| |
TR - 2004/07/31 – 21 Hours of the Sawatch (Oxford, Belford, Missouri, Huron, La Plata)
• Distance: 32 Miles
• Trailhead: Colorado Trail TH near Clear Creek Reservoir at 9,000 feet
• Elevation Gain: 14,820 Feet
• Partners: Aron Ralston, Bill Geist, Dave Benjes.
Saturday, July 31st
Aron, Bill, Dave and I all departed from the Colorado Trail junction with Chaffee County 390 near the Clear Creek Reservoir at 5:20am along with 8 others to kick off the Sawatch 14ers in 24 hours hike of 2004. This hike is a tradition now in its third year. I missed the first year but had a great time last year summitting Yale, Columbia, Harvard, Oxford and Belford in 30 hours and high hopes of an even more enjoyable hike this year. This year the group was broken into two groups for better logistics and more efficient hiking. Aron, Bill, Dave and I were the “mountaineers” while the other 8 hikers were the “ultra runners.” This worked out well.
Our goal for the hike was ascend Oxford, Belford, Missouri, Huron and La Plata and return to the car at the Lake Creek Trailhead on highway 82 within 24 hours. This was a supported hike and big, special thanks go out to my girlfriend Allison for her crewing work during these 21 hours.
From the Colorado Trail junction at Chaffee County 390 we hiked the very well traveled Colorado Trail up until near its junction with Mount Oxford’s long east ridge around 11,400 feet. From there it was enjoyable, scenic hiking through open trees and then open tundra terrain along the ridge to the summit of Waverly Mountain (13,292’).
Aron on the shoulder of Waverly Mountain with Mount Oxford in the background.
We could have avoided the real summit of Waverly but jaunted over and found a glass jar register placed in 1981! I noticed John “Homie” Prater’s signature from 2002 in the register. From Waverly we enjoyed some talus scrambling to the summit of Mount Oxford at 8:58 a.m. The day was looking good and our “mountaineering” group was making great time and feeling good. After some time on the summit we ran and hiked quickly to the summit of Mount Belford in 34 minutes arriving at the summit at 9:49 a.m. Looking back towards Mount Oxford we could see the “ultra runners” reaching the summit as well and waived.
After some snacking we started some more downhill running south from Mount Belford towards Elkhead Pass reaching Elkhead Pass at 10:20am. Our original plan was to descend south from Elkhead Pass, skirt below the cliffs and loose rock on Missouri Mountain’s southeast side and then take the south ridge up to Missouri’s summit. However, after some discussion we opted to take the East Ridge of Missouri Mountain ironically tempted by Roach’s description of this route as a “route...so rotten that it is relegated to this author’s nightmares.” Aron had left his prosthetic in the car so he warned us that he “may need a spot in a few places” and we agreed to it. At 10:35 a.m. we began our ascent up the route closely following Roach’s description which is very well written. We hiked along an exposed but solid ledge to the “white (orangish) band”. The first crux of this route is this white/orange band which is very loose rock with some major exposure. Holds had to be tested not once but twice before pulling on them and care had to be taken to not step on loose rocks and send them down on the others. It was tedious. Above the white/orange band was an 8-foot chimney that transitioned into some decently solid rock finally! This was the crux of the route for us all and Aron had some difficulty getting through this requiring Dave to help support his feet while Bill helped point out good holds for Aron’s left hand and occasionally pulled on his right arm to help him through the tough spots. This route contains some super sketchy loose rock that is hard to navigate with one hand! I’m not sure how Aron did it but he persevered. Once above the chimney the fun climbing began in a large, solid-rock dihedral with some fun stemming moves and a cool slab exit to the ridge line.
Bill, Aron and Dave exiting the solid rock dihedral on Missouri’s East Ridge.
I would suggest this dihedral borders on fifth-class climbing. Once on the ridge it was enjoyable scrambling to the summit of Missouri Mountain at noon straight up!
The weather was still holding wonderfully which was great as we could see over to Huron Peak and then over to La Plata Peak and knew we still had some good distance to cover. Around 12:30 p.m. we began our descent of Missouri’s West Ridge down to Clohesy Lake, our first aid station. On the two-way radios we got a hold of Allison and Dave’s girlfriend Denise down at Clohesy Lake. They had parked at the 4WD parking at 10,800 feet below Clohesy Lake. We reached the vehicle at around 1:40 p.m. and gorged on protein drinks, pringles and fresh peanut butter and grape jelly sandwiches for about 30 minutes. At this point Dave had had enough and gracefully bowed out for the day having hiked super strong all morning and keeping us all laughing and smiling with his funny comments and positive attitude. We later learned that he was not alone in dropping out after Oxford, Belford and Missouri as all eight of the “ultra runners” had called it a day after reaching their aid vehicle at the Missouri Gulch trailhead that afternoon.
At 2:15 p.m. Aron, Bill and I set up the East Slopes route of Huron Peak. Bill, Allison and I had ascended this route the day before to make sure we knew the route well and had difficulty following Roach’s directions from the start and blazed our own route up a very obvious talus blocks gully into the small basin below Browns Peak and Point 13,518 and this worked fine for us on Saturday as well. We made surprisingly good time up to the summit of Huron topping out at 4:30 p.m. under still perfect weather. After some more food and rest we headed down the nice CFI trail on Huron’s Northwest Slopes around 5:00pm. We all commented that the bottom of our feet were feeling the descents for sure but otherwise we felt great. We met Allison at the vehicle in Winfield at 6:35 p.m. and again ate heartily of sandwiches, cookies and Powerade. This vehicle supported 14er action is awesome!
Well ahead of our planned schedule, we departed Winfield at 7:25 p.m. en route for La Plata Peak via the Southwest Ridge route. Hiking up the dirt road to the 4WD parking for this route we enjoyed a wonderful sunset that got us excited for the soon-to-occur Blue Moon Rising!
Beautiful sunset seen from Winfield.
The Southwest Ridge route is a very nice and straight forward hike save some minor mushy willow walking in the basin around 11,800’. We were well above treeline and ascending the steep headwall to 13,200’ when the moon began to rise. A smoky haze in the air made the full moon appear to be a bright orange as it rose for the first hour. Stopping to take some photos and enjoy the warm, still night under the filtered light of the moon, we relaxed for a bit just taking it all in. Awesome! And on we went; scrambling up the scree and talus ridgeline towards the summit of La Plata. As we continued on and the minutes kept passing by, I vividly remembered my first ascent of this route and the numerous false summits along the ridge.
Bill hiking up La Plata Peak with the orange moon lighting the way.
This was a bit tiring on us mentally but what can you do? Downing some Clif Shots and water we pushed on to reach the summit of La Plata Peak at 11:03 p.m. I pushed extra hard towards the end to try to summit by 11:00 p.m. straight up but it was not to be. Oh well, forget the minor benchmarks.
The moonlit view from the summit of La Plata was extra special and truly awesome. We could see Mount Elbert to the summits of the four other 14ers we had summitted that day to the south.
Me, Aron and Bill in the moonlight on the summit of La Plata displaying the number of 14ers we had ascended that day.
The air was surprisingly warm and our spirits high. That was, until we saw the headlights of cars on Independence road and we realized we still had 4.5 miles and 4,300 feet of descent before we would reach the vehicle. We also had plans to meet Aron’s friend Dan from Aspen at the Lake Creek trailhead later for a moonlight ascent of Mount Elbert but our enthusiasm for that ascent was waning. So sorry Dan!
We began the descent around 11:30 p.m., found the Northwest Ridge trail and began the downward plodding. By this time our feet-bottoms and knees were feeling it a bit and delicious thoughts of a comfy bed were running through my mind. The trail was very good and easily discernable with the bright moonlight now beaming down on the north side of the mountain. However, given the time of day (now past midnight) and the length of the day (approaching the 21st hour) the trail seemingly continued forever! But finally we saw it, the nice foot bridge across the South Fork Lake Creek and it was a quick stroll from there to the vehicle by 2:00 a.m. Originally Allison had planned to leave the vehicle at the Echo Canyon TH of Mount Elbert two miles up the road from our location but private property signs there had scared her off and we were very thankful for that!
Aron’s friend Dan was waiting at the Lake Creek TH for us with his girlfriend. It was a pleasure to meet Dan again but I felt awful telling him we would not be making the Mount Elbert ascent. We were bushed and Aron had a talk to give later that day so... excuses excuses and we were driving in the vehicle and back to our rented cabin at Twin Lakes for a few hours sleep.
This was a great endurance event allowing us to see some wonderful parts of the Sawatch in one continuous hike. Big time thanks to Allison for her support and to our friends Rich Haefele and Theresa Daus-Weber for coordinating this hike.
Photos from this trip are on my Sony Imagestation site:
http://www.imagestation.com/member/?name=halladay |
|