One of many
trip reports under the
SilGro home page for Alan Silverstein and Cathie
Grow.
Email me at
ajs@frii.com.
Last update: July 25, 2024
(Previous trip report: 1989_0818-20_LakeMcConaughy.htm)
(A
Fourteener
trip report.)
This and the following three reports describe a joyous week-long adventure. Once again I created for myself a sort of personal "Outward Bound" experience. During seven sequential days I revisited three Colorado Fourteeners and one subpeak, starting with Uncompahgre Peak, including spending a night on the highest point in the San Juan Range; climbed a new (for me) Thirteener; started three separate expeditions from trailheads; and gained over 17500' vertical... All in no particular hurry!
As always I encountered numerous, unexpected surprises, witnessed many natural scenes almost miraculous in their beauty, and happened into a couple of amusing coincidences. As usual I will include in my reports various details that might bore the reader, if an armchair adventurer, but which are useful to those who later retrace my steps (including me). Also some of the retelling requires some stage-setting... Bear with me.
My trip began rather differently, at the end of a weekend, and ended on Labor Day -- not a fun time to be on the highway. I left Fort Collins alone in my Jeep Wagoneer (too) late on Sunday night, August 27. I pulled into the Kenosha Pass campground, 10000', northeast of Fairplay, after midnight. Though it was late and I was tired, it was so pretty -- dark, starry skies with no moon -- that I stayed up awhile observing with binoculars and didn't hit the sack until 0100, in a sleeping bag on a tarp alongside my Jeep.
My very next thought was, "Someone is breaking into my Jeep!" I heard a loud banging and rattling. I looked up and immediately saw, silhouetted by starlight, a very large, very black bear, standing right in front of me! There was no mistaking the shape. My heart rate rose through my target zone without hesitation. The bear wheeled around and lumbered off to attack some garbage cans 30' away. I simply froze in terror.
It was 0245. After about 20 minutes with no further noises from the bear, and my vital signs back to normal, I debated what to do next. I was very tired. It was tempting to return to sleep. No, better not take any chances... Sigh. I opened the back door, cleared the back seat, and crawled in to spend the rest of the night, rather cramped.
Monday: Next morning about 0730 I discovered dusty paw prints all along the side of the Jeep. The bear had walked right next to me, between me and the vehicle, nearly stepping on me. It had worked for a while on the rear window, which was rolled down two inches, and now had claw marks on it. I guess he smelled a loaf of bread inside. I suppose he gave up and walked off because I woke up. Good thing he wasn't really hungry!
Several empty campsites away I met a couple who'd been camped for three nights. They said the bear had visited every night and had caused all sorts of consternation. Every trash can in the place was knocked over and strewn about. While we were talking they pointed out that the bear hadn't left yet! Sure enough he was exploring a hundred feet away. I watched him for a while as he revisited the cans near my camp site. He was actually pretty shy; he would walk off if I even stepped toward him, some distance away. A very big, impressive animal; full grown. He left claw tracks about four inches across.
I stopped at the Forest Service office in Fairplay. They were nonchalant about the bear. "This time of year they're in all the campgrounds. They never hurt anyone. The Division of Wildlife won't move them." I was surprised there wasn't even a specific warning sign like, "Bear is here every night!", not just the generic, "How to get along with bears." My misadventure seemed suddenly quite mundane, even though it was the first time I had seen a bear in the wild.
I continued from Fairplay through Poncha Springs, Gunnison, and Lake City to the North Fork Henson Creek road (15 minutes and 5.4 narrow, dusty, winding miles west from town), then up Nellie Creek -- 35 minutes and 4.2 miles of 4WD trail that was pretty, and more dirt than rock, but slow with water diversions and hairpin turns. I reached the parking area at the wilderness boundary, 11480', at 1450 Monday afternoon, just as the last people there for the day left.
I assembled a full pack, less a tent but including four liters of water, and started up the trail (that used to be a road) at 1600. It was a pretty, cool afternoon. Cumulus rained in the distance but nothing threatened nearby. As everywhere I visited on this trip, the tundra was already brown and dry, with streaks of lime green, bright orange, sunset red, and other pastel shades. There were only a few late season flowers. I enjoyed the mile or more of steady approach to Uncompahgre Peak from the east, with long shadows across the peaceful landscape. The peak loomed into view early on the trail, and grew larger as I worked toward it up the rolling tundra.
Unlike last time I followed the easy trail this time -- no snowfield available to take as a shortcut. I made surprisingly good time considering I hadn't been at altitude for over a month. I reached the broad summit, which ended abruptly in a sheer cliff, at 1913. I had plenty of time before sunset at 1948. I decided to sleep out of the breeze just southeast of the summit rocks, next to a mysterious 4' square concrete pad, 10' from the north face.
The summit had a strong feeling of contrast. There was a lot of flat ground there, and much more quite flat (but vertical) cliff face dropping down, down to a distant valley below.
It was a fantastic night. Like the San Juans this time of year, sunset was relatively brown, hazy, and colorless. Still, the airy feeling of infinite distances around me compensated for any lack of intensity. I watched the stars pop out. Venus followed the sun down, a brilliant white point that grew blood red. Just as it vanished, through binoculars I saw an intense, two-second green flash, a rare sighting of that well-known phenomenon.
By 2115 I'd had a hot dinner under the arch of the galaxy with my head full of excellent stereo classical music from KPRN, Grand Junction. I looked for Saturn, Uranus, Neptune, and Vesta, and was ready to call it a night. Then I noticed... A shimmering green glow, low in the north, over the narrow, orange strip of lights that was Gunnison, and northeast from there to the pearly white glow of distant Denver. An aurora danced! I was entranced.
I watched and photographed it for over an hour, and several more times through the night as I awoke periodically, until it faded out about 0200. Most of the time the glow was little more than a fuzzy, odd-looking greenish cloud that changed slowly as I watched. Sometimes though it brightened, sent up vertical rays, formed a curtain, or moved visibly across the sky. Once it turned perceptibly reddish. It never got higher than 30 deg altitude.
I slept pretty well, to my relief, between exhausted but ecstatic observations of the aurora and the rest of the sky. With starlight alone it was bright enough to recognize rocks and the oddments I had scattered around me, although I couldn't see details. Before dawn, I think the Zodiacal Light rose along the ecliptic; it was hard to be sure. The temperature bottomed out at 22 deg F, yet I was quite warm.
Tuesday: Ah, what a sunrise! Cloudless, hence not so overwhelming an event. But as always intense colors preceded the sun. And a narrow, crescent moon, circular with earthshine, hung low in the glow, near where the Denver luminescence had inexplicably faded through the night. (Perhaps everyone turned off their lights, or stopped driving, or a cloud condensed between me and town?)
Earth shadow, pink above purple, formed and dropped onto the land as the first pinpoint of sun appeared at 0635. Mountain shadow materialized at infinity and sank north of Mount Sneffels. I burned a cone of incense(!) and listened to more classical music. Then I went back to sleep and didn't wake again until 0900.
Another lone hiker was my first company at about 1100. I was slow departing, not wanting to leave that enjoyable summit. I set a new personal record: 16:40 on top. Finally I trekked out rather quickly, 1135-1312. It took me 3:13 to climb 2830', and just half that long to descend it. That is to me one of the signs of a "perfect" trail.
The same hiker arrived before I finished decommissioning my backpack. I gave him a ride down Nellie Creek to his 2WD car.
Uncompahgre? Uncomparable!
(Next trip report: 1989_0829-31_Challenger,KC.htm)