1st Taste of 4th Class : Mt. Lindsey North Ridge 14,042'

Peak:

Mt. Lindsey - 14,042 feet

Warning: Don't attempt a 14er with with MountainMicah83 unless you are looking for a crazy adventure. I always read those reports of those who climb mountains such as greys and torreys in 4-5 hours and have a decent time and get back to the car with an uneventful trip. This has yet to happen to me and Mt. Lindsey has kept the adventure running.

This will be a long report but hopefully interesting

I was planning on doing this peak with Jean Roy (the canadian who is attempting all of our 14ers this summer), but I misread the date he was climbing. My friend Matt called me on Wednesday of last week saying that he was itching for a climb. He fractured his heel in like 10 places snowboarding back in march and has just returned to work only a couple of weeks ago. With 14 screws in his bones, the Dr. said his bones were strong but his ligaments would be sore, but that he should be able to climb. He showed up to my house in Falcon around 5:30 on Sat night and we were off around 6. We decided to take his friend's Jeep that he was borrowing. After driving through the torrental rain, the Jeep petered out down near fountain. It decided that it didn't want to run any more. We called a tow truck and had it and us towed back to his house in the springs where our wives met us with my Jeep. At 9:30PM, after swapping over our gear, we were off again for our mountain.

After detouring into Walsenburg at about 1030 for some much needed dinner, every restaurant was already closed. We ended up having hot dogs from the gas station. Driving up HWY 69 and then the 15 miles or so of dirt roads was slow going. There were deer, skunks, and porcupines out everywhere. We arrived at the TH from the rough 4WD road (as 14ers describes it) around 1245 PM. My honda civic could have driven up that road... backwards! I was worried about Matt's foot tiring out, so we decided to hike then rather than sleep at the car.

We stepped off at about 1:15 AM


After about 30 minutes, the route finding became a bit difficult as the water runoff has overtaken the trail. After skipping over back and forth several times through all of the hundreds of routes that hikers have created, we got a bit turned around. We relied on the 14ers.com GPS track (thanks bill) to get us through and back to the trail. Soon later, we came to the beloved river crossing. This was interesting in the dark.


I was hoping this iced matt's foot a bit. We rested and had a PBR that I packed in while our feet dried out a bit. Now after 2 AM and we weren't feeling tired yet.


We set up "camp" at about 4 in the morning at about 12000'. We were moving slow so as not to aggrivate the foot! Got so sleep around 4:30. After about 2 hours of kind of sleeping, we awoke and Matt snapped this pic of me with Lindsey in the distance.


Matt built his "mini-stonehenge thing" (I can't remember the technical name) for good luck while I was gearing up my pack.


At 8:15 or so, we resumed our slow pace towards Lindsey.


We meandered up this hill that reminded me of the Mt Elbert trail...


Upon almost reaching the Lindsey/Iron Nipple saddle at about 12900', the mountain was in our sights...


We reached the saddle at around 13,100' (I think) and snapped this back towards part of Iron Nipple (left) and Huerfano Peak (right) which I was hoping to climb (hike) later if the weather lasted.


To this point, the summits of Blanca/Ellingwood and Little Bear were all socked in and the clouds were approaching Lindsey. Luckily, they were dissapating up and away mostly. Matt snapped this photo of me as we headed toward the final stretch. Notice the 3 climbers in the couloir. Our route was going to be the class 4 ridge so we split right shortly after this...


we stayed high (actually too high on the class 3 ridge and ended up having to downclimb those sharp points in the route description over some pretty decent exposure. This is matt just before getting to those sharp points.


Because we were far right, it was too difficult to cross back into the main class portion of the face without being over exposed with not very many good holds so we decided to take a route that ended up being about 5.7 on the far lower right. Matt is much more of an experienced of a climber than me and is pretty much a trad expert so I felt pretty safe. We climbed as the exposure increased until I felt that I needed to rope up. We didn't have a full rope but only a small 30 meter half rope/iceline. This was enough since any falls should be able to be caught without too much vertical drop on the rope. There were only really about 10-15' that I was a little scared of with the exposure, but we used the length of the rope anyhow. After both tying into it, Matt just free climbed the section because he felt safer about it. He set his anchors at the top and belayed me as I climbed. The climb was not too hard but very exposed. After getting past the crux, where I felt more comfortable, I snapped this pic of Matt belaying me with the sun behind him. The part in this picture is really only probably class 3.


Matt reaching the false summit...


Near the false summit, we passed the 3 climbers from earlier that were in the couloir decending the other way. The said the couloir was nasty and the ice axes were just breaking out large chunks of snow. They didn't want to return that way.

The rest of the route...


As we reached the summit, the clouds revealed Blanca's summit and part of Ellingwood to us. We eventually got a good view of little bear but didn't get a pic. Blanca is just beautiful from this side, with like 2000' feet of vertical cliff back there.


Matt sporting the logo of his climbing shop back in Oregon...


The summit was nice. Tiny breeze and over 65 degrees up there. We needed some lawn chairs and umbrella drinks.

Me on the summit with Blanca in the Back...


Then these crazy shirtless mountain men came out of no where and started swinging their ice axes at us...


After that, Matt decided he needed a new facebook photo...


After some cliffshots, a smoke on the ol tobacco pipes and a couple of shots of whisky, we headed down because the cloud formations became worrisome.

At around 1:15 PM we arrived back at the saddle. We actually found an easier, much less exposed class 3/4 route down the other side of the wall on the way down. The weather looked decent so the plan was that Matt would rest and I would bag Huerfano, since it is one of the Centenniels. I got up through the notch of Iron nipple and back down and on the way to the summit and the clouds quickly nastified. I turned around and scurried back to Matt on the saddle and we headed back to camp. On the way, I snapped this pic of Blanca...


and one of Matt


We arrived back at at camp and each had another PBR that I had stashed in the snow under our vestibule. Matt was getting slower and slower on the way back being out of shape from his injury and the pain of his foot. At around 11,000', we agreed that I would take off ahead and fire up the charcoal grill at the car for some burgers. I headed out, crossed the river and set for the car. It began to lightly rain and I was praying it would stay like that and not get worse.

Since we ascended in the dark, I snapped these pics of the lower valleys...




20 minutes or so later when Matt caught up, we had a beer and some burgers chilling in the now hard rain.


Little did we know, the adventure was not yet over...
While driving back down the long dirt road, in the middle of nowhere, this chick in a long black skirt with hiking boots came running out of the woods screaming and waving us down. Assuming she was in trouble or maybe even had been kidnapped and escaped we began to stop since she was waving us down with a very concerned look at her face. She then began crying and then shouted for us to get away and that she didn't need help. Then she turned and started hitting the tree next to her and yelling at it. I noticed a revolver holstered on her hip and we got the heck out of there. I wasn't willing to stick around and see this chick who was probably tripping start shooting at us. I hope she ended up ok! I don't mind helping out, but not when I am risking my life!!!

We headed home with one more tale left. Driving through Colorado Springs, the sunset was very orange and just gorgeous. Then... Matt noticed a funnel cloud north of pikes peak. It appeared to be right about on hwy 24. Sorry the pic isn't that great. It was raining and we were cruising down the highway...


After viewing the news this morning, they mentioned the funnel but said it didn't touch down and there was a lot of hail over there.

All in all, it was another fun filled adventure and I can't wait to see what happens next time. Maybe the actual mountain will possess the adventure rather than everything else.

Long Columbia Harvard Traverse

Peaks:

Mt. Harvard - 14,420 feet Mt. Columbia - 14,073 feet

Thanks to all who joined along in this hike: MountainMicah83, MattPayne11, JakeK, and Jean Roy.

I picked up MattPayne11 in Colorado Springs at around 8:15 on Friday 6/19 and we headed up towards the mountains. We arrived in Buena Vista shortly after 10 when I realized that I forgot my mountaineering boots. Luckily, I had my La Sportiva ascent shoes on, so I decided that I would be able to manage.

2 Miles up the final road (before it gets rougher) to the N. Cottonwood Creek TH we saw Jean Roy and his Honda Element with Quebec Plates (around 10:30PM). Jean has come down to Colorado from Montreal for the Summer and is attempting to finish all of the 14ers by the end of August. Yesterday he was at 18 days and 18 peaks. He takes 1 rest day per week. Pretty amazing, but I guess he can handle it since he has done Denali, Aconcagua, and Kilimanjaro among many others. We took him to the TH and set up the tents. We crashed around 1130PM and woke up dark and early at 3 AM. We wanted an early start to have a chance for the traverse. With 30% chance of afternoon thunderstorms, things were not too positive for the entire trip.

Here is the trail when we stepped off around 3:40 AM. The approach is very long and very flat. I think you rise like 600 feet before treeline and that‘s it.



With about half an hour of light and being a ways past where you break off from Columbia, the fog broke from Yale.



Shortly after we had our first views of Harvard. It is in the center, you can see how mild of a climb it was.



We got a great view of Yale at this point!



This was a picture with the greater part of the ridge to Columbia (Right)



The sun rising above Harvard‘s east ridge!



Me on the summit. I made it around 7:45. First person of the day. I selected some of class 3 right up the center. Belford and Oxford were behind me.



After having my shot of whisky and celebrating Jean Roy/MattPayne11 were right there. JakeK and his climbing partner arrived within a few minutes as well. Fog was surrounding us at this point but we made the decision to go for Columbia. There was overcast everywhere but no looming storms. The four of us set off and JakeK‘s buddy headed for the car. His new boots were killing him. The picture is Jean Roy headed down the start of Harvard‘s east ridge



There was not too much snow up to the summit of Harvard. Definitely no snowshoes or crampons needed. There was one field of about 100yds and the last couple hundred feet was hard snow. This picture was the last pic headed towards pt 13512 that was snow free. From there much of the ridge had snow, but I managed to keep my shoes dry through it.



After dropping down just before 13512 we began to circle and at around 13100 we came to this snowfield. The pic doesn‘t do it justice, but the snow was too soft to cross and we ended up dropping to about 12700 going around.



At about 12900 this picture was our choices for heading up columbia which was up to the right in the clouds. There was the large talus field to the left. The small talus field in the center, the rocks to the right of that, or snow fields on the far right. We assumed the snow would be too soft at this point in the day so we were planning on some 3+ climbing through the rocks and having to drop down to maybe 12400 to get over there. At 12600-12700 we tasted the snow on the right. The pack was way hard. We were relieved that we were not going to have to manage through all of the talus and rock.



Heading up through the snowfields, the snow continued to get softer. There was quite a lot of recent wet slide activity to our side from the ridge. This picture is JakeK and his high elevation lungs from vail Kicking a** up the slope kicking steps for us with Jean Roy following.



Looking at the southern portion from the east on the traverse saddle.



MattPayne11 bringing up the tail



By this time my shoes were soaked from all of the wet snow. At least I had wool socks! Here is our outlook to the summit from there:



We decided to around to snow because we were now sinking to our knees. This is what the route looked from there at around 13100‘. The climb was manuvering over large talus bolder fields. We made the ridge and did not find the eastern trail up columbia.



For the final couple of hundred feet, it began to snow. The rocks got wet and slippery. Then with about 200‘ to go, we heard the thunder from 3 nearby lightning strikes. 2 from the north near harvard and one from the south. Our butts puckered as we scurried to the summit. (this is the only way down). I got one pic of myself and am hoping JakeK will post the group pic. Don‘t worry, you aren‘t missing anything. Everything was all stormy and there was no visibility past about 20‘.



After a very quick group photo at about 1215, we started down cautiously. We wanted to go quickly to avoid the storm but still be safe on the wet rocks. This is the final photo that I snapped of Jean Roy who is a billy goat going both up and down and JakeK decending. (I am very grateful to not climb the standard route up Columbia.) The route was very nasty coming down.



At around 12‘500 the Snow turned to rain. What a day to end the spring! I threw the camera in my pack to keep it dry and put on the rain coat. My "non-cotton" hiking pants were already fairly wet, so I didn‘t put on the rain pants cause I didn‘t want to overheat. We took a quick rest at treeline and made our way to the horn fork basin trail. It rained and rained and rained and rained... With already wet shoes I just tromped through all of the water running down the trail. Exhausted, we made it to the car at about 3:15 to close out the day.

over 7,000 total feet of elevation gain and almost 16 miles, we made it. Pancho‘s Burritos from Buena Vista never tasted so good. The hike was fun but long. Brought 3 liters of water and only used up 2 total.

Good luck Jean Roy, I hope we catch some more peaks with you throught the summer! I look forward to seeing some of the photos of Jean Roy, MattPayne11, and JakeK.