had been here since the recent snow, so there were no tracks on the summit.
A few weeks ago I dropped a summit register off, so I went to go check on it. It was buried under some snow; I took it out and placed it on a rock. Still looking good!
The tree is still decorated for Christmas. I wonder if it’ll be decorated all year long?
I followed my tracks back down to the trail, and to the Buckskin/Mays Saddle
From the saddle I took Trail 667 southwest
I was delighted to find this trail also had a boot pack
Well, at least it had tracks for a little while. It seems the hiker ahead of me at some point got tired of trenching and turned around. So I started trenching.
I followed/trenched Trail 667 for 3 miles, until I made it to the 668/622/667 Junction. Here I turned left and headed east towards the summit of Kineo Mountain.
Did I mention the wind? It was very windy all day, even though I was below treeline. Since it had snowed recently, the wind blew all the snow off the trees. This snow kept hitting me in the face.
Here are some pictures of the way to the summit. I just kept trekking east
I made it to the summit and looked for the summit register, but it was buried somewhere under all that snow and I was unable to locate it.
The trek back was much easier than the trek in, as I just followed my footprints back to the Mays/Buckskin saddle
It was still windy
And it was warming up, so ice was getting stuck in my microspikes
I made it back to the saddle and took the road back to the trailhead. Here I saw more skiers hiking up the trail, a few dogs, and a man pulling a sled with a bunch of rocks in it so it would carry him down the mountain faster in his sled. I pointed out to him there were probably rocks at the top.
I made it back to the trailhead at 12:30pm, making this a 14.36 mile hike with 3659’ of elevation gain in 5 hours, 45 minutes.
I’ve already done a detailed trip report on this route, so I’m just adding pictures and some notes/a story for today’s hike. Funny thing: It’s been almost exactly 2 years since I’ve done this hike. The end of January seems to be a good week for La Plata in winter.
I was really, really tired on the drive in, so when I got to the trailhead I decided to take a 20 minute nap before starting. I was also hoping someone else would arrive so we wouldn’t be the ones doing all the trenching: no dice. We started out at 6:30am, and were the only ones in the parking area, so we had no hopes of anyone trenching before us.
I put on my snowshoes at the truck, knowing I’d eventually need them and not wanting to take off my gloves to put them on. It was -2 degrees when we started hiking. I kept the snowshoes on for the entire hike. We started out following road 391 to the trailhead. This was a well packed down road, but not in the beginning. It looked like someone had tried to drive the snow packed road. They made it across the bridge, then obviously backed up. Funny: that was probably the hardest part of the road.
Here’s the trailhead. Note, there’s private property all around: stick to the trail
The trail was trenched! Woot! We followed the trail a short ways, and check this out: An old cabin! This is my 5th time on this trail and I’d never see the cabin before. On our way back we spent some time trying to figure out how old it was by looking at the boards, logs, chinking, etc.
On we went, following the trench as it wound through the trees and across the log bridge/through the willows. From here, it’s all uphill.
We were following the summer route, and I kept looking for a trench indicating the winter route, but we never came across one. It’s my goal this year not to let a good trench go to waste, so we decided to follow the summer route to the basin and see if we’d be able to summit this way. We hiked on some seriously steep slopes below treeline, where a slip off the trenched trail would send you sliding quite a ways into the drainage below. The trench ended as soon as we made it to the basin, so we decided to make our own trench up the ridge to the headwall. Here you can see our basic route
Also, I don’t recommend this route in winter: there’s avy danger. Today however we didn’t see enough snow to be worried. I’d wanted to teach SkydiverHiker how to use his ice axe, and there didn’t seem to be enough snow/ice to make it relevant on the way up. Here’s our route up the headwall.
I should also note it was really, really cold in the morning before the sun reached us. Several times we considered turning back, but in the end we knew the sun was just over the ridge: all we needed to do was make it up the headwall and we’d be fine. This part was slow going and slippery.
Once we made it to the ridge and I felt the sun warm my face I was ecstatic! Also, I screamed. Raynaud’s attacks are no fun, and now that the sun was warming my fingers and toes the blood rush felt like I was picking up a hot pan I couldn’t let go of. Not fun. Luckily SkydiverHiker is used to this and let me scream as loud as I needed without judgement.
It’s a really long ridge hike to the summit of La Plata Peak. My route says about 2.3 miles of ridge work. I don’t have a lot of pictures of the hike in due to my frozen fingers, so all of these pictures are from the hike out. Here’s a look at the ridge today
We trudged up this ridge, but it was such a nice day we didn’t mind much.
I kept looking back to see if anyone was poaching our trench, but never saw anyone. Such a shame! There were some small cornices forming on the ridge. Nothing too dramatic, but we stayed away from them.
At one point we stopped to get a shadowselfie and a picture of Sayres Benchmark
We summited in bluebird conditions: no wind, no clouds, just a nice, sunny day. There were some small cornices at the top.
Here’s a summit photo and video of the summit
NE La Plata
We actually stayed for a but at the summit because the weather was so nice. The views were amazing, and demanded to be appreciated. I should have put on sunscreen, but didn’t. I have much better pictures of the route down because: warmth. Check out that ridge! Here’s the overall route.
And some step by step to the headwall
Here’s looking down the headwall
I decided to go first to blaze a trail. Here’s looking back up at SkydiverHiker, waiting patiently
I spent a long time gingerly making a nice trail for SkydiverHiker to scree surf down
SkydiverHiker decided to glissade down instead (smh). This was his first real time, as I’ve had him practice before, but never where the run out was so long. He learned first hand about hitting rocks, keeping his feet up, and how long it takes to stop once you place your ice axe. He may have rolled a few times (on purpose, of course).
The snow was getting dangerously soft: we were booking it out of there, but I got a final shot of our paths down (lots of rollerballs).
We made it back to the trench and started our hike out
This part was pleasant, but my feet were thawing out, so every once in a while I’d get a sharp pain in my toes (note: two days later, I’m still having pain. Raynaud’s sucks). We saw our first people of the day; snowshoers who were just following the trench as long as it went. We let them know they had another 20 yards or so to go, and continued on our way.
We took some pictures of Lake Creek as we crossed
And made it back to my truck at 3:15pm, making this a 10.93 mile hike with 4620’ of elevation gain in 8 hours, 45 minutes.
Some final thoughts: It was a shame we were the only ones on the summit today, as it was a beautiful day. Also, if possible, take the standard winter rout that goes up the ridge sooner: our route had more avy danger than is recommended.
I get requests for this route quite a bit, and unfortunately, since I did it so early in my hiking days, I didn’t have a GPX file for the route. So this week, when the weather was extra windy above treeline, I decided to do the route again to get a good GPX file. Contact me if you’d like a copy.
I arrived at the Heizer Trailhead at 6am. It’s important to note you cannot park at the trailhead itself, but instead at the southwest corner of Cascade Park, at the corner of Park Street and Anemone Hill Road.
It was dark and icy and I had to put my truck into 4WD to back into a spot. There’s room for 5 vehicles if everyone parks nicely, and if not, 2 or 3.
I gathered my gear and was on the road at 6:20am. This is a class 1 trail from the beginning to the end. To begin, I followed the road a short distance as it curved east and then south to the trailhead.
Here’s a picture of the trailhead
The first mile of this hike is strictly elevation gain. I gained 1925’ in the first 2.4 miles of this hike, switchbacking up the side of the mountain.
Just before the elevation gain stops for good it dips down a bit
And then climbs to the highpoint
This is an obvious highpoint. “Cascade Mountain” is to the west, but you’ll need ropes to climb it (no worries, it’s unranked anyway). I continued on the trail as it now curved southwest, losing 575’ of elevation in just over a mile as it wound down to the creek.
There’s a cool rock formation as you take your first switchback down (it’s on the left)
And then it’s down, down, down, following the drainage
There’s an obvious junction, where you turn left to go to Mt Manitou (I’ll be doing this sometime soon, just because) and right to go to Barr Trail. I turned right, following trail 703.
I quickly came to another sign. Here you have to go left to avoid the Manitou Springs Water Shed and reservoir. They’re very serious about their signage of no trespassing here (something I appreciate). The sign said it was 2.5 miles from here to Barr Trail. Someone had scribbled in “4 miles” underneath. My CalTopo GPX shows it’s 4.4 miles (so obviously, the 2.5 miles is wrong; don’t get your hopes up).
I turned left at the sign, and crossed North Fork French Creek and the trail became Trail 638.
From here the well-traveled trail I’d been hiking on was now snow covered, with only one set of footprints. These footprints lasted the entire way to Barr Trail, and made it so I didn’t need to put on snowshoes. Yes, I still postholed at times, and I thought it interesting there were no footprints going in the opposite direction. It hasn’t snowed in a week, so this is proof this trail doesn’t get much use (especially in winter). Here are some pictures from along the trail, as it wound south towards Barr Trail. Notice how frequently the terrain changes? The snow levels changed too, depending on how much sun that side of the mountain received.
I crossed South Fork French Creek on a log bridge and followed the trail another 1/3 of a mile to Barr Trail. This part had some uphill to it, but was still on a class 1 trail, and bonus: it looked like some snowshoers had been I the area.
I made it to Barr Trail at 10:20am. It had taken me 4 hours to get from Heizer Trail to Barr Trail in less than ideal conditions (January). CalTopo says it was 7.75 miles of hiking. It’s obvious when you get to Barr Trail, as you come to a ‘T’ in the trail, and see this metal sign. Going right will take you to Barr Camp / Pikes Peak, going left will take you to the Manitou Incline and Barr Trail Parking Lot.
I turned around and headed back the way I’d come, following my tracks. Here are pictures of the trail in reverse. Next time I do this hike I think I want to do PT 10245 with it (I’ve already summited this point, but from the other side. It looks easily doable from this trail as well).
Back over North Fork French Creek
And following the creek to the junction, where I turned left and followed Heizer Trail
Here I gained 575’ of elevation as I hiked to the highest point (once again, cool rock formations at the highest point here). This is also where I started seeing other hikers on the trail. It looks like most people just hike to Cascade Mountain, but some make it all the way to the junction.
And then I followed the trail back down to the trailhead, losing 1925’ of elevation as I did so.
Then I followed the road back to my truck.
I made it back to my truck at 1:20pm, making this a 15.2 mile hike with 4323’ of elevation gain in 7 hours.
I’d already summited 3 peaks this week, but with my being so close to 100 14ers and winter weather moving in I really wanted to try to get in one more summit. I did a lot of weather watching: the storm kept changing areas, times, wind speeds, etc. I finally settled on Mt Columbia because I haven’t done it yet in winter and someone said they’d trenched it earlier in the week (remember, my motto this year is not to let a trench go to waste).
I didn’t make it all the way to the Harvard Lakes Trailhead on the drive in. There was too much snow and I ended up backing my truck up for about half a mile to find a good parking space. I parked here. There’s room for 2-3 vehicles if everyone parks nicely.
I gathered my gear and started hiking along the road. It’s about a mile from where I parked to the Harvard Lakes Trailhead along this road. Alost as soon as I started hiking my flashlight stopped working, so I had to get out another. When that one stopped working as well I walked for a bit in the dark, then sighed and got out my emergency charger/flashlight. It was then I realized I’d missed the trailhead, so I had to backtrack a ways. I was also very glad I’d decided to turn around/head back when I did on my drive in: the road isn’t driveable to the trailhead.
I made it to the proper trailhead, and followed the Colorado Trail as it switchbacked up the side of the mountain.
After hiking on the Colorado Trail for .8 miles I left the trail and followed the ridge. Luckily, this part was (mostly) already trenched.
From here on out it was a ridge hike. I followed the ridge to treeline (about 1.25 miles). Some of the area below treeline was trenched, but there were many areas under several feet of snow. I was stubborn and reused to put on snowshoes, postholing up to my waist several times.
Also, it takes forever to get to treeline!
Finally, it became impossible to go any further without snowshoes, so I put them on, just before making it out of treeline. Here’s a good overall view of the route above treeline. It’s important to note the true summit is still not visible (it’s behind that ridge, to the north).
Now this became a ridge hike, above treeline. I could see the clouds moving in, and indeed, it was snowing off and on. The wind was also picking up. Taking off my snowshoes, I followed the ridge as it wound northeast. First heading towards point 12042
Once there, I lost some elevation, and the ridge split. I don’t think it matters which side of the ridge you take. I went right, since there was less snow there. Here’s an overview of the route
My camera died here (due to the cold), so I started using my phone. Here are some more close-up pictures
Around this point the wind became unbearable, and I could no longer take off my gloves to take pictures with my phone, so I don’t’ have any from this point on. Also, as you can tell, the weather moved in and you wouldn’t have been able to tell much from the photos anyway. What you need to know about the rest of this hike is it’s further than it looks, it’s all class 2, the ridge goes on forever, and what you think is the summit… isn’t. The summit is actually the northernmost point, not what looks like the summit from below (that’s PT 13544). It’s a rocky summit, and I couldn’t find a summit marker (but I also didn’t look for one).
The wind didn’t let up, and I summited in whiteout conditions. It seems the 50% chance of snow after 11am was happing at 9am. I tagged the summit, turned around, and retraced my steps down that long ridge. My fingers and toes were burning inside my socks and glvoes. I had on ski goggles that kept fogging up, and I had to be careful of my footing since I couldn’t see much in front of me. As I got further down the ridge the weather let up a bit, and I could see my way back (these pictures were actually taken from my way in).
I put my snowshoes back on and kept them on for the rest of the hike. The snow started picking up again, especially as I made it back to treeline.
I made it back to the Colorado Trail, and followed it back to the road
And now to follow the road back to my truck
Along the way I was passed by a cross country skier. He seemed impressed I’d just hiked Mt Columbia, especially since it was now snowing quite a bit. I’m not gonna lie, I was a little worried about my drive out. I wished him well as I took off my snowshoes and kept trudging along the road.
Just as I made it back to the trailhead I turned and saw a white dog running towards me, no owner in sight, clenching a deer leg in its mouth.
The skier said it was his dog, assembling a deer one piece at a time. His wife soon followed after the dog, they packed up and were on their way. I made it back to my truck at 12pm, making this a 14.28 mile hike with 5498’ of elevation gain in 9 hours.
The snow was really falling, so I got out of there quickly. The roads weren’t as bad as I’d thought, and completely clear by the time I made it to town.
In the end, I was glad I’d hiked today, but will most likely do this one again to get better ridge pictures. I should have picked a better weather day.
This was a last-minute decision. I left the house at 10:30pm and made it to the trailhead by 4am, after a rather tricky/slick/whiteout conditions drive over Monarch Pass (note to self: check the weather along the route, not just for the peak you’re climbing). I also had a gas station mishap in Gunnison (long story) so my truck smelled like gasoline when I parked. I was pleasantly surprised to find CR 20 nicely plowed from Lake City. There was 1 other vehicle at the trailhead, and only room for 2.
The other vehicle looked outfitted for sleeping, and there were window coverings on the windows, so I wasn’t sure if there was someone sleeping inside. I tried to be quiet as I hit the trail at 4:30am. This is the lower trailhead, so I followed the 4WD dirt road (now packed with snow) for 4 miles to the upper trailhead.
There was some ice on the trail, but it was mostly an easy road to follow
And here’s a look at the stream crossings. There were snow bridges over the water, and you could hear water flowing under the snow.
I was still hiking in the dark when I saw a flashlight behaving erratically up ahead. As I got closer, I realized it was a skier. My flashlight was acting funky, so I couldn’t see him clearly, which was good, because he told me he was changing his pants (putting on warmer ones). His name was Paul and he sounded like he was in his 20s. He said he’d “see me up there” and I continued on.
From this point it was clear he’d been trenching with his skis, but even so, I didn’t need to put on snowshoes until I made it to treeline. I continued hiking along the road
I made it to the upper trailhead and the bathroom (I didn’t check to see if it was open, but it looked like there were game trails leading up to the door)
This is where the trail got ‘iffy’. There was no longer a trench, but if I strayed from the old trench I’d sink up to my waist in snow. I put on my snowshoes and only postholed every 30 steps or so. Here’s the upper trailhead
From the upper trailhead the trail heads northwest to treeline and then through willows.
Once at the willows I had to gain this small ridge. This was easier to do in the morning than in the afternoon (pics of my glissade route later). Here’s my path
Just as I made it up this ridge the sun began to rise. I had a great view of the sunrise over Uncompahgre
And looking back
There was no trench here, nor any sign of a previous one, so I got to make my own. Here’s my basic path
And step by step. Lots of trenching, but pretty straightforward. Your goal is to gain the ridge.
You’re aiming for this sign on the ridge. There are a lot of these signs in the area, all saying to be careful of vegetation, so make sure you aim for the one obviously on the ridge.
Once on the ridge, I turned right and followed a faint trail northwest. The snow on the switchbacks was a bit sketchy.
I gained the ridge again and traversed a short distance along the backside, looking for a short gully to climb
I took off my snowshoes at the gully and climbed up, carrying them (bad idea)
At the top of the gully I found cairns and a trail that wound back to the east side of the mountain to the summit, so I stashed my snowshoes and kept going.
I walked back and forth all along the summit to make sure I hit the actual summit. The summit is towards the middle… the pictures were better towards the west though. Also, usually when there’s a lot of snow I can see herds of animals, or at least their tracks in the basins below or on the ridges. No tracks today, so they’re all probably below treeline now.
It was a long drive back home, so I turned and retraced my steps
I made my way back to the gully and found my stashed snowshoes. I seriously wished I’d stashed them below the gully, but because I wasn’t sure of the conditions above I’d brought them with me. I carried them gingerly in my left hand as I headed down
At the bottom of the gully I put my snowshoes back on and kept them on for the remainder of the hike. I turned left and followed my tracks back to the ridge.
Once in the ridge I had some switchbacks to go down before following the ridge proper. It had only been about an hour or so, but the tracks I’d made on my way in were already gone, so I got to make new ones.
Once down the switchbacks most of my tracks were still there, so I followed them back down the basin. Side note: From here I could see the skiers tracks, and the skier still in the basin below. He’d chosen a different route to gain the ridge, and seemed to be stopping for lunch. Since he was on skis I expected him to pass me on the way down.
This is where I ran into a little bit of trouble… The skier had gone over my tracks on his way in, and in doing so made them slippery as the sun warmed. They’d turned into ice, and my snowshoes couldn’t grab onto my tracks. The snow was too soft to make new tracks. I tried to retrace my steps down, lost footing on the ice, and glissaded into the willows. The slipping wasn’t calculated, but the glissading was: Once I’d started I quickly assessed the risks and just decided to keep going.
Here’s a look back on that short glissade
And now, to hike out. The trench was still in place, so it was relatively easy. Here are some pics.
I made it back to my truck at 1:30pm, making this a 16.42 mile hike with 5069’ of elevation gain in 9 hours. I never did see the skier. Here’s a topo map of my route
Wild Wanderer 