One of many
trip reports under the
SilGro home page for Alan Silverstein and Cathie
Grow.
Email me at
ajs@frii.com.
Last update: March 25, 2024
(Previous trip report: 1986_0607-08_MountDemocrat.htm)
(A
Fourteener
trip report.)
(Originally posted to internal newsgroup:
/* hpfcla:hpnc.general / ajs / 10:46 pm Jun 16, 1986)
Having been snowed off Mount Cameron last weekend after climbing Mount Democrat, we could only but return a week later to finish Mount Lincoln (14286'), Mount Cameron (a sub-peak at 14238'), and Mount Bross (14172'). [2024: This was long, long before the privately-owned summit of Bross became off-limits due to liability concerns!] It was natural to do them a "different way", from Quartzville (site) to the northeast at 11700', instead of from Kite Lake to the southeast. This starting point was not recommended if you intended to climb Democrat too, unless you relished an extra 800' on return to Cameron!
Dave Landers slept Saturday night at his brother John Landers' place in Denver and drove up through Fairplay early Sunday. And me? Well, I spent the end of Saturday and the beginning of Sunday driving alone from Fort Collins to Quartzville, about 160 miles.
Quandary Peak was lovely by moonlight. Hoosier Pass was eerie at 0100. Finding turns on dirt roads with a flashlight and topo map was challenging at 0130. Jacking up your car to put rocks under the tires so you can get unstuck and up the 4WD road was nothing short of bizarre at 0200. "I love the smell of clutch in the middle of the night... it's the smell of victory."
By 0230 I was decked out in a sleeping bag under the most glorious and clear dark starry sky you can imagine, at Quartzville, between the cooling car and the melting snowfield that blocked the road. "Getting there was half the fun."
When Dave and John didn't show up (in Dave's 4WD :-) by 0725, I took off ahead of them. Just as well, being short on sleep I moved kinda slow; it took me 2.5 hours to make the 2600' to the summit. They started half an hour later but almost caught up.
There were jeep roads in pretty good shape almost all the way up both Lincoln and Bross, but this time of year the occasional snowdrifts made them impassable. With a 4WD you could easily drive most of the way, later in summer. The hike up Mount Lincoln was pretty nice too. Lots of old mining ruins and refuse, tailings, and many sections of road you could follow between climbing sprints. The last couple of hundred feet up the southeast face was easy snow, topping over a mini-cornice to a small summit.
Did I mention the glorious good weather? Hardly a cloud, cool winds, crystal clarity. What a view! Pikes Peak 67 miles ESE, Longs Peak (I think I spotted it) the same distance NNE, and the peaks of the Elk Range (such as Maroon Bells) 50 miles west. And the Mosquito Range and Sawatch Range of course... A world of snow, ice, and rock.
On the way up I ran into and joined up with the very same lady from Denver who I described meeting last week on Democrat, with her husband and three dogs. Once again she and the dogs made the summit but her husband didn't, turning back only a hundred yards shy. Some people have no luck... but I bet he brought it on himself; he stopped for a smoke once or twice!
After Dave and John arrived and we had had enough of the top of Lincoln (which is impossible, but you can't stay there forever), we mosied down a nice trail, and across and up the short ways to Mount Cameron. It was only a 20-minute jaunt on easy rock, 1/2 mile and 150' up from the saddle. The top was very flat, like a rolling football field of naked rock -- pebbles and sand reminiscent of desert pavement. Very ancient and worn. Pitted with "discovery" holes dug by miners a hundred years ago. It was hard to find the high spot.
Here I met two HPites, Pete Perkins and Ken McNaught, coming the other way from Democrat bound for Lincoln! Mind you, there were only about 15 people on all four peaks that day, so it was quite a coincidence.
After Cameron it was about a mile and 450' up to the flat top of Mount Bross, the roundest of all the Colorado Fourteeners. A pole and rock windbreak marked the summit, such as it was. You had to stand up to see more than the horizon.
Well after a mellow hour on top out of the wind it was time to start down at 1240. Soon off the summit we picked up a shallow but decent glissade down to the road far below. From there, a gentle, mechanical stroll took us back to Quartzville, with a couple of shortcuts down snowfields. We were back by 1345.
(Next trip report: 1986_0622_N,SArapaho.htm)