GoreRange.info

Originally, I had planned to take an aspen photo outing up to the area around West Booth Pass.  But, the day before I was going to leave, George sent me an e-mail inviting me to come along with Jennifer and Gerry Roach and him for a climb of Peak “N” in the Gores.  So, without a hesitation, I changed my plans.  Peak “N” was a very significant climb for Jennifer as it was the one remaining thirteeners that she hadn’t climbed.  There are 638 thirteeners (I think) in Colorado.  That’s a lot of mountains to climb and obviously a significant accomplishment.  Up to this day, there were only eight people to have climbed all of the thirteeners.

So, I woke up at 3:30 on Saturday morning and met George along with two others, John and Lori, at Morrison.  We drove up to Silverthorne and then on up the Brush Creek 4×4 road to the trailhead where Jennifer and Gerry were waiting.  Surprisingly, there were many other 4x4s up there.  But they were all up there for bow hunting.  So we put on some bright clothing and started hiking just after 6:30.
 
We hiked for about a quarter mile or so before hitting the Gore Range trail, which we followed north about a mile to a western branch leading towards Lost Lake.  From this trail junction it’s another 2 miles or so to Lost Lake.  The lake is well below tree line.  The trail runs along the eastern shore and this is a good place to take a short break, which we did.  The other shores are practically inaccessible with lots of fallen trees and swampy ground.  From here, we had good views of both Peaks “N” and “O”.  They were both separated by a pair of nasty looking towers, supposedly not exceeding class 3 difficulty.  The long broad ridge coming off of Peak “O” towards the lake was a long long talus field.  At this point, there are no trail continuing on to the peaks and our plan was to head southwest and bushwack towards the wide cirque shared by Guyselman Mountain and Peak “N”.  We had to ensure that Jennifer got to Peak “N” obviously!

The bushwack starts right at the lake and doesn’t let up for well over a mile.  The forest is pretty dense so we had to wend and wind quite a bit.  Sections of it are quite steep too.  Eventually we emerged out onto some talus and had to climb over a series of talus slides to get around the steep and jagged rocky ridge coming directly off the eastern side of Peak “N”.  After passing the ridge, we dropped down into a little grassy basin with a small lake that Gerry and Jennifer had previously named “Paradise Lake”.  We took a short break here, right at the edge of treeline, then headed up more talus into the cirque.  Guyselman Mountain (also known as Peak “M”) was right in front of us and looked quite impressive.  It’s north face is quite steep and there are a couple of nice couloirs set in the face.  I had originally thought maybe I’d go up ahead and climb Guyselman as well, but instead I wisely opted not to completely wear myself out and save this peak for later.

Once we got high enough into the basin, we turned towards Peak “N” and headed up.  The peak has no form at all from this close up.  Near the top though were long sections of smooth rock analogous to the Flatirons in Boulder.  We split up here briefly:  George, John, and I opted to scramble up the slabs while Gerry, Jennifer, and Lori climbed up a faint talus ridge to the left.  As the three of us climbed up in parallel with the others, we had great views of them outlined on the ridge against the steep north face of Guyselman Mountain.  I took a couple of pictures of them climbing up (left).  Then we had to focus more on the slabs in front of us.  The slabs were very solid and clean which was definitely welcome after some loose scree sections below.  The climb was a bit exposed but the holds were so good that I always felt confident.  The difficulty occasionally was 4th class but was a great way to finish the climb.  The slabs ended a mere five vertical feet or so from the summit.  We sauntered twenty feet to the summit and hollered for the others to join us.  Jennifer and Gerry were on a small point about 100 feet below us as they began the final few feet to Jennifer’s last thirteener.

We took a nice long celebratory rest on top of Peak “N” and took in the expansive views.  To the north and east, we could see miles and miles past Green Mountain Reservoir, the Indian Peaks and Longs Peak.  To the west and south, we had great views of the main chain of peaks in the Gore Range.  Over towards the northwestern side was the remote Black Creek drainage.  I spent some time studying the various valleys in this huge drainage.  There was no register on Peak “N” but Jennifer and Gerry brought one so we all signed it then left in near the small cairn built on the peak.  We still hadn’t decided for sure if we were going to go on to do Peak “O”.  We wandered over to take a look at it and it looked quite doable, but there would definitely be some scrambling involved.  George, John, Lori, and I decided to try it and Jennifer and Gerry would retrace their steps back down to the lake. 

The only real problems on the ridge between these two peaks are two prominent gendarmes.  The first one (going from “N” to “O”) is significantly smaller and looked to be easily passable on it’s right side.  Since it was the first gendarme, we called it the “No” gendarme, the second therefore was christened the “On” gendarme.  We scrambled easy 3rd class terrain down to the notch before the first gendarme.  At the base, we headed down and around on the right side.  “No” looked climbable on this side but we weren’t sure about the other side so we continued to traverse.  You can actually go down maybe 50 feet to a prominent grassy ledge running back up to the notch between the two gendarmes.  We didn’t drop quite that far and instead traversed on a 3rd class ledge directly below “No”.  At the notch between the two, we looked back on the tower and it appeared to be climbable again.  So, we climbed BACK over the top of the gendarme.  This side was in shadow and had a decent amount of fall snow too.  The climb was a bit exposed and was tough 3rd class at it’s easiest; there were a couple of 4th class moves.  Once we got on the top, it looked too hard to come back down the same way so we dropped back over the back side and traversed again back to the notch. 

That was a fun twenty minute little scrambling interlude.  We headed on to the next gendarme.  It featured a thin little ridge that was quite exposed with steep and smooth slabs on it south side.  We easily downclimbed the back side of the gendarme and made our way up easy 3rd class terrain to the gentle summit of Peak “O”.  Again, there was no summit register but I left mine, a little green Celestial Seasonings tin.  John and Lori didn’t stay on top long at all but I wasn’t ready to head down.  I wanted to take in the views as long as possible so George and I remained on top for another fifteen or twenty minutes before heading down.  We strolled over the gentle grassy slopes and then made our way down the long long talus field.  We had great views of Black Lake and Black Creek below it which was loaded with yellow aspens.  Black Lake is on private property and there’s a giant lodge at the far end of the lake.  That must be a really nice place.  We also saw a small boat touring around on the lake.

The descent off Peak “O” seemed like forever.  Descending is the most exhausting part of the trip for me and this was certainly a long descent.  It reminded me more of an obscure side of Mount Princeton because there was so much more talus.  The good news was that once we were down into the trees the lake wasn’t far away.  We bushwacked our way through the forest and followed our noses back to the lake.  The lake was our rendezvous point and we were the first to arrive.  Ten minutes later, Gerry and Jennifer emerged out of the thick foliage.  We took one last leisurely break at the lake then headed back the final three and a half miles to the trailhead.  We arrived back at the trailhead exactly twelve hours after we departed.  It was another successful and very enjoyable Gore Range trip.

I had some interesting side business to take care of on Saturday and my usual hiking partners were really worn out from last weekend so I hooked up with Bill and Johnson whom I’d hiked with numerous times in the past.  Johnson was interesting in hiking in the Gores so obviously I tagged along.  Bill and I went out to meet him at Shrine Pass on Saturday evening to camp out the night before the hike.  I was planning on suggesting that we try to climb “East Partner Peak” and Peak “W” which are at the end of the Pitkin Creek Valley.  It turned out though that Johnson had been up there the day before.  So we decided to hike up Bighorn Creek and attempt Grand Traverse.

After a good nights sleep that featured a good amount of rain, thunder, and lightning, we set out for the Bighorn Trailhead.  We started hiking by a little after seven.  The trail started up steeply as usual but wasn’t as bad as Pitkin or Booth.  The trail also passed through a giant aspen grove that must be just amazing in fall.  As we approached the first views of the Grand Traverse I noticed that Bill and Johnson were slowing down a good bit.  It sounded like they were going to try to climb the peaks but they might just run out of time because of their speed.  They were sort of expecting me to go on alone but I didn’t want to attempt that ridge alone.  So, I decided this would be just a scouting trip so we decided to hike up to the cabin and then see what we wanted to do there.

The trail description at the Bighorn Trailhead mentions a cabin about 3 miles up the trail.  It didn’t take us that long to arrive at the cabin which is halfway between Grand Traverse and North Traverse Peaks.  The description mentioned how the door was kept unlocked so that hikers could use it if necessary.  It made the cabin sound like it was in good condition.  Not so.  Although you could camp inside it, it’s very dilapidated and the roof is very short.  There was a couple of tarps and candles in there.  I’d take a tent any day over the mice and ghosts that are certain to roam around in there!

After hanging out at the cabin for a while, we headed up the valley.  Johnson said he wanted to hike up to the next shelf.  So, I stashed my pack off the trail and brought only my camera along.  We hiked around and the trail started to fade fast.  At a large meadow that was full of Parry’s Primrose, the trail completely stopped.  We kept wandering around.  As we approached some of the upper tarns, a prominent 12er at the end of the valley began to look appealing.  I suggested that maybe I could go on ahead and try to climb the 12er.  They said they would try to follow. Just before I took off, we saw some people on the saddle between this 12er and North Traverse Peak.  Amazing!  I never see anybody up here. I went on ahead and spied my route.  I would climb a short scree gully then traverse across grassy ledges to the ridge then head to the top.  The scree gully was a real pain.  It was very loose and because I wasn’t planning on hiking very far, I left my trekking poles way back down by the cabin.  Oh well, I continued on and emerged on to the more comfortable grass slopes.

The hikers coming down were yelling down at Bill and Johnson trying to have them point out the best route down from the saddle.  Going straight down the saddle led to cliffs so they had to traverse.  Because they were asking directions, they must have come from the other side.  The clouds looked really really dark emerging from the other drainage.  Not hearing any thunder or feeling rain, I continued up and arrived on the ridge.  As I approached the summit, I realized that I would see Keller off in the distance.  At this point I had great views of East Thorn, Willow, and Mount Valhalla, the latter of which is a very prominent mountain.  I got a shock on the summit – there was a higher mountain right in front of me barely 100 yards away.  I realized that I was indeed on Keller! The day before I was planning on going up Pitkin Valley so I brought the Pitkin map…so I didn’t have the chance to really look at the map of Bighorn Valley and Johnson’s map cut off early.  At the top of this peak, which was actually a shoulder of Keller, I took my remaining pictures.  I took a lot of panoramas, picking out the peaks in the heart of the Gores to the Northwest and then the southeastern section.  I went up to the southern summit of Keller.  At first, I thought this was the true summit but after looking at the map later, I realized the true summit was still a ways off although it was only thirty feet higher than the summit.

I was almost positive that Bill and Johnson turned around so I started back down. I caught up with the other hikers at one of the snowfields at the head of the valley and they informed me that they were still up there.  I don’t know how, but I passed them.  The other hikers were 5 college students who had hiked from Rock Creek to Bighorn, a pretty short but neat shuttle hike.  We stayed at the cabin for a while then they headed out.  About forty five minutes later, Bill and Johnson showed up.  Johnson ended up staying in the valley but Bill had climbed to the top of the 12er.  As we hiked out, we got rained on and the dark clouds made the scene pretty gloomy…but it was really neat to hike in and a reprieve from the hot sun.  This was a really fun hike.  I’m hoping to return here and camp out near the cabin the attempt the Grand Traverse the following day.