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We decided to kick off the hiking season with a 14er! Aside from it being super windy, the weather was perfect! We hiked up the Southwest Ridge from Fourmile Creek. The trailhead is really easy to find, you basically drive on CR 18 until it ends. The road was in great shape and we were able to park right by the gate at 12,000ft. The gate was actually open and a few people had passed through and parked up closer although there wasn't much of a difference in the hike. It was nice not to have a long assent hike like a lot of the other 14ers. We started around 9:00am. The whole hike took us around 4-5 hours but we were hiking pretty slowly since it was our first big hike of the season.
The dirt road up to the trailhead:
At the trailhead.. you can see that the gate is open and a few cars are parked right before it.
The trail starts to get a little snowy but this made it easier to follow! It gets a little confusing by the first mine but if you stay to the right it is easy to pick up.
A more winter season boot and gaiters would have been helpful, especially for the descent but we managed to slide down just fine
As I mentioned earlier, it was SUPER windy, especially on the ridge.
Leica, our husky, loves 14ers!
We made it!!
Victory drink!
Time to head back down:
Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):
I would recommend wearing gaiters since the snow was deep and slushy in some spots.. the bottom of my pants were soaking wet by the end of the day.. but that is pretty much it!
Heading up there this weekend. Your TR was very helpful. Do you think a glacade is possible off the summit?
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