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For anyone who hasn't followed my saga, these reports are a bit late ... this one deals with the period from Friday, 9/17, through Saturday, 9/18. The weather was fantastic that Friday and Saturday, but took a turn for the worse Saturday night with mixed rain and snow moving in. There was a beautiful break in the weather on Sunday which, unfortunately, I didn't take advantage off.
In any event, this segment included a successful climb of Sneffels' SW ridge (class 3) from the East Dallas Creek / Blue Lakes TH on the north side.
Hopefully I can finish up my travails on one subsequent report: a successful -- and very wet -- ascent of Huron Peak's North Ridge route (class 2) from the South Winfield TH; a scouting trip of Democrat's class 3 North ridge from the Montgomery Reservoir trailhead; and a final, snowy failure on Gray's standard class 1 route, the North Slopes.
I had been foiled on Sneffels' sw ridge a few days earlier. From there I had gone and done Wetterhorn. The morning of the Thursday the 16th (I think), I drove my Montero Sport back down to Lake City, let the visitor's center know I was still alive, and then looped back through Montrose and Ridgeway to Ouray, where I once again took advantage of the hot springs at the Viesbaden. I really love that town! After cleaning up and having lunch at a main street deli, I headed back north to Ridgeway, turned west and took the turnoff to the East Dallas Creek TH, which is on the north side of Sneffels. There are some great views of Sneffels from this route.
I found a fantastic place to camp along a stream; some sites were already occupied by hunters ... I wasn't dressed in blaze orange but no one tried to use me for target practice.
That afternoon I just hung around at my great site, had a few beers, read, got my stuff ready, and enjoyed the bright sun.
Got a reasonable start at about 8:30 am ... there already were about 3 - 4 cars at the trailhead. It was a beautiful, albeit windy day. Overall the Blue Lakes trail is really enjoyable: although it starts very steeply right out of the gate, the trail's surface is nice -- not a lot of "rubble," but relatively even dirt surfaces. This route from the north is a bit longer ... I imagine 13 - 14 miles round trip including the summit ... but I'd highly recommend it to anyone over the Yankee Boy approach. The Blue Lakes are beautiful -- and very blue, at least the lower one. As you work your way past the final Blue Lake, you get a glimpse of the many switchbacks that lead up out of the basin to Blue Lakes Pass (which is where this trail and the Yankee Boy trail meet up).
The switchbacks were fairly tedious ... I'd guess in the summer, though, the hillsides would be packed with wildflowers.
I reached the pass at about 11:30 am ... still very beautiful, and very windy. I closely studied the photo of the sw ridge in Roach's book. I have to admit I wasn't entirely clear on which ridges to go between on the west side, but I seem to have stumbled across the notch he mentions at 13,500 feet.
Overall the exposure, I think, is not too radical; there were a few shorter traversing sections higher up, on the east-facing side where you have to watch your step, but nothing unmanageable. In fact, as I was finishing up the final hand-and-foot section, a couple was downclimbing with their dog (who had a yellow ribbon tied around his neck). Talked with them for a bit; they were from Utah and were camped by the lower Blue Lake.
When I made the summit I met two guys who had come up the scree-laden, south slopes. One guy, Brett, had left his two dogs a bit below the summit. We chatted for a bit, then he took off to retrieve his dogs. I left shortly thereafter. Somehow I found myself to the southwest of the couloir Roach mentions as leading to a notch near Sneffels' summit. Once again my route-finding had abandoned me, but I did finally spy the couloir and get into it. Brett -- a river and hiking guide from Dolores -- his dogs and I hooked up to go back together. He actually had come from East Dallas Creek, but had taken the Blaine Basin approach, which he wasn't too excited about.
By going down the standard scree route, we had to descend and then regain Blue Lakes Pass from the south, but I for one was not up for downclimbing the sw ridge, and it didn't add too much.
Saw about three parties coming up the standard south slope route; honestly, between the scree, loose dirt, and boulders, it doesn't look like a whole lot of fun.
Anyway, when we had hiked up and over Blue Lakes Pass and on down to the first Blue Lake, we sat down and took a break. Brett's dogs naturally jumped in the water. One of them, a larger yellow-lab mix, strolled over by Brett, soaking wet. He (the dog, not Brett), had a big grin on his face and looked ready to shake himself off. "Don't DO it ... don't DO it!" Brett warned him. To which admonition he (the dog) just strolled over to me. THEN he shook himself off all over me. What the heck, I'm a dog lover and the water felt kind of good.
We had a nice hike back to the cars, although I was very tired for the last few miles. Brett's dogs were tired too: as soon as we got back to the TH parking area, they just tipped over on their sides and hardly paid any attention to the now-more-numerous hunters in the area.
Brett packed up his hounds and headed back to Dolores, while I drove back down about a mile, hoping against hope my camp area would still be vacant -- I was in no mood to bumble around in the dark in my usual manner, driving too long and too late. My site was still vacant! Whoo hoo! I pulled in, went through my evening rituals, which this night included a few Sierra Pale Ale's and freeze-dried stroganoff, and crawled into the back of the Montero for a pretty good night's sleep.
The next day (Saturday, 9/18), I'd be driving east, over the incredibly scenic Cottonwood Pass and on to Huron's South Winfield TH, from where I'd have a fun -- but very, very wet -- climb of the north ridge on Sunday. |
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