Displaying items by tag: Willow Lake

Mount Adams is one of the last mountains in the top 100 in the Sangre de Cristo Range that I've yet to climb. It has always drawn my attention on other hikes in the area, and I had hopes of climbing it this spring. Instead, I opted to climb California Peak with Ethan, which was a great hike. Originally, I had planned to climb Pyramid Peak this weekend; however, none of my climbing partners had crampons, so we decided to hit Mount Adams instead. I had always read great things about climbing Mount Adams, and Gerry Roach has the west ridge route marked as a classic climb. Since I have more or less always agreed with Roach's ratings for "classic climbs," I figured that it would be the best way to climb it. So, Ethan and I agreed to take the west ridge route instead of the standard route. Feel free to read more about Roach's 13'er guidebook HERE.

This was particularly exciting since I have wanted to go back to Willow Lake for awhile now. Willow Lake is truly a magical place, and should be designated as a wilderness area, in all honesty. The lake is pristine, with a giant waterfall at its head. Additionally, it is surrounded by some of the most rugged and aesthetically remarkable mountains in Colorado, including Kit Carson Peak, Challenger Point, Columbia Point, Crestone Peak and Crestone Needle, not to mention Mount Adams!

Mount Adams is the 66th highest ranked summit in Colorado, sitting at 13,931 ft. 69 more feet and it would be climbed much more frequently, not that Ethan and I are complaining that we didn't see another soul on the summit...

Looking at the maps while driving over, Ethan and I also thought it might be fun to tack on another peak or two while we were out, so we decided that once we reached the summit of Adams, we would evaluate the conditions and how we felt and then decide on the next steps.

The drive over to the town of Crestone was remarkably unremarkable except for two incredible details. First, the pizza at Amicas in Salida was incredible, as usual. Second, the sunset as we were leaving Salida was insane. We drove out of town, heading west into Poncha Springs, and decided we HAD to pull over and take photos of this rediculous sunset. For my photos, I opted to do a minor HDR treatment since the foreground was quite interesting -we had stopped just in front of a huge grassy area used for cattle to pasture on. The results were stunning, with the sunsetting directly behind Mount Shavano.

Here's a zoomed-out version of the same scene, which I personally prefer.

We arrived at the Willow Lake trailhead around 10 PM, set-up Ethan's tent, and hit the sack, with our alarm set for 2 AM. We wanted to ensure that we had enough time to reach the summit of Adams before the weather hit. As soon as the alarm went off, we packed up quickly and hit the trail. The hike was an interesting one since there was a full moon and because we did not get a ton of sleep. Nevertheless, we hiked quickly and reached the base of Willow Lake within 2.5 hours.

The full moon made for some pretty fun photography opportunities, although photographing the moon is always a big challenge unless you have a really nice zoom lens. Most photos you will see of the moon and of a scene are two images layered as one, since it is literally impossible to photograph the moon and your foreground without either overexposing the moon (like above) or underexposing your foreground. Anyways, seeing Willow Lake again was great. We rested there for a good 30 minutes and took some photos. The waterfall was just as awesome as I had remembered it to be.

We saw lots of tents on the way up, probably 15 total. Lots of people were up here to climb the 14ers. We were the only group doing Mount Adams though. We gained the trail to the left of the lake and began to ascend above the lake in quick order, stopping every once in awhile to get some photos.

Before we knew it, we had gone too far and were nearly at the head of the lake near the waterfall. While we knew we were somewhat off-route, we decided to get into a good position to get photos of the sunrise and the full moon over Willow Lake.

We then turned sharply south to gain elevation into the small basin beneath Mount Adams. Since there is no trail up there, we just followed beneath the termination of a large cliff wall that led into the area, looking back from time to time to catch the sunlight on Kit Carson Peak.

I've always like the geology of this area, which is comprised of clastic sedimentary rocks, which appear as large pebbles that are cemented together. These rocks sometimes erode, to leave behind some really interesting features. For more information on Crestone Conglomerate, check out this interesting website.

As we gained the basin, we could not help but notice the amazing hues cast onto Willow Lake by the sun hitting the southern aspects of Challenger Point.

Indeed, the alpenglow on KIt Carson Peak and Challenger Point were quite impressive, and coupled with the moon and the lake it made for a perfect scene to hone my HDR skills. If you've ever wondered how to do HDR, you can do like I did, and read about it a ton, or watch this perfectly succinct tutorial from Trey Ratcliff.

We kept on hiking up into the basin towards Mount Adams and stumbled upon a pair of really nice looking ponds. The ponds were surrounding by wildflowers and separated by a huge jutting rock feature, which made for quite a lovely subject for an HDR panoramic. Additionally, the clouds were insane, and continued to be all day long.

After a few more minutes, Mount Adams finally came into view for the first time.

The route seemed quite straight-forward to us, so we opted to just follow a rock gully up towards the ridge, which was strewn with all sorts of wildflowers.

Ethan was a superb photography this day - he captured many many photos of me throughout the journey, all of which I really enjoyed his perspective and composition on.

We finally gained the ridge!

We were able to look down at South Crestone Lake and some 'miniture' Crestone Needle looking mountains.

As we continued up, Crestone Peak came into view, and eventually Crestone Needle as well.

The wildflowers on Mount Adams were amazing.

And the route up the west ridge was fabulous. In some sections, it really reminded me of Crestone Needle, just not as steep. The same type of rocks made for some enjoyable route-finding. I shall hereby dub Mount Adams, "Baby Crestone Needle." The similarities in the rock were remarkable.

The clouds continued to look awesome, and so I was able to get this photo of Ethan gaining the ridge higher up.

I was also able to get a really nice panoramic photo of Ethan gaining the ridge with the nutty clouds behind him. Click to see a larger version.

Check out this cloud - it looks like its going to eat my soul - thanks Ethan!

We stopped frequently to shoot photos. This is an all too familiar scene - me shooting photos of flowers. Thanks for catching me in the act, Ethan!

We kept on truckin' up to the summit block, which proved to have some enjoyable class 3 options if one so chose, so we did.

Finally, we reached the summit and took a congratulatory summit shot using Ethan's camera on self-timer.

Mount Adams was a great climb, for sure. The summit was superb, with excellent views in all directions.

We also had some insane smoke appear out of nowhere in the valleys around us, and before we knew it, the smoke was gone. It was truly odd. It was almost as if the valley below was on fire and then put out before we knew it. A look to the north revealed some crazy looking clouds over Rito Alto, Venable and Comanche.

We also found an awesome spot with a great vantage point for a celebration pose. We took advantage and marvelled at the sheer depth below us from where we stood.

Naturally, my focus was on Crestone Needle and Crestone Peak, two of my favorite mountains in Colorado. They are so distinguishable and quite honestly some of the freakishly looking peaks there are in Colorado. In fact, Crestone Needle ranks just 4th on the "Most Impressive" list (for ranked peaks) that is based on the work of David Metzler and the ORS/RORS scales.

A view to the east revealed Fluted Peak (far left), Horn Peak (left, in distance) and the Horn Lakes below.  UN 13,580 (ranked 201) was directly south, with UN 13,541 and Obstruction Peak and Humboldt behind. Additionally, Crestone Needle and Crestone Peak stood out like sore thumbs with Columbia Point, Kit Carson Peak and Challenger Point all towering over the basin below.

A closer look at the 14ers of the area. Left to right - Crestone Needle, Crestone Peak, Columbia Point (13er, ranked 56th), Kit Carson Peak and Challenger Point.

Ethan was loving the views and the clouds.

And so was I...

Alas - a perfect summit does not last forever, so we decided to head south towards UN 13,580 and beyond to see what we could accomplish. The dramatic nature of the cliffs to our left kept us on our toes and in amazement for quite a long distance.

Also, the traverse over to 13,580 proved to offer some really fun challenges, including this class 3 manuever above a hugely exposed section.

But it also offered some fun boulder scrambling on very solid rock.

UN 13,580 was not too far from us, and the views kept us from moving too quickly.

The rock was all totally solid, but in places it was awkward walking on slanted slopes of what felt like giant fissures in the earth.

A look back at Mount Adams...

We finally reached the summit of UN 13,580 and enjoyed as what Gerry Roach describes on page 155 as "a startling view of Horn Lake." I don't disagree with Roach one bit on this detail, but what I do disagree with him on is that he describes UN 13,580 as a bi-centennial, meaning it is in the top 200 in Colorado ranked by elevation. According to my list, it is ranked 201 and just shy of that mark. When I built my database, I ranked mountains in the following order:

1. By elevation
2. By prominence
3. By isolation
4. By name

So, if two mountains had the same elevation and prominence, the mountain with more isolation is ranked higher. This seemed like the most fair way to rank mountains that had very similar characteristics. I am not sure how Roach or any others rank them.

Subsequently, according to my database, which is based almost entirely off of data compiled by John Kirk of Listsofjohn.com, Clark Peak, a 13er in the Elk Range, is also sitting at 13,580 ft. Additionally, it has the exact same prominence as UN 13,580, making them tied in most regards. The mountain with more isolation (Clark Peak) gets ranked higher.

Sorry to get on that soap-box... here's a self-timer of Ethan and I on UN 13,580.

And Ethan with the Crestones in the background...

With me enjoying the "startling views."

It was really cool signing the summit register for this rarely climbed peak. At the top of the register was Gerry and Jennifer Roach, followed later by John Kirk (of ListsofJohn fame), Susan Joy Paul (a regular on 14ers.com and a Facebook friend), and Doug Hatfield, another regular 14ers.com contributor who quoted on the summit register, "100/100 in Custer County," meaning, this was the last ranked peak in this county that he needed to finish. Quite an accomplishment!

Naturally, the Crestones just kept my gaze for much of our time resting on UN 13,580, so I decided to get some more HDR shots, as well as a non-HDR shot.

We decided to keep going along the ridge to see where it would take us. Much to our surprise, a lone goat crested the ridge to greet us below to the south.

"We're gonna climb that one now?"

Unfortunately, the storm clouds starting building to the west, so we opted to bail at the first opportunity. Since there's no trails in this terrain, we had to do some heavy route-finding. This ended up being quite enjoyable and challenging, and afforded us with plenty of class 4 down-climbing opportunities.

We found a crazy gully just below the first set of slabs we had down-climbed, and decided that the terrain on the other side of this mini-ridge below the gully looked much better as an exit. Unfortunately, the gully was loose and chossy, with eroded garbage and hardened mud. It was a real nightmare to downclimb. I went first, and faced-in for many sections. I kicked down tons of loose debris and tested every hold. It was quite a mess. Once I was down, I yelled up to Ethan that I was clear. Ethan had a bit more trouble, mostly because he was schlepping his trekking poles on his pack still (I opted to not bring any), and his camera bag was not of the LowePro Toploader variety that I have grown to love. His bag got into his way and he had to stop and re-pack the whole thing into his main pack. Almost down, Ethan had a few more moves left. He faced in and placed all of his weight on his feet, which were being held by what appeared to be a very solid and large boulder. Ethan shifted his weight to another rock, and as he did, the rock he was just standing on crumbled and disintegrated, causing huge blocks to go down the rest of the gully and down the mountain. Ethan was quite lucky. Here's some views of the nasty gully:

After the lame gully, we were greeted by a series of steep ledges that had interesting holds, probably rated at class 3 or 4.

A look back up the ledges:

And over to Kit Carson and Challenger...

We descended this section pretty quickly, having to shift directions a few times due to the bands of ledges terminating a few times. I rested a few minutes at the base of the boulder field we came down and found a new friend.

The columbine flowers were really nice too!

Another look back up the insanity we down-climbed...

We re-joined the trail that leads up to Challenger Point and headed towards the waterfalls above Willow Lake.

Which were quite amazing!

Finally, we made it back around and to the lake in short order.

When I was here in 2009, I took a panoramic photo series from the lake, which included the waterfall and a really interesting rock in the lake. I always regretted that photo because it cut the top off of Challenger Point. Not this time!

Also, we stopped below the lake to get some amazing shots of the lower waterfall near the trail.

The hike out was pretty uneventful after the waterfalls, except of course for the insane amount of switchbacks on the lower trail. We made it back to the car at 4 PM on the nose, just 14 hours after we started...

Here's a look at the map, showing our route and elevation profile. Feel free to click on each to see larger versions. 

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Kit Carson Mountain is a very prominent mountain located in the Sangre de Cristo Range. The area surrounding Kit Carson Mountain is both rugged and pristine, with views of amazing peaks such as Crestone Needle and Crestone Peak in abundance. The hike to Kit Carson Mountain by way of the Willow Creek trailhead is nothing short of astounding, with breathtaking vistas available the whole way up. To put it lightly, this is one of the best hikes in Colorado, bar none.

Here are some meaningful statistics from my adventure up these amazing mountains:

Challenger Point – 14,081 ft – ranked 34th highest in Colorado

Kit Carson Peak – 14,165 ft – ranked 23rd highest in Colorado

Columbia Point – 13,980 ft – ranked 56th highest in Colorado

“Kitty Kat Carson” – 13,980 ft – unranked

Total distance traveled: Approximately 15 miles 

Total elevation gain: 6,500 ft.

By now you might be wondering what makes a mountain ranked versus unranked. This is a fairly controversial topic in the climbing community. Basically, there is only one factor to consider when determining if a mountain should be "ranked" and that is prominence. The prominence of a peak is the height of the peak’s summit above the lowest contour line encircling it and no higher summit. Prominence is interesting to some mountaineers because it is an objective measurement that is strongly correlated with the subjective significance of a summit (and how difficult it is to climb). Peaks with low prominences are either subsidiary tops of some higher summit or relatively insignificant independent summits. Peaks with high prominences tend to be the highest points around and are likely to have extraordinary views. In the case of Colorado mountains, most mountaineers use a cutoff of 300 ft / 91 m to determine whether or not a mountain is ranked or not. So using “Kitty Kat Carson” above as an example, since there’s only 80 ft in elevation drop between itself and Columbia Point, it is not ranked. Alternatively, since there is 360 ft in elevation drop between Columbia Point and Kit Carson Peak, it is ranked. 

I picked up my friend Terry from his condo at 5 AM on Friday and departed for the quaint town of Crestone. We arrived at the Willow Creek Trailhead at about 9 AM. There were several vehicles at the trailhead, which was kind of surprising given that it was still early on a weekday. This was going to be our third backpacking trek in as many weeks. This week I was able to get my pack down to 45 pounds, thanks in part to some lightweight food my mom graciously provided to me the previous day. We began our hike up the trail, which was well travelled. About 5 minutes into our hike, a gentleman with a long gray beard was coming down the trail and was very friendly to us, warning us of electrical storms. I commented to Terry that this was not my first rodeo and that the man reminded me of Jesus. I was hoping that his presence was not a sign of things to come… bearded man looking like Jesus appears out of nowhere and warns us of lightning… The trail was such a nice change from last week since it was actually easy to follow and was clearly maintained and free of vegetation and confusing side trails. The trail makes many large switchbacks up a gradual slope and then at the top of this slope it drops you right next to a huge meadow, accompanied by great views of part of Challenger Point.

After awhile, the trail brought us closer and closer to Challenger’s headwall.

Shortly thereafter, the trail begins a long series of shorter switchbacks leading to the north and east until a large waterfall is exposed at the base of the headwall.

After gaining the headwall and hiking further up the trail, we were right at the base of Willow Lake. Being that we were in a Wilderness area, camping was restricted to areas no closer than 300 ft of the lake. One of the very first campsites we encountered had some Big Horn sheep grazing at it.

The sheep quickly scattered up the valley towards the lake. 

We kept going on the trail and found a really wonderful campsite left of the trail nestled in some trees. The funny thing was that the sheep were hanging out in this campsite. I was able to take several pictures of the sheep after we were able to claim the campsite as our own. This was one of the cooler things that has happened to me this year because one of my lifelong goals has been to see Bighorn sheep up close in the wild.

After we were able to chase off the sheep, we set-up camp. The campsite was very nice, with an established fire pit and logs all around it for seating. Here is the view we had of Challenger Point’s north face:

After setting-up camp, we decided to head up the lake to see what it was like. Boy, were we in for a scenic treat! The lake had a giant waterfall at its head and was surrounded by small cliffs where the waterfall was at. Here’s some stitched panoramic photos from the lake: 

After soaking in as much of the lake as we could, we decided to head back to camp, cook dinner, and call it a night. We woke up at 4 AM the next day and quickly readied ourselves for what was going to be a very long but rewarding day.

We hiked up past the lake and began up the valley to the south. Quickly Kit Carson and Challenger came into view (left and right respectively): 

I think Kit Carson looks like a Klingon’s forehead. Who’s with me?

I originally thought that this was “The Prow,” a semi-famous section of Kit Carson that is a a notorious rock-climbing route; however, it turns out that “The Prow” is on the other side of Kit Carson and is seen from Columbia Point.

Another view looking up the valley at Kit Carson (right) and the adjoining ridge to its South and East. 

We climbed up the grassy slopes of Challenger Point and then up a loose talus section to the ridge. From the ridge we could see the top of Challenger Point and looking down we could see the upper Willow Lake and the sun’s reflection on it. 

We started climbing up the ridge to the southeast towards Challenger Point. Here is a view from near the summit of what the ridge climbing looked like. 

A few minutes later and we arrived on top, with Kit Carson and Crestone Peak in full view and the Blanca group in the distance to the South. 

Looking east we could see Mount Adams poking up towards the sky. 

And here’s a shot of me on the summit looking southeast towards Crestone Peak and Kit Carson: 

On top of Challenger Point rests a plaque dedicating the mountain to the Challenger shuttle disaster of 1986. 

After refueling on top of Challenger Point, we began the journey down Challenger Point’s southeast ridge towards Kit Carson and the Kit Carson Avenue, a long ledge leading around the side and then around the back of Kit Carson. Here’s a look at some of the perilous cliffs below Kit Carson Avenue and subsequently, a photo of the Avenue and the route up it. 

The Avenue looks pretty sketchy from here but in reality it was a nice ledge with plenty of room for walking. Once at the top of the Avenue, you once again can see the awesome Crestone Peak (center) and Columbia Point (left) with the back-side and downward heading remainder of Kit Carson Avenue. 

Going down the Avenue, I was struck by the really remarkable geological formations. It appeared to me that water had eroded the underside of Kit Carson in the Avenue, making it look like something had burrowed its way right through the rock all the way down. 

And another view looking down the Avenue – it looks far less intimidating than it did from the top of Crestone Peak. 

Once we reached the bottom of the Avenue, the route took us sharply to the northwest. The climbing was pretty standard class 2 stuff. Near the top of this last section Terry ran out of gas and took a break to rest. I decided to make the final push to the top after visually verifying that Terry was not injured and was continuing. Here’s a shot looking towards Columbia Point and Crestone Peak again. Take special note on the intimidating nature of Columbia Point (closest peak) from this vantage point, as it was the side of that mountain that I would later climb… Looking at Columbia Point you can see a small fin that is separated from the mountain by a small gap. That is the fin I would later ascend to reach the top (more later). 

From here, reaching the top of Kit Carson was a breeze. There were several other groups on top. Here’s some stitched photos looking towards Challenger Point. This is a good view of the route we had to come up earlier in the day. Basically starting from the large lake pictured right of center, you climb up the grassy section and then up the rocks to the ridge.

Speaking of the lake, here’s a really high-detail pano of it.

And a shot looking south. 

And a 180 degree pano with Columbia Point in center. 

And of course here I am flexing victoriously on the summit. 

After a quick snack on top I decided it was time to go back down and decide if I was going to climb Columbia Point. Terry had already headed down and would not be attempting Columbia Point. After running into another climber on the way down and picking his brain on the approach for Columbia Point and assessing the weather, I decided to give it a shot solo. This was possibly the most technically challenging climbs I’ve done to date. The route was not well-established and there was a couple of spots where I was exposed and could have fallen to my demise. Here’s a picture outlining my rough route up. 

Once I reached the top of the first gully of the fin (5th red line from bottom), I had to make a really risky move to down-climb about 10 feet to the next section of the fin. I sat there for at least two minutes and contemplated the move’s risk and thought of turning around. I would definitely rate the move as Class 5 (Class 5: Technical free climbing involving rope, belaying, and other protection hardware for safety. Un-roped falls can result in severe injury or death) as it was 100% vertical and required both hand holds and footholds. Even though I still had on my backpack and had my camera around my neck, I decided that I had the skills and the mental acuity to give it a shot. This move was really tricky as I had to somehow flip myself around and onto the face of the rock wall, with 300 feet of exposure (Empty space below a climber, usually referring to a great distance above the deck through which the climber could fall) to the left and a steep rocky slope below me to the right. I took a photo of the spot but it really does not do it any justice. Perspective is everything. I was amazingly cool during the attempt but did find myself shaking a little and my heart was racing pretty fast. Once I secured myself onto the face of the wall, I descended several feet down, ensuring that my hands and feet had secure holds with each move. In retrospect, this was a very risky move and leaving the gully earlier to avoid it would have been prudent. After this, the route was pretty straight forward up the fin and then up the steep ridge. It was hand over hand the rest of the way up. I reached the top and took photos of the mountains surrounding me; Crestone Needle, Crestone Peak, and Kit Carson.

At this point, “The Prow” of Kit Carson was readily apparent to the left of Kit Carson’s summit. 

After taking pictures I took some time to search for something I had heard about… I was unable to locate a plaque that was dedicated to the Columbia shuttle disaster of 2003 as seen here:

This was a real disappointment because it was one of the reasons I wanted to climb this mountain. I searched around the summit in all directions but could not find it. Frustrated, I second-guessed that I was truly on the summit of Columbia Point and not “Kitty Kat Carson,” an unranked 13’er right next to Columbia Point to the south. You can see it behind Columbia Point in the photo above. Even though a summit register on top said I was on Columbia Point, I wanted to go over to the other summit to be sure. After a quick trip over to “Kitty Kat Carson,” I determined that I was indeed on Columbia Point previously; however, the trip was well worth it as I was able to get some pictures of the full-on and un-obscured view of Crestone Needle and Crestone Peak. 

After enjoying the views from “Kitty Kat Carson,” I decided to go BACK over to Columbia Point one more time to try to find the plaque. Unfortunately I was not able to find it. Looking east, I noticed that some clouds were building so I decided it was time to head back towards Kit Carson and back up the Kit Carson Avenue. Another look back towards Kit Carson revealed that another climber was coming up Columbia Point so I knew I needed to be careful not to kick any rocks down on him.

I reached the top of the Outward Bound Couloir between Kit Carson and Columbia Point and headed back over towards Kit Carson Avenue by way of a steep gully with a large rock terraced over it, which created a nice and tight fit back over to the Kit Carson side of the couloir. 

After reaching the top of Kit Carson Avenue, I climbed back down to the saddle between Kit Carson and Challenger Point and decided to re-summit Challenger Point as to ensure that the same route we took to get up would be the one used to get down. Once at the top of Challenger Point again, the nasty weather was building and looking more and more ominous. 

Fortunately the weather cooperated just enough to let us get back down to the lake in our haste. It was pretty cool seeing the flora down there since it was dark earlier in the morning when we were coming up. 

We made it back to camp, packed-up, and headed out. We got back to Colorado Springs at about midnight and I was exhausted.

I would rate this climb highly. It is challenging, offers many routes, and there are several peaks to ascend in the area. All in all, this is a must-do climb for any serious Colorado mountain climber.