Category: Colorado

The Decalibron

Tuesday, July 26, 2016

The Decalibron is Mt. Democrat (14,148 ft), Mt. Cameron (14,238 ft), Mt. Lincoln (14,286 ft), and Mt Bross (14,172 ft). These four 14’ers in the Mosquito range can be climbed in a single day. I started at the Kite Lake trailhead. The road to the trailhead is bad in 2 spots, one about a mile from the parking lot and another about a quarter mile from the parking lot. For details on doing this hike I recommend using 14ers.com .

Mt. Bross closed, but that didn’t stop hikers. I didn’t see fences or guards. This area is privately owned.

On summit of Mt. Democrat

View toward Mt Cameron

Summit of Mt. Cameron looking toward Mt. Lincoln

The trail to Mt. Lincoln looks scary, but isn’t as scary as it first appears. The photo doesn’t do justice to the feeling of being on the edge.

On Mt. Bross looking back on Mt. Lincoln that I had come from.

The descent from Mt. Bross to complete the loop is scree covered and very steep in at least one place shown here.

Road to Kite Lake. Bad spot closest to parking lot.

July 26, 2016
Mt. Holy Cross Ascent

July 23 – 24, 2016

Mt. Holy Cross is one of 55 mountains over 14,000 feet elevation in Colorado. At 14,005 feet it ranks 53rd. To plan your trip I recommend using www.14ers.com . That site can provide better info than l can.

I do recommend camping for most people because this would be a tough out and back in a day. I saw several single day hikers not yet finished at 6 pm and 7 pm and they had been hiking more or less constantly from 6 am. They had that dead look in their eyes. On the other hand, there was a guy who started at the parking lot at 3:30 AM and reached the summit before me. I reached the summit at 8 AM after a 2.5 hour climb.

There are 10 designated camping sites near a stream. You can double up on sites. I had no problem squeezing in my small tarp tent in site 10 that already had 2 groups of campers. There were swarms of mosquitoes. With no tent and no bug repellent, I put on my rain suit and tightened up the hood and waited out the mosquitoes. Fortunately, I hiked in late the first day and only had 2 hours of sunlight left after arriving in camp.

Also, start before sunrise to avoid dangerous storms. I started the ascent from the camp area at 5:30 AM. I was the 4th person to summit that day. There were probably somewhere around a hundred people attempting a summit that day.

Sign at trail head. There is a long 8.5 mile drive on unpaved road.

Columbine. The trail to Mt. Holy Cross has beautiful wildflowers, streams, and views of waterfalls. It would be a nice hike without doing the summit.

Early morning view before completely leaving trees.

Trail follows ridge line. Stay just to right of cairns and near ridge line all the way to the shoulder of the mountain.

I am on the summit!

I love taking photographs of the cairns.

Marmot

View of Holy Cross from near Half Moon Pass

– Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

July 26, 2016
Grays and Torreys Peak 14’er Climb

On July 10th I tackled two 14’ers at the same time. Grays and Torreys peak can be easily picked out from the Frisco area where I was staying. From Frisco, look east toward Keystone and pick out a rounded peak on the right with a pointed peak just to the left.

It is a fairly easy hike down the saddle of Grays Peak and back up Torreys Peak as long as you have the energy and stamina to reach the top of Grays Peak.

Getting there:

Getting there is a little tricky. I took the 2nd exit past the Loveland exit after passing through the Eisenhower tunnel. Right off the exit is a paved parking lot with a very rough 3 mile road leading south toward the start of the trail. Mostly trucks and SUV’s tackle this road. The road starts off right from the paved lot with some scary ruts that may make many passenger car drivers decide not to take on this road right away. After that first bad spot the road gets a little better meaning you only have to bump over large rounded rocks poking out of the roadbed. With 1.4 miles to go you reach a sign that says Private Land. Just past that spot the road ascends and reaches very large ruts. This is where I backed up in the dark about 200 yard where I could turn around and find a parking spot. I walked and hitchhiked from that point. It turned out that the road got much better after that difficult spot with large ruts. I should have pushed on. I only saw one passenger car parked at the trailhead. There were about 30 trucks and better equipped vehicles parked at the trailhead parking lot.

Here are the photos.

Trail map shown on sign at trailhead

I was warm enough until I summited Grays Peak at 14,270 feet. The wind was blowing and I was freezing at 7:52 AM. It took me 1 hour 52 minutes to hike from the trailhead to the summit of Grays Peak.

Here I am on Grays Peak with Torreys Peak in the background. I climb down Grays and up Torreys in the direction shown behind me.

Now on top of Torreys Peak (14,267 feet) with Grays Peak in background. It was warm on Torreys Peak and I soon took off the jacket to enjoy the warm sun.

This is one of the guys that gave me a ride the final mile and a half to the trailhead. He had just gotten out of the army and might have been a little crazy. The first thing he wanted to do on Torreys Peak was to make a snow angel on an overhanging snow cornice. As he jumped on the cornice he said that it wouldn’t be a good time for it to break off and plunge down the side of the mountain.

Army guy again. He is standing on other side of Torreys Peak where a climber soon appeared. This climber came up the hard way, over a sawtooth formation that was a Class 4 climb. Nice guy. He helped me identify 8 other 14’ers from this spot. Grays Peak, Mt Elbert, Mt Massive, Mt Evans, Mt Bierstadt, Longs Peak, Quandry Peak, and Mt Holy Cross. This guy had climbed many of the 14’ers and skied from the top of several including Torreys and Mt of the Holy Cross. He climbed Holy Cross straight up the avalanche chute.

Nice chunk of ice just off the top of Torreys Peak.

View of Torreys descent trail crossing snow field on a steep slope. I was nervous crossing this, but many had gone ahead of me and it wasn’t that bad. I still wouldn’t have wanted to fall and slide down this steep slope. The path was only about 18 inches wide. Not good for people passing. Strategy for me was to kick in uphill and off trail should someone attempt to pass. Luckily, I had no passers.

View of way across snow field from below.

View of Grays peak trail in valley below. It was a long walk just to get to the real climbing.

View of Torreys Peak and snow fields. Some people were glissading down. I didn’t see it, but I heard the screams. I also saw many glissade tracks including some from pretty high up the ridge. (Maybe they were tracks of rocks that rolled down the hill. Well maybe some were.)

Here is a tiny house not very far below the trailhead parking. I’ll guarantee that if someone lives here during the winter that they would have to ski out to the grocery store.

July 10, 2014
Gore Ridge Trail – Copper Mountain to Frisco

On July 9th at about 7 AM, Sandra dropped me off at Wheeler Flats near Copper Mountain. I hiked about 12 miles from Copper Mountain to Frisco on the Gore Range and North Ten Mile trails. I started at an elevation around 9700 feet and reached an elevation just under 12,000 feet somewhere above Uneva pass.

I didn’t see any other hikers on Gore Range trail; however, I ran into several campers (out and back hike) just short of Uneva Pass. There were a number of hikers on North Ten Mile trail.

Logistics:

Traveling west on I-70, take the exit to Copper Mountain. If someone is dropping you off and traffic isn’t heavy, have them pull over at the far end of the exit ramp just before the bridge across I-70. The sign for the trail head is alongside I-70 just down the embankment from the road.

This is a great point to point hike for someone staying in Frisco. You come out on I-70 just opposite Main Street in Frisco.

Here is a view of Copper Mountain.

Wheeler Lakes – Take side trail off Gore Ridge trail to right about quarter mile.

Most water was easily crossed like the stream shown below. There was one boggy area at least 50 yards across where there was no choice but to plunge in over the top of my boots.

Here you can see that trail disappears in snow on hike toward Uneva Pass.

Closing in toward Uneva pass I had to cross hollowed out snow. Here you can see where I broke through, about a 2 foot drop.

West of Uneva Pass. The pass would be to the left of the photo. This is the mountain above the pass to the south.

Below is a snow Cornice spanning west side of Uneva pass. I walked east on and off the trail to the smallest portion of the cornice, but decided against following some tracks over the top. The slope below was steep and there was also a small dropoff below the cornice at this point. I bypassed the cornice by crossing the slope the full length of the cornice to the north until I could make my way around the cornice well above the gap.

Below: North of Uneva Pass. Uneva pass is below and low point along ridge straight ahead. This is the point where I came out after making my way around the snow cornice.

Some snow after crossing Uneva Pass. Just northeast of Unveva Pass.

Here is an alpine lake northeast of Uneva Pass.

Cairns mark the way in the open areas beyond Uneva Pass.

Below you can see boulders strewn across grass below heavily bouldered slope. Located on descent well east beyond Uneva Pass where I am about to enter forested portion of Gore Range Trail.

Long descent toward North Ten Mile trail through sun protected forested slope had many areas of large snow piles obstructing trail. The tread of the trail was not easily picked out in many places and crossing so much snow made it difficult to know whether I was following a drainage or a trail. There was the reassurance of one set of footprints that were sometimes visible in these piles of snow.

July 9, 2014
Meadow Creek and Gore Range to Eccles Pass

On July 7th I hiked from Frisco to Eccles Pass and back along Meadow Creek trail and the Gore Range trail. Here are the photos.

Beaver Dam with Red Peak in background.

Beaver Lodge

The view opens up into high meadows. Somewhere in this meadow is the intersection of Meadow Creek trail with the Gore Range Trail.

Crossing snow. There wasn’t any difficult snow crossings on this day.

View west from Eccles Pass. Many snow patches in the woods. Copper Mountain and the Ten Mile Range is visible. Look closely and you will see a Marmot standing up. This little creature was trying to sneak up on me while I was eating lunch. The Marmots were very shy of me at least until I brought out the food.

Better view of Copper Mountain

Snow covering northeast descent from Eccles pass along Gore Range Trail.

On Gore Range trail, view from Eccles Pass toward Red Buffalo Pass (Gore Creek Trail). Red Buffalo Pass is the low point on the ridge where you see grass. The pass is topped by a snow cornice. It would be very difficult to pass Red Buffalo Pass on the Gore Creek Trail on a hike to Vail. I hiked from Frisco to Vail on the Gore Creek Trail 2 summers previous. There was no cornice blocking the way that summer. The Gore Ridge Trail intersects the Gore Creek Trail at the bottom of this hill near the lake seen below.

View of Gore Range Trail to northeast of Eccles Pass. This is the area behind Buffalo Mountain.

Here I am with the back of Buffalo Mountain to the right.

View north from Eccles Pass with Gore Range trail visible. I don’t think that is Red Peak, but it is somewhere over there.

Gore Range trail leads over the pass and directly into the snow.

July 7, 2014