| Ref: 14ers.com
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On our attempt, you
can tell it's windy just by looking at the snow plumes from Mounts
Bross and Lincoln.
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| Snowshoe
trip:
RT 8.5; 4.5 up. Some things are just better
the second time around! After our failed attempt a couple of days ago
due to unbearable wind, check out this VIDEO
and judge for yourself, it
was understood we'd be back to settle the score but I didn't know we'd
come back so soon. Once again, the weather was unsettled and committing
to a longer trip wasn't an option; hence we
decided to return to Mount Silverheels. This objective is
straightforward and
starts high from Hoosier Pass, with less wind luck was on our side.
Like a déjà vu, we left from Leadville eating breakfast on the road.
The initial part of the hike carried on with less hesitation and more
optimism, we reached our turn around point in good time. The following
ridge walk was pleasant but visibility was reduced higher up by
homogeneous
cloudcover; like all the surrounding mountains, our objective remained
shrouded. As long
as we could still see the terrain in front of us, there was no reason
to turn back. The landscape and atmosphere had a lunar feel to it. We
continued down to the saddle and started climbing to
the summit ridge. As we got higher, we
entered the cloudcover and lost some visibility. The broad summit ridge
appeared featureless, we
wanted to mark the area where we crested from the climb so we didn't
overshoot it on the descent. Tim built up a cairn with the snowshoes
and alpine axes, dotting the ridge with an impressive marker. We then
carried on to the top. It was snowing by now, I
took a couple of pics and back down we went. We hiked the broad ridge
slightly spread out in order to find the cairn Tim built, the terrain
was indeed featureless and had he not built that marker, we could have
easily missed our descent gully; I was impressed by Tim's ingenuity! We
picked up our stuff and aimed for the snow gully alongside the ascent.
The glissade was a hoot and put a smile on our face, we made it down to
the saddle in no time. After some delicious chocolate cake, we
climbed back up to the access ridge. We encountered the first
"hiccup" of the day on our way to the road; because of reduced
visibility, we veered too far north.
Lower down, when we got glimpses of the terrain below, we realized we
were heading towards Quandary Peak; we corrected with a traverse and
located the radio towers soon thereafter. We were happy to have pushed
on with this centennial 13er, we had settled the score despite the
weather. We celebrated with some Mexican food in
Frisco!
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Snow
transport.
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Leaning
into the fierce wind, we decided to turn around.
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Supplemental
walk in Mayflower Gulch on our way back to Leadville.
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Mount
Silverheels take II.
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Less
wind, more clouds...
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Looking
back at Mount Lincoln and North Star Mountain (right).
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Reaching
the turn around point of our attempt.
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This
time "it's a go"!
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This
wind-scoured ridge grants pleasant hiking.
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A
vast basin south-west of us.
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Impressive
powerlines on the access ridge.
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Ready
to climb to the summit ridge.
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Ascending
the centennial 13er.
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On
the summit ridge Tim marked our access/descent snow gully by stacking
our snowshoes and axes.
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Into
the cloud, walking the broad featureless ridge.
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At
the top for a brief moment.
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Heading
down, looking for Tim's built up marker.
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After
finding the marker, we steered into the descent gully for a fine
glissade.
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Glissading
is good for the soul!!
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I
bet Tim is pulling out home-baked chocolate cake.
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Time
to resume our descent.
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The
sun makes a momentary appearance.
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No
more visibility for the remainder of the hike.
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After
veering off route higher up, we're back on familiar ground.
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Another
Colorado spring storm.
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| Back
to home page
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