One of many
trip reports under the
SilGro home page for Alan Silverstein and Cathie
Grow.
Email me at
ajs@frii.com.
Last update: May 29, 2024
(Previous trip report: 1986_0622_N,SArapaho.htm)
(A
Fourteener
trip report.)
One Saturday we made our long planned and awaited traversal flight of all 54 of the Colorado Fourteeners (peaks over 14000' elevation). Five of us, all Hewlett-Packard employees, rode in a Cessna turbo 210, including pilot and Civil Air Patrol member Jer/ Eberhard, myself (navigator and programmer), Dave Landers, Andy Goris, and Roger Edrinn.
(A year later we repeated the same traversal.)
We didn't think this trip had ever been done before. (We discovered later in old copies of two publications that previous attempts had been made in 1945-63.) It required knowledge of the locations of the peaks, which was tediously available from maps or, since 1981, a USGS database. Deriving a "good" short route wasn't hard, but finding the "best" route consumed a fair amount of computer time.
(I had a lot of fun creating some software to attack the "traveling salesman problem", which is generally not solvable in reasonable time for 54 points, but a number of tricks made it tractable.)
A faster plane would make a "best" route less important, but it would go by faster too. In the Cessna, we sighted and came within a short distance of every single peak, and spent time maneuvering around the more interesting ones. Even at maneuvering speed, the panorama changed quickly, too fast to really study the scenery.
The flight actually consumed 6.3 hours of engine time, or a little less than six hours flight time. Total cost per person was less than $150. We left Fort Collins downtown airport [2023: long ago shut down] at 0518 and were back on the ground there at 1308 (7:50 elapsed), with one break at Montrose 0825-0953.
Longer legs were flown below 12500' at about 155 knots, slowing to about 90 in around the peaks. The longest leg, 140 miles from Windom Peak to Culebra Peak took only 45 minutes, hardly time to get bored. Nominally the total distance was 842 miles, but actual ground track was probably much longer with turns and circling. [This was well before the advent of cellphone-based tracking apps!]
We'd waited more than a month for good weather and availability of the aircraft. Due to being patient we had remarkably smooth and clear conditions through the first 37 peaks before Montrose. We viewed Longs Peak just after sunrise, then went around Mount Evans (since renamed Mount Blue Sky) and Mount Bierstadt between Grays Peak and Torreys Peak, around Quandary Peak and Mount Lincoln et al, over Mount Sherman and shot over to Mount of the Holy Cross. It was especially clear and magnificent, with the cross well defined and visible a long ways off.
(Most of the navigation was done visually, which is just as well because I added 13 instead of subtracting, when converting headings from true to magnetic, which only confused things until we noticed that.)
From there, rather than drop to the rest of the Sawatch, the route took us out to the Elk Range, to Capitol Peak. We circled it, passed Snowmass Mountain, and went all around the Maroon Bells and Pyramid Peak still in very smooth air. Then around Castle Peak and back to Mount Massive in the Sawatch Range. Here the next 14 peaks were close together and went by quickly, though we did a number of turns and S-curves. Despite being familiar with the area I had trouble picking out Mount Belford, Mount Oxford, Mount Harvard, and Mount Columbia until right near them.
After Mount Shavano at the south end, we set a course for San Luis Peak in the San Juan Range, and flew between it and Stewart Peak. Then Wetterhorn Peak and Uncompahgre Peak were quite easy to recognize as we searched for Redcloud Peak, Sunshine Peak, and Handies Peak. After passing Handies we circled the Uncompahgre Peak area and admired the awesome "castles" in the area. On to Montrose, to the north, for breakfast and an "iddy biddy bladder break" about three hours into the flight.
Climbing back south to Mount Sneffels, Ouray, and Telluride, we saw that small cumulus had formed, which meant a little bumpier trip and more interesting photos. Mount Sneffels was a very spectacular pyramid of a mountain, flanked by many other peaks. Next we circled all around the El Diente Peak cluster, very impressive, and then the Mount Eolus area ("Needle Mountains", well named).
From there we used magnetic and then VOR (aircraft radio navigation aid) headings to reach Culebra Peak, 35 miles south of the prominent Blanca Peak area of the Sangre de Cristo Range. The summits of Culebra and the peaks north in the Sangres were wreathed in clouds, so flying was a little trickier, but we still saw every peak. We passed right next to Culebra, then did several loops around the Blanca section.
Between Blanca and the Crestones the route crossed right over Great Sand Dunes NP (then an NM), nothing short of magnificent from above, a tremendously wide carpet of rolling sand. Medano Creek was running full right then too. We came up to the Crestones from the south, and flew along them and around Kit Carson Mountain. We explored this area for about eight minutes before making a line for Pikes Peak, the last of the 54, with a nice look straight down on Royal Gorge on the way.
After a lazy turn about Pikes, we stayed west of Denver for the 40 minute ride home, going over Red Rocks, Boulder, and Loveland.
I wanna do it again. (And next year we did! But that's another trip report.) It was certainly a wondrous, mind-boggling trip to see so many mountains and so much of the state in so short a time.
If you've flown in a small plane, you know that it's cramped and noisy, and perhaps bumpy. I was busier than our most-competent pilot, switching between navigation, narration, video taping, still photography, noting times, and occasionally "holding the aircraft". The last required a combination of sensitivity and firmness that I can assure you, took practice (I didn't have). Next time, no video gear, I'll just take a camera!
(An edited version of this document ran in the December 1990 issue of "Trail and Timberline", the monthly magazine of the Colorado Mountain Club.)
(Next trip report: 1986_0629_ChasmLake.htm)