The Scene Begins

Today would have a little bit of everything. We broke camp and hauled our packs a couple of miles down the trail where we stashed them in some trees and made ready for the Mount Yale climb after sending Henry on his way.

Hartenstein to Mount Yale trail

Mount Yale

out!

We were in store for a great day weather wise, and the mood was good in the group after having our fill of great food the night before.

Time to head out again

The routine of waking up in a tent, breaking camp, and getting out on the trail was a familiar one now. I was amazed at how well everyone was holding up and excited to think that we might actually pull this off.

Easy downhill going made for a nice warmup

Once we switched to our day packs we were all business for a while as we motored up the steep climb. Knowing that we had a long day ahead helped to spur our pace, as well as the thought of pizza waiting for us in Buena Vista!

All smiles now

When we climbed above treeline the massive views opened up to us once again. By now the landscape was very familiar to us and we could easily pick out the surrounding peaks and other landmarks.

Loving the climb

Ben cresting the ridge

Tyler and Malcolm

A little boulder-hopping (credit: Tyler Lofgren)

Cool cairn

Bryant and Corbin

After a final pitch through the boulders we topped out and enjoyed the second summit of our trip.

Made it!

Tyler

We all passed around Tyler’s phone again (his was the only one to get signal) and made the requisite celebratory calls and text messages. Different world we live in these days…

Malcolm and Ben

Made all the 14er ascents in my Merrell Trail Gloves

Mount Yale - 14,196'

All too soon, it was time to start the trip down. The hiking was enjoyable as we had an immense landscape sprawled out in front of us.

Tyler on the switchbacks

Looking back towards Ice Mountain and yesterday's route

The heat really started to build the lower we went. I ran out of water and was super happy to refill my bottle once we made it back to where we stashed the packs.

Just a mile to go

From there it was about a mile and a half to the trailhead where we had dropped a car on Monday. It seemed a LOT longer than that, but we made it out just fine. Then we had to go grab the other car from our starting location before we could head into town for some much needed grub.

Pizza Works - Mmmm...

We destroyed 3 large pizzas in short order and then made our way north up the highway for our final campsite at the ghost town of Winfield.

A little leg soaking was in order

Our filtering system worked well

A puddle of alpenglow

Winfield is a great place to camp. You are surrounded by high peaks all around and there is a nice meadow and lots of space. It is also the 50 mile turnaround point for the Leadville 100 trail race. We hit the sack early in anticipation of a 4:30 wake up and our biggest day yet.

Goodnight Winfield, see you in a month

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Collegiate Peaks High Adventure 2011 – Day 3

Aug 17

Posted by chrisboyack

Find the rest of the week’s trip reports here:

Day 3

Kroenke Lake – Hartenstein Lake

5.3 miles

1600′ descent

1600′ climb

This day was scheduled to be our easiest of the week. Just a short trip up and over the Continental Divide and then on to Hartenstein Lake.

Kroenke Lake to Hartenstein Lake

It was kind of a strange morning. We purposely slept in a little, but then had to hustle around camp to get packed up before being hit with what looked like a really nasty storm. Thankfully the storm blew over and we were treated to nice blue skies for the rest of the day.

On our way up the climb to the Divide

The climb was initially very steep and then eased off a little bit. It was nice to not have to hurry to our destination, and have plenty of time for looking around, stalking marmots, etc.

Malcolm crosses the final snow field of the trip

We took off the packs and relaxed for a while up on the pass. Other than being a touch cold, it was really pleasant. The mountains and clouds around us were very striking. Ice Mountain looked amazingly cool, and was put on the ever growing must-do list.

Ice Mountain and the Three Apostles

Chris, Tyler, Malcolm, Bryant, Ben, and Corbin

The dominant flower in the area was the Alpine Sunflower. The grow slowly for several years (10+?), concentrating on storing up as much starch as they can in the taproot during what is a very short growing season. Then, when conditions are right, they bloom once – then die.

Alpine Sunflower

Blue skies, puffy white clouds, crushed granite trails, and lots of flowers. Good day on the trail.

Love this trail!

The next photo shows my 1993 Mountainsmith pack. Still going strong.

Buy good stuff, it lasts

We made camp in the early afternoon and had plenty of time to lay around, explore, and generally goof off. I took up my favorite high alpine lake passtime of using a dead stick to smack rocks way out into the water. If you find just the right ‘bat’, you can hit those rocks pretty far!

Lazy afternoon

Columbine with Mount Yale in the background

Soon dinner arrived, on Henry’s back! He had made the drive from home picking up deli sandwiches, chips, candy bars, along the way and hiked in to meet us. Wow! We gorged on some good grub and shared some laughs. That was awesome!

We couldn't quite finish them all

Then the binoc’s came out and we spent the rest of the evening spotting critters waaaay up on the mountainside. Amazing what you can see if you know where to look.

Yep, spotted another one

That deer is four years old, and his name is Bob

Posted in stuff

Collegiate Peaks High Adventure 2011 – Day 2

Aug 16

Posted by chrisboyack

Find the rest of the week’s trip reports here:

Day 2

Bear Lake – Harvard summit – Bear Lake

4.7 miles round trip

2300′ climb

–

Bear Lake – Kroenke Lake

4.5 miles

1700′ descent

800′ climb

Tuesday morning we got up before dawn with a long day ahead. The tents were fairly wet from the rain overnight, so we ate a quick breakfast and would save breaking camp for our return. The first part of the day would be spent climbing to the summit of Mount Harvard.

Hike to Harvard

We left plenty early to take advantage of the mild morning weather. The route to the top wasn’t too complicated. Just go up!

Starting out

We crossed a few snowfields and went around another. The climbing was very steep up to the ridge line. I got there first and spotted several mountain goats close by. They looked calm for the moment, but I knew they would be easily spooked so I turned back to the group below and made the shhh motion with my forefinger to my lips. The boys, with ipods cranked, said ‘WHAAAT?’ in response very loudly. I turned back to the goats as they were starting to stir and get restless. I hissed back, “beeee quiet”. Still with the tunes rocking, and completely oblivious to what I was trying to tell them, the response came back, “WHY!?!?!”. At this point the goats were all up and making their way off the ridge. I yelled back, “Shut your hole!” but it was too late. The goats were gone. Oh, well. At least I got one pic.

Mountain Goats - shhhh!

From that point the route climbed steeply through broken rock. The views off to the west were incredible, it was such a fine morning to be in the mountains.

Climbing through the rocks high above Bear Lake

So far, so good

Corbin taking in the view

Then we arrived at the final pitch. A little bit of scrambling was needed to climb up to the summit. It was a great way to finish off the ascent.

Final scramble to the summit

We enjoyed our time on the summit together and took in the amazing views. A great moment was had when one of the boys was able to call home and report on his successful climb. It was super cool because he had come up short on an attempt last year so it was especially sweet this time around.

Dad, I made it! Bryant calling home from the summit of his first 14er.

Mount Harvard - 14,420'

Striking pose - or striking a pose

All too soon it was time to head down and get on with the rest of our day. We made quick work of the descent.

Dropping onto a snowfield

A little snow to deal with, but it wasn't too bad

Descending past Bear Lake back to our camp (credit: Tyler Lofgren)

Tyler caught a rare pic of me smiling. Easy to do when you are in a beautiful place doing what you love. (credit: Tyler Lofgren)

Flowers were popping everywhere

Once we made it back to camp, it was time to pack up our gear and head out to our next destination. Kroenke lake.

Hike to Kroenke Lake

We retraced our steps from the previous afternoon for a couple of miles, until we made it back to the main canyon.

One of many creek crossings

Then we headed upstream on a good trail for a few miles to the lake.

Flower growing out of a log

Flowers by a stream

We found a great campsite and were all able to get a little down time during a light afternoon rain shower.

Ready for dinner

Lasagne

The one downside of this trip was that everywhere we traveled was under fire restrictions. This meant we couldn’t spend the evenings hanging out by a fire telling jokes and the usual stories. The boys played some card games, but everyone was tired enough from the hiking that we all went to bed fairly early.