Southwest ridge route from Lake Como Trailhead

Ellingwood Point is a really pretty mountain.  I came to this area back in 1997 with Scott.  We climbed Blanca Peak in bad weather and, if I would have known, would have climbed Ellingwood as well.  I didn’t realize that it was an official Fourteener though.  Some people dispute this but I think it should be.  It seems far enough from Blanca to qualify.  Certainly, if Bross and Lincoln are considered separate fourteeners, Ellingwood and Blanca should.

Kirk and I decided to attempt Ellingwood Point immediately after our successful ascent of Little Bear.  However, I could see in Kirk’s face that he wasn’t into the climb. He was also apprehensive about the weather. I was pretty confident though that these clouds were harmless. They were the low, wet type that swirled around summits. These weren’t thunderheads. He ended up hiking up to the alpine lake near the spot where I left the trail and began heading up the talus and the grassy ledges which led to the southwest ridge on Ellingwood. In the photo to the left, you can see the southwest ridge.  It’s the lefthand ridge in the photo.
 
I hiked up the surprisingly stable talus and then headed right (north) up the sloping benches which led directly to the low point of the saddle.   The benches or ledges can be seen as the dark line running from the talus to the low point of the ridge.  This route was easy 3rd class scrambling. It didn’t take me long at all to gain the ridge.  At the top of the ridge was a small cairn with a stick in it.   This must have been the “correct” route.  From here, the remainder of the routefinding is easy.  All I needed to do was follow the ridge all the way to the summit.  The clouds were still looking pretty good and it was fairly clear.  I could see all the peaks around me clearly.

Here’s what the route looks like on the way to Ellingwood.  The ridge is fun class 3.  There are a couple of tricky spots but nothing bad at all really.   The best advice for this route is to always stay on the ridge crest.  You only have to drop to one side or the other for only a few feet.  If you’re below the ridge for more than 50 feet, you’re doing something wrong. The ridge seemed to get progressively harder and more narrow, on average, as I progressed.  Still, it was nothing to really worry about although if you’re not an experienced mountaineer, you might not want to try this route.  However, for experienced people, I heartily reccomend the route above the standard talus route which I descended.
 
 As I continued along the ridge, I could make out Kirk at the lake far below.

At one point, very near the summit, I made the mistake of thinking that it would be easier to drop below the ridge. I dropped into a major couloir below the summit.  This was a big mistake.  The couloir was very loose and miserable. I took my first fall here too!  My feet just slipped right out from under me and I began falling.  Somehow, my body helicoptered around to where I was facing out.  Then suddenly my feet hit and I stopped instantly. It wasn’t a fall really, but the closest I’ve come to it.  The moral of the story is to stay on solid rock.
 
I finally made it to the top of the couloir and got back on the ridge and finished the final 100 feet or so of the climb.  At this point, however, the clouds had begun swirling around the summits again and I had no views at all.  It was completely gray around me.  It was pretty cold up here too with the wind and no sunlight.  I crouched down between the rocks on the summit and finished my lunch and signed the register.

As I was finishing up my lunch, the clouds began to break!  I got amazing views of Little Bear, Blanca , and even Lindsey.  After I took the pictures, I started down the standard route.  I never found much of a trail.  A few cairns here and there helped guide me, but for the most part I just went straight down the loose, annoying talus.  Finally, I made it back down to the bottom, found the trail, and started heading back to camp.
 
I got back to the campsite about 3 hours after leaving.  It was a quick and enjoyable trip.  We spent a few minutes eating and drinking then began the hike back to the jeep. Almost as soon as we got to the car, it began raining.  By the time we were back on pavement, there was a cloudburst over the peaks.  Talk about timing.

As far as favorite fourteeners go, I think the four peaks in this area are my favorite.   Every trip I’ve had down here has been really exciting.  The scenery too is some of the best in the state.

From the Como Lake Trailhead, West ridge route

Kirk and I decided to climb Little Bear Peak the weekend after my Elk Tooth hike.  Elk Tooth was not a very pleasant hike for me because I’d had a mild case of food poisoning the night before and was very weak during the climb.  I was a little worried that I hadn’t completely recovered from that trip and now we were about to attempt one of the hardest fourteeners in the state.  I also needed to climb Ellingwood Point since the first time that I came to this area to climb Blanca, I didn’t even realize that Ellingwood Point was considered a fourteener.

Kirk and I left Denver around 11 am and drove to Colorado Springs where we had lunch at the Cracker Barrel.  We then took the standard route south through Pueblo and a very nasty yet short hail storm, turned west at Walsenburg, headed over La Veta pass to the Lake Como trailhead.  I was driving the Grand Cherokee which meant that we didn’t have to hike from the trailhead like we both had already done once.  The road was pretty rough but we were able to drive pretty high.   We found a great parking spot then got our stuff together and set off for our campsite which was to be above Lake Como.
 
It really didn’t take us long at all to arrive up at the lake.  I think we only hiked for about an hour and a half and we were there.  This was much nicer than hiking all the way from the valley floor about about 8000 feet.

Along the way, we saw many jeeps and other 4WD vehicles attempting the difficult road up to Lake Como.  Some of the obstacles look very difficult.  We passed two vehicles that blew tires and one that was in the process of being winched up over one of the obstacles.  It was sort of annoying actually because the fumes from the exhaust were noticeable.  It turns out that if you’re in a hurry to get to Lake Como or above, you might as well hike the hard part; it’s a lot faster.

We arrived at picturesque Lake Como and paused for some pictures.  Little Bear looks over the Lake and we could see a lot of the route from this point.  On the other side of the lake, the road because two huge mud trenches.  I can understand why some people want this road closed.  The tundra is really damaged on the northern side of the lake.  The forest service should close it as soon as you arrive at the lake.   There’s no real reason to continue.  There is a sign at the other end of the lake that says “Road closed to motor vehicles” but everyone was ignoring it.   It was very annoying seeing jeeps drive by above treeline.
 
The area above Lake Como has some of the best and most plentiful campsites in Colorado.  So much of the ground is level and soft up here.  You’re just below treeline, so you have plenty of great views, and there’s an abundance of water too.  We camped a little below where Scott and I camped a few years ago.  I remembered the area well enough and after a little bit of scouting, I found our old campsite.

Kirk set up the tent and I headed off to refill the water supply.  The sun started setting pretty quickly and we ended up cooking our dinner in the darkness.  This was one trip where I did not pack lightly (or cheaply) on the food and it paid off.  We both ate very well and it was very satisfying.  I brought along oreos this time as well as vienna sausages.  Good stuff.  After eating, we hung out around the campsite for a while watching the stars. 

I slept great (I always do up here, strangely enough) and we awoke to a very cloudy morning.  There were clouds swirling around the summit of Little Bear.  While we were eating breakfast, the sunrise started breaking through the clouds above the peaks.  It was a really amazing sight; it seemed that the ridges were on fire.
 
We left for the Little Bear somewhere around 7am.  Our first goal was to gain the west ridge of Little Bear.   The way to do this is to climb up a unusually stable talus gully to a prominent notch in the ridge.  The gully is not that long (nothing like the one on Elk Tooth the week earlier) and it didn’t take us long at all to get up there.   Along the way, we had great views of the foreboding summit of Little Bear.   The clouds were still pretty low around the peak.

From the top of the notch, we had great views of the San Luis valley 5000 feet below.  From this point, we began hiking west along the ridge.  We didn’t stay on top of the ridge for a long time.  We dropped over to the southern side and follow the cairns to another prominent notch.  The gully to this second notch is way too steep and narrow to climb.  So, don’t even think about climbing it.  In the picture below, this notch is the low point along the ridge.

From here, you can also see the remainder of the route.  From the notch, we headed right (south) around the southern side of the peak and headed for the Hourglass, aka the “Bowling Alley”.  You can just make out this section in the picture below.   It’s the narrow slot in the corner of the two ridges below the right side of the summit.
 
At that time, we weren’t exactly sure where the Bowling Alley was but I was pretty sure that it was indeed the gully on the south side of the peak.   However, the Fourteeners CD-ROM by Crestone Systems has a picture of the route that is incorrect.  It shows the route climbing up over some dark, water-stained rocks.   This obviously wasn’t the route.  They’d better fix that before they get someone in trouble.  I can’t believe someone let this slip by.

Anyway, we climbed up to what we thought was the correct route and discovered that there was a team of three climbers rappelling down the Bowling Alley.  We had indeed chosen the correct route.   The climbers yelled to us to let us know we should wait until they were all down so they didn’t accidentally knock rocks onto us. 

The Bowling Alley (“Hourglass”) is appropriately named.  It’s a steep gully usually with water running down it.  The middle section is the most narrow part and is obviously the inspiration for the name “Hourglass”.  According to most of the guidebooks, the 4th class section is about 150-200 feet long.  However, I think it’s only about 30 feet long, but it’s hard 4th class.  It’s very steep and with water running down it (which we had), there’s even less room to choose a route.   Any rock knocked from above gains velocity very fast and is funnelled straight down through this section.  This can be very very dangerous.  So, the advice I would give to anyone would be not to attempt the climb if there is anyone above you on this section.  Be sure that the climbers above are on the summit and know you are coming or who are waiting above, without moving, for you to climb up this section.   Fortunately, for us, there was no one else on the peak. 
 
After all the climbers were down, we scrambled up the 100 foot 3rd class section (which was very easy) to the climbers.  One of them asked me, “How long is your rope?” – sort of seemed like a subtle and indirect query of our skills as mountaineers.  Anyway, they asked because apparently their rope was about 15 feet too short.  It ended right above the trickiest part of the climb.  Oops.  Might as well have not brought it.  When I told them we were free climbing it, they looked kind of surprised.

We gave them about 15 minutes to get down and then started up.  I went first.  This section was indeed tricky.  The easiest spot looked to be the very middle.  The only problem was that there was water running down it and it was most likely slick.   Anyway, I didn’t feel like getting wet so I chose a very narrow ramp leading up and to the left.  I had to climb about 10 or 15 feet though of steep rock to get up to it.  The climbing was kind of tricky and scary.  At least it wasn’t exposed.   A fall would be no doubt painful but not fatal.  I would not attempt something this hard if it was above cliffs.  No way.  I made my way up on small footholds to the ledge and then traversed up the narrow ledge.  This was pretty tricky too since it was so narrow.  At the top of the ledge though, the climbing became much easier.

I paused at the top to watch Kirk come up.  He started up the right side which appeared much smoother.  Eventually, he ran out of safe footholds so he traversed across the water and onto the ledge and then tenuously headed up.

This section was the toughest section on any fourteener that I’ve been on to date.  However, I still think Capitol is a harder peak overall.  The scrambling just doesn’t relent on that mountain.

Above this 30-foot tough section, the scrambling continues but it is much easier.  Also, the guidebooks mention that above this section, you must be very careful of rockfall.  This is so true, however, it was very easy to avoid rocks by hugging the left side of the gully.  It was very solid for about 300 feet.  The right side was loaded with baseball size rocks and I bet that most people go that way.   That was where the permanent sling was for rappelling.

We were both worried about coming back down that section but for now we headed up the gully for the summit.  I was about 150 feet ahead of Kirk and scouted the route.   It was pretty straightforward.  I only had to retrace my steps once.   Finally, I came to the top off the gully and popped out onto the summit.  This finish was sort of like Wetterhorn.  You’re climbing and climbing, then suddenly you realize you’re there.  I started shouting, which relieved Kirk – he knew it wouldn’t be long until he arrived.
 
Little Bear has a fairly small summit.  It’s the high point of 3 steep ridges. 

We stayed on top for a while taking pictures and enjoying the views.  We were able to spot our tent below.  The west face of Little Bear is nearly vertical.  It’s a long long drop down into the Lake Como valley.

We started down after about 20 minutes.  Kirk went first when we got to the crux.   I coached him down and he finally made it.  Then it was my turn.  I was relieved to discover that the descent was, for some reason, much easier than the ascent.   Once we got down from the 4th class section, we started celebrating.

Back at the trail near Lake Como and our tent, we met the other party.  We told them that we had no problems in that section and that the climb was really fun.  They then mentioned that they were going to do Ellingwood tomorrow and asked what we were going to do.  I replied, “We’re going to climb it now.”   “Now??!!”  They were stunned, but I was feeling great.  Kirk wasn’t sure if he was going to go but after a short break at camp and some food, we headed up the valley for an afternoon attempt on the southwest ridge of Ellingwood Point.  Consequently, Kirk decided not to try since he’d already climbed it and the clouds looked menacing.  I was confident in the weather and I felt strong so I climbed it too!
 

From the Silver Creek Trailhead

I decided that if I were to drive all the way to hike Wetterhorn and Uncompahgre, I might as well hang around for an extra day to climb Redcloud and Sunshine.  That way, I wouldn’t have to make the 13 or 14 hour round trip back down here.  Well, after the excruciating hike of Wetterhorn and Uncompahgre, the three other guys (Kirk, Ken, and Jim) all high-tailed it back to Denver.   I was determined to at least attempt these peaks the following day.  I was a bit worried though because I’m usually fairly sore and stiff after a hike.  I did plenty of stretching after getting back though so I was betting that I would be fine.

I ate with the guys in Lake City and then headed to the southern road on the Alpine Loop that would take me to the Silver Creek Trailhead.   The clouds were still quite thick but I was hoping that they would clear.   After traversing the narrow shelf road, I arrived at the trailhead just as the sun was setting.  There were about eight other vehicles already here but I found a nice spot in the corner that I could sneak into.

After pumping some fresh water to brush my teeth with, I turned in.  I read for about an hour then turned off the light around ten and went to sleep.  I awoke around 3am to the pounding of rain on the car.  It was coming down hard.  If it hadn’t cleared by now, I realized, it most likely would not be clear in the morning.  I went back to sleep but woke up again around 5am as a second hard rainfall began.
 
I awoke around 6:30 am and noticed someone just beginning their hike.  I ate a little bit, got dressed and was on the trail by 7.  The clouds had indeed not cleared; they were very thick and low.  The ground and plants and trees were sopping wet.  Miserable hiking conditions at first glance – but it turned out to be very pleasant.

My legs felt pretty good actually.  The ball of my ankle was still sore but after taking an ibuprofen tablet, it didn’t bother me as much.  It did seem that I didn’t have quite the energy that I normally do as I began hiking up.  The first part of the trail is sort of steep and I was breathing heavily as I trudged along.   Silver Creek was way below me at this point but eventually, you level out a little bit and begin paralleling the creek.

Eventually, you come to a huge beautiful alpine basin on the northwestern side of Redcloud.  You continue following this trail on around to the north side of Redcloud.  I took several pictures along the way.  The rain was coming down pretty hard as I took the picture of a high alpine tarn .

On the north side of Redcloud, you begin traversing your way up to the north ridge.  The higher I got, the thicker the clouds got.  Actually, it was simply a matter of me moving into the clouds.  From time to time, I spotted the silhouette of the person who had begun thirty minutes before me against the grey backdrop of the clouds.

Parts of the ridge were quite steep.  Not steep enough to require handwork of course, but it was tough on the calves and, from time to time, was quite loose.  The trail is prominent the entire way and I was very thankful for that, for even if the visibility dropped even more severely, I could at least follow the trail all the way back down.  There were a few sub trails that traversed here and there but they all lead back to the main trail on the ridge.  So getting lost and taking the wrong trail was not an issue.

I continued on and passed a few heart-breaking false summits.   I had a feeling they were false because my altimeter was reading around 13,800-13,900 feet but I was hoping that the weather was throwing it off and I was actually much closer.  Finally, I did catch a glimpse of the true summit and hiked a few more minutes until I was finally there.  The summit was very red – obviously an influence on the name of the peak.  The person that I’d seen was there.  It was a 40 to 50-or-so year old woman.   I talked to her a while and it turned out she was the author of a Colorado Hiking guidebook:  50 Best Hikes in Colorado which you can find at any bookstore in CO.

The top of Redcloud was completely socked in with thick clouds.  There were no views at all from the summit which was fine this time – it actually looked really surreal.
 
I headed down the ridge to continue on to Sunshine Peak.  The clouds were still very thick.  However, when I caught up with the author Chris, the clouds were beginning to break.  We had a view of the route to Sunshine Peak.  We passed another party coming from Sunshine Peak.  I wondered where they came from since we were obviously the first climbers on Redcloud (our names were the only ones signed in).  I thought maybe they could give us some advice on alternate routes back to the trailhead instead of hiking back over Redcloud.  We had the option of hiking down the talus field into the Silver Creek drainage.  I thought they might have hiked up the west ridge of Sunshine.  When we talked to them, the told us that they had indeed come the same way we had.  The had camped high up along the trail and were able to get a very early start.

I continued on to Sunshine fairly certain that I would be re-climbing Redcloud in order to get back down.  The clouds began breaking even more and I got my first view of Sunshine Peak.  I knew I was going to get my fourth fourteener of the weekend!

I was on the top of the peak well before Chris arrived and I took time to sign the register and take some pictures.  The clouds were really beginning to break and expansive views began manifesting themselves.
 
I am on the top of Sunshine Peak.  Sunshine was the 35th fourteener for me.  Sunshine has a really neat summit.  It’s kind of small and it affords fabulous views.  In the picture you can see the vicinity of the trailhead way below.

Another man of about 60 arrived on top and the three of us chatted for a long time.  We also were enjoying watching the clouds stream all around us.  We headed down after about thirty minutes.   When we arrived back at the saddle, the older man continued up Redcloud.   Chris indicated she was going down the talus field.  I was sort of reluctant to go down it after my experience on Mount Columbia.  Plus, there was a warning sign in front of it.  However, she finally convinced me and we started down.  It was actually a very good choice.   There was trail all the way down and it wasn’t too steep.  I only slightly slipped one time.  The hike out of the Silver Creek drainage was very pleasant too.   The trail is well-defined and easy.  It’s hard to see from the main trail (though I spotted where it ought to be) and there’s a wide but shallow stream crossing over silver creek.

I arrived back at the jeep around 1:30 pm.  It was good to get back.  I stretched for about 15 minutes, said bye to Chris, then headed back to Denver.
 

Shuttle Hike from Matterhorn Creek Trailhead to Nellie Creek Trailhead

This was a weekend I was excited about.  I was planning on hiking four fourteeners:  Wetterhorn, Uncompahgre, Redcloud, and Sunshine.  I would be doing Wetterhorn and Uncompahgre with Kirk, Ken, and Jim.   On Sunday, Ken was planning on doing Sunshine and Redcloud with me while Kirk and Jim would attempt Handies.

I drove down alone around 2:30pm on the afternoon of Friday the 13th.  I arrived at the turnoff to Nellie Creek with enough light remaining.   I began driving up and took this shot  of a nice waterfall.  I continued up and the road forked.  Uh, which way do I go?  I didn’t have my guidebook with me so I followed my nose.  I picked the lefthand fork because it looked a little more travelled than the other.  It began switching back quite a bit and got really muddy in places.  I started to get sorta worried that I was on the wrong road.  I didn’t think to reset my odometer so I wasn’t sure how long I’d been going.  For all I knew, this road continued on forever.  Still, my logic told me that this must be the main road because it would undoubtedly be documented as a trailhead since it was between Matterhorn Creek and the other fork.  OR it would simply end soon.  Well, I was right – this was the correct road.  I arrived at Nellie Creek trailhead with just enough light remaining to filter some water.

I got the back all ready for me to sleep in and read for a while.  Then I got out and decided if I could see any meteors.  The night was perfectly clear and the Perseid meteor shower was “scheduled” to begin any minute.  I looked up and couldn’t believe the amount of stars in the sky.  I could also see the hazy strips of the Milky way running across the top of the sky.  After about 15 minutes, I began seeing meteors.  Some of them were quite long.  What a great experience.  After about thirty minutes I decided that I had better go to bed.

The rest of the guys were supposed to show up much later.  Kirk had told me that they would try to find me that night though the wouldn’t wake me up.  As soon as I turned out the light, I saw a vehicles headlights.  The SUV pulled up near me then turned around and headed back down.  It was them.  They were heading back down for a flat spot to set up their tent.

The following morning at 6am, they drove back up and picked me up and we all headed for the Matterhorn Creek trailhead.  We left my car at the Nellie Creek trailhead.   We were going to hike Wetterhorn first, then over to Uncompahgre, then back out to Nellie Creek where my jeep would be waiting.
 
It took us about an hour to drive down the Nellie Creek road, down to the Matterhorn jeep road, and up to the trailhead.  After taking self portraits of all of us, we began hiking.  It was 7:08 am.

It was pretty cold this morning – in the low 40′s.  This was probably a combination of the fact that it had been crystal clear the night before and was cloudy this morning.  We made good time though and it wasn’t long at all until we had our first view of Wetterhorn Peak  peeking over the rise in front of us.

There was one large switchback and then we contoured along, angling up slightly, until we broke out of treeline and had a grand view of Wetterhorn.

The trail we were on continued towards Uncompahgre and we were searching for a branch that headed towards Wetterhorn but we couldn’t find one.  So, we simply broke out across the meadow.  We found a trail on the way there, but on the way back we noticed that it does simply end after a while and you have to cross the meadow without a trail regardless.
 
I was surprised at how close Wetterhorn looked.  We’d only been hiking for a couple of hours at most and it seemed we were nearly there.  Of course, the past four fourteener hikes I’d been on had been 16 miles minimum round trip.  It was great to be so close so quickly.  As we hiked up, we had great views of Matterhorn Peak and Uncompahgre.  The trail winds around underneath Wetterhorn and eventually gains a little shelf. From here, it’s only a short hike to the saddle.   From here, you have a commanding view of Wetterhorn. 

As you hike up, the terrain becomes increasingly difficult but none of it is what I would consider “difficult” at all.  It’s mostly second and third class scrambling.   The route is fairly easy to follow as well.  I was well in front of everyone and scouting out the route, choosing the best one, and relaying it to the others.  I pretty much followed the cairns however occasionally, they would disappear. However, it was easy to stay on route; I simply picked the easiest one.  Eventually, I came to a large “V” in the route.   I believe this is a key to the route.  After you find this notch, climb through it, down a little bit and up onto the ridge.  At this point, the Ship’s Prow is right in front of you.  The Ship’s Prow is the prominent tower on Wetterhorn’s south side.  Here, We dropped down on the east face and traversed underneath the tower and then back up to a large flat area (with great campsites!) at the other side of the Ship’s Prow.  At this point there are two distinct keyhole formations in the ridge.  The route takes you through the northernmost (and smallest) keyhole.   Once you’re here, the rest of the route and the crux in in plain view.
 
The crux of the route is a steep and shallow gully leading to the summit.   It’s about 150 feet high.  It looks pretty scary from this vantage point but I thought it was very easy.  It’s a lot like a giant ladder – it’s about that easy to climb.  I hung back for a few minutes and let Kirk and Ken take the lead where I took this picture of them on the way up.  Kirk was in the lead and he zoomed up it.  After about 125 feet of climbing, you come to a smooth ledge that’s about 2 feet wide at most.  If you want, you can continue climbing straight up.  This is what everyone did execpt for me.  I saw a cairn at the lefthand corner of the ledge about 20 feet away and walked the ledge around the corner to some slightly easier cliffs.   I climbed up about 25 feet and suddenly appeared on the top of Wetterhorn.  Kirk was already on top celebrating and Ken was just coming over the crest as Kirk and I high-fived.

Though this route was thrilling and a lot of fun to climb up, I was surprised at how easy it really was.  Some guidebooks talk about using a rope on this section.  While I suppose it’s good to be cautious in this sense, using a rope for this section is just a waste.  The only reason to use a rope here is if you are practicing for something more difficult.  The climbing is so easy that it’s virtually impossible to fall and I’d imagine that a rope would actually make this climb more dangerous because you’d be prone to tripping on the rope or getting tangled in it.   These silly scenarios are much more likely, I think, than slipping and falling on this wall.  Now, with snow and ice and wind, this picture changes dramatically. I bet that would indeed be a pretty scary climb.
 
Gerry Roach’s guide book talks about Wetterhorn’s “tiny summit”.   I don’t know what inspired that description but Wetterhorn has a huge summit.  There’s enough room up here for 200 people.  This would be a great place to celebrate the climbing of all the fourteeners.

We stayed on top for a while eating and taking pictures. I called home as well.  After several minutes, it started getting kind of cold so we started back down.  We all thought it would be scarier going down but it wasn’t at all.  In this case, it almost felt like descending a staircase.   Granted, you had to be careful, but it wasn’t dangerous, in my cautious opinion.

All in all, it had only taken us about four hours to climb Wetterhorn.  I was surprised at how fresh I still felt.  I hoped that the weather would hold so that we would have an attempt on Uncompahgre.  We hiked out the same trail that we found earlier and it indeed ended prematurely. So we hiked across the boggy meadow, hopped the creek, and regained the main trail that headed to Uncompahgre.  The meadows up here were just stunning and the next three miles were fairly level – it was a pleasure to be hiking up here.
 
The trail to Uncompahgre swung way around the south side of the mountain to a small saddle, then began traversing under the south slopes up to the head of the Nellie Creek drainage.  Here, the trail split – one leading to the summit, the other to Nellie Creek.  I was ahead of everyone so I took off my pack and rested while waiting on Kirk.  When Kirk arrived, he wasn’t sure what the others would do.  I informed him that I was dropping my pack so I could get to the summit as soon as possible.   I decided to wait a couple of more minutes to see what Ken was going to do.   Ken said he was going to go for it too. So, with the cloud looking more ominous by the minute, I started up.  Ken started up not long after me and then so did Kirk and Jim.  I stopped to talk to someone coming down for about 5 minutes.  At this point, Ken had caught up to me and we headed up to the summit together.   We kept checking our altimeters and realized we were getting close. 

As we exited a short talus field we had this view.  We knew that had to be the summit.  We were both getting pretty tired at this point and were ready to arrive.  The trail headed around the right hand side of this picture. 

We could see the summit and the trail wasn’t steep at all but we were still taking it pretty slowly.  We passed a couple of rock wall shelters.  There seemed to be several built up here.

Finally, we made it to the true summit.  The register is anchored to a concrete block.  As I approached the north side of the summit, I realized that the rumors I had heard about Uncompahgre’s summit were true.   The north face is a sheer 1000-1500 foot drop to the bottom.  When I say sheer, I mean 90 degrees and greater at some points.  We thought this was so cool that we were running from side to side switching cameras and taking pictures.  We laid down on our stomachs and peered over the edge – quite thrilling! 
 
We stayed on the summit for 30 minutes then headed back down.  We met up with Kirk and Jim who were about 50 feet at most from the summit.  Jim didn’t look too pleased and it seemed they were thinking of turning around.  Ken and I zoomed the rest of the way down and enjoyed the hike out to the Nellie Creek trailhead.  Shuttles are a lot of fun…new terrain the whole way.  We waited at my jeep for about 45 minutes.  Kirk and Jim finally showed up and Jim promptly announced that he was done hiking fourteeners for the weekend!   They also told us that they ended up turning around on Uncompahgre because of the clouds.  We couldn’t believe it; they were so close.

We decided to go pick up the other car and head down to Lake City for a good meal.   We ended up eating at a small cafe.  We chose to eat outside; the weather was really pleasant although it started raining after about 30 minutes.  After we finished, we said our farewells.  Kirk, Ken, and Jim seemed pooped so they headed back to Denver and I headed up to the Silver Creek trailhead to attempt Redcloud and Sunshine Peaks the following morning.

From the Stewart Creek trailhead – return via Cochetopa Creek drainage

San Luis is one of Colorado’s least climbed fourteeners.  True to this rumor, I saw very few people on this trip.  I had planned on hiking this peak with a co-worker (Brian) but he wanted to drive down much later.  I enjoy having a couple of hours of daylight remaining when I arrive just for relaxing or strolling around.  So I left Denver around 1:30 pm on Saturday and took the standard route down to that part of the state:  Highway 285, over Monarch Pass, and on towards Gunnison.  The turnoff to the Stewart Creek Trailhead is highway 114 a few miles before Gunnison.  From there, you turn onto about 25-30 miles of backcountry dirt roads to get to this shy mountain.  Gerry Roach’s directions on how to arrive at the trailhead were technically accurate, but they involved about 5 or 6 turns!  There’s actually a much much simpler way to get there.   At the turnoff onto Old Regency Road, keep going past the turnoff that Roach mentions.  After a couple of miles, you see a pair of lakes.  Turn right past the second lake and keep going until you see Stewart Creek. 
 
I arrived at the Stewart Creek trailhead (by the difficult directions) at about 7:00pm.  There was only one other car there but no one was in it.  It’s occupants were probably camped out somewhere along Stewart Creek.  I had about an hour and a half of daylight left so I hiked down the trail a little way and found a good rock to cook dinner on.  I took a few pictures here of myself, rocks , and the multitude of beaver ponds.
 
I was expecting Brian to show up sometime around midnight.  I set up my sleeping space in the back of the Jeep.  I read for about an hour and then turned off the light.  I had a dream that I woke up and the trailhead was packed with vehicles of all sorts and there was a traffic jam along the road…I woke up and discovered that it was indeed a dream – the other lone car was the only other vehicle around.  Brian’s car was nowhere to be seen.  I figured he simply just didn’t feel like driving all the way down here.

I started hiking rather late at 8:00 am.  The first part of the hike was easy going.   The trail is very level and well defined.  I passed several beaver ponds along the way and even saw some deer.  As I approached, they bounded across the meadow four legs at a time.

I saw more wildlife on this trip than any other I’d been on.  I saw the usual variety of picas and marmots, but also the deer, wild ducks, and tons of neat birds.
 
The La Garita Wilderness (where San Luis Peak is located) is a really pretty area.   I suppose that there’s so much wildlife because it’s such an isolated area.   It was very green and had heavy evidence of glacier and volcanic activity in the past.

I trudged along.  Eventually, the trail steepened and I arrived above treeline.   I passed a tent and some campers.  The other car at the trailhead belonged to them.  These were the first people I’d seen all day and they indicated there was no one in front of me.  There certainly was no one behind me.  Not for a long way, anyway.  So I continued on.  The head of the valley is dominated by a giant scree slope summit that is a sub-peak of San Luis.  At this point, I headed for the saddle between Organ Mountain and San Luis.
 
At the saddle, I finally had my first complete view of San Luis.  It’s a giant scree pile.  The trail to it, however, is packed pretty well and walking along it is not a problem at all.  At the top of the saddle, I found a pair of backpacks that had been stashed.  I guess that these hikers must have come from the Cochetopa Creek drainage on the opposite side of Organ Mountain.

Brian and I had discussed making San Luis a loop hike by hiking out the Cochetopa Creek on the Colorado Trail.  I hadn’t decided if I would do this or not.  It didn’t look too much longer.

As I hiked on, I indeed spotted two hikers on the summit of San Luis.  I eventually passed them and they told me that they had hiked up Cochetopa Creek and were going to hike out via Stewart Creek.  They had obviously left the trail early and hiked to the San Luis/Organ saddle, whereas the Colorado Trail takes you to the head of the Cochetopa drainage on the opposite side of San Luis.
 
I made it to the summit around 11:30.  I had the whole summit to myself.  I ate lunch and then made some phone calls.  I took several pictures from the summit including one giant panorama that shows both Stewart Creek and Cochetopa Creek.

The weather was great although clouds were indeed beginning to move in.  I decided that I would make this trip even more fun by hiking out via the Cochetopa Creek drainage.  So, I began descending the other side of San Luis.  On this side I met two girls who were hiking the peak from the Willow Creek trail.

From San Luis from the saddle on the Cochetopa Creek side.   You can see that the clouds are getting thicker.  I think I heard faint thunder only once.  These seemed to simply be rain clouds.

I began hiking down then came upon a hiker with a dog tieing his shoes.  As I said “hello”, he looked up and I realized it was Brian !
 
Brian had indeed arrived late and had missed the Stewart Creek trailhead in the dark.  It is indeed hard to see.  He had camped at the Cochetopa Creek trailhead and had started hiking from there at around 9:30 am.  That’s late BUT he wasn’t even to the saddle yet and it was around 1pm!  I realized that it must have been a long way back to the car because he’s a strong hiker.

It started sleeting on us at this point and Brian told me that he was going to hike up to the saddle and then see if he could make the summit.  I told him that I was too tired to accompany him.  So we parted and I headed out. 

The hike out was so incredibly long but absolutely spectacular.  This is one of the prettiest valleys that I’ve seen in Colorado.  This is certainly one of the loveliest, wildest parts of the state that I’ve been in to date.  The trail was very wet and I had to cross several streams.  At one point, the a spring bubbled out of the middle of the trail!  I stopped here to fill up my water supply.  Later on, I passed a nice cliffy area with a large water fall.   After that were large long meadows full of deer.  The valley was slowly swinging it’s way north but it seemed like it just wouldn’t end.  Finally, after a full 16 miles round trip, it did.   After I stretched, I turned the car on and I noticed Brian driving up.  He’d hiked out very fast.  I wasn’t moving too fast because my left ankle was sore and my right ankle bone was bruised.  Good timing though.  We hung out at the trailhead and drank 14er beer for about 30 minutes until about 5:15pm.  We then headed back to Denver.  This was another successful, very enjoyable, 14er hike.