Humboldt Peak Trip Report 10/06/2014

Peak(s):	Humboldt Peak - 14,068 feet Conundrum Peak - 14,037 feet Hanging Lake
Date Posted:	10/06/2014
Modified:	10/07/2014
Date Climbed:	09/27/2014
Author:	moneymike
Additional Members:	Gueza

Coming Out of Hibernation (or Good Riddance to Summer)
It's that time of year again. The aspen are turning and the snow is starting to fall in the alpine. It's the time of year when I start emerging from my hole and venturing into the mountains. As a 34 year old with the knees of an 84 year old, I don't really like those summer time hikes where you have to walk down the mountain. Although it's not quite time to ski down mountains yet, I can feel it in the air that my time is approaching. I just recently got out into the mountains and thought I'd share with you my first non ski trip report (more or less). Hanging Lake. September 27, 2014 Noticing that the aspen were turning, I decided to venture up into the mountains. The last Saturday of September, my good friend Mary and I decided to take a drive to Glenwood Springs, and check out hanging lake. The drive was long, but absolutely spectacular through Summit and Eagle counties. Entire mountain sides were bright gold! I don't have any pictures to show since all the aspen were seen from the car, and I'm also a little self conscious about my inadequate landscape photography skills (there are much better aspen photos on this site). The hanging lake exit was closed due to high traffic (cars were parked along the off ramp all the way to the high way). We ended up parking at the rest stop at the next exit to the east and then walked three plus miles on the path along the Colorado river to the hanging lake trail head. From the trailhead, the hike was simple and within no time we arrived at hanging lake. Our delayed arrival time due to the longer approach turned out to be a blessing since the massive hordes of tourists were descending the trail as we were ascending. We arrived at hanging lake with relatively few tourists. Humboldt Peak. September 28, 2014. The next day, I headed down to the Sangres for a Humboldt hike with my dog, Penny Lane, hiking partner Kimberly, and her German Shepard, Meekah. The peaks of the Sangre de Cristo range were engulfed in clouds, whereas everywhere else was blue bird. Under gray skies, we hiked the standard route to the saddle and then up the west ridge. Penny Lane and I Kimberly and Meekah Sheep Meekah and PL On our way up, we passed a gentleman who asked us if we had seen his wife. She had apparently bailed on a summit attempt while he continued on. If his wife had come down the proper trail, we should have seen her, but unfortunately we had to tell him that we indeed had not seen his wife at their camp or on the trail. He continued down the trail, looking for his wife, and I continued up, after promising him we'd keep an eye out for her. Within an hour, we came across the woman, descending from the saddle. She apparently became disoriented in the clouds and descended the wrong side of the saddle. At some point, she realized something was wrong and climbed back to the saddle and started to descend the correct trail. She was very worried, but I assured her she was now on the correct trail and that her husband was looking for her and will probably be shitting his pants (I didn't use those words exactly) when he discovers she is not at camp. Relieved that we had found the missing woman, we pressed on into the clouds, rain, and snow. Shortly below the summit, Meekah lost her confidence hopping the large boulders. Instead of stressing the poor girl out, we decided just to forego the summit and descend. And so we descended out of the snow and clouds and into the pouring rain. Conundrum Peak. October 5, 2014. Thrilled to be out in the mountains again, I immediately started planning a trip to climb Castle Peak. After seeing that more than a foot of snow was forecasted for later in the week, I knew my hike would end up becoming my first ski trip of the season. Saturday, Oct. 4, my friend Eric (Gueza) and I drove out to aspen and up Castle Creek road to Montezuma basin. The creek levels were low and so the crossings were easy. Although the snow began showing around 10,000', the road was mostly melted out and we drove up to nearly tree line and set up camp. At 6 a.m. Sunday morning, we drove up the 4x4 road to nearly the upper parking lot. We encountered enough snow lingering on the upper portion of the road (approx. 12,300') to not want to attempt going all the way. Gueza moneymike (photo by Gueza) The original plan was to hike Castle's NE ridge and ski the Castle/Conundrum saddle out. However, once we saw how much new snow was lingering, we decided to check out the Conundrum couloir. Sure enough, the couloir looked to be in prime conditions and we made our way up. Some portions held deep new snow, but most of it was shallow enough that we could easily push through to the permanent snow. Cramponing the permanent snow base was remarkably easy and we made our way to the top in a matter of minutes, for the quickest couloir ascent of my life. Gueza Me (photo by Gueza) Gueza and I climbing the couloir. Photo by jrs1965, taken from Castle's NE ridge Gueza topping out After taking a couple pics at the top, we clicked into our skis and prepared for our first ski of the season. Before committing to the couloir, I made a few hop turns on the flat snow at the top, just to make sure I remembered how to ski after a long 4 months of not skiing (yes, I know I'm spoiled, living in CO). Confident I knew how to ski still, I dropped into the couloir over a diminished cornice. Soft, shallow powder greeted us at the top of the couloir, making the first few turns spectacularly beautiful. Midway down, in the narrows, little new snow covered hard icy permanent snow. Jump turns here were made very carefully in order to edge the icy slope. moneymike dropping in (photo by Gueza) Gueza dropping in Skiing out onto the apron, we were super psyched to have an extreme ski descent as our first ski of the season, and in good spirits we headed over to the snow field below the Castle/Conundrum saddle. We met up with two other skiers, Ted Mahon, and his ski partner "Joey." Our tracks. From left to right: Joey's, Ted's, Mine, Gueza's After chatting with Ted and Joey for a bit, they headed up Conundrum couloir and we headed down the permanent snowfields to the road. Looking up the couloir The lower headwall held absolutely amazing powder! We definitely did not feel guilty about tracking up the powder that a mess of other skiers were climbing up to ski. Gueza making powder turns Making a mess of the lower headwall A short ski/hike out, brought us back to the car where cold beers awaited us. Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):

Coming Out of Hibernation (or Good Riddance to Summer)

It's that time of year again. The aspen are turning and the snow is starting to fall in the alpine. It's the time of year when I start emerging from my hole and venturing into the mountains. As a 34 year old with the knees of an 84 year old, I don't really like those summer time hikes where you have to walk down the mountain. Although it's not quite time to ski down mountains yet, I can feel it in the air that my time is approaching. I just recently got out into the mountains and thought I'd share with you my first non ski trip report (more or less).

Hanging Lake. September 27, 2014

Noticing that the aspen were turning, I decided to venture up into the mountains. The last Saturday of September, my good friend Mary and I decided to take a drive to Glenwood Springs, and check out hanging lake.

The drive was long, but absolutely spectacular through Summit and Eagle counties. Entire mountain sides were bright gold! I don't have any pictures to show since all the aspen were seen from the car, and I'm also a little self conscious about my inadequate landscape photography skills (there are much better aspen photos on this site).

The hanging lake exit was closed due to high traffic (cars were parked along the off ramp all the way to the high way). We ended up parking at the rest stop at the next exit to the east and then walked three plus miles on the path along the Colorado river to the hanging lake trail head. From the trailhead, the hike was simple and within no time we arrived at hanging lake.

Our delayed arrival time due to the longer approach turned out to be a blessing since the massive hordes of tourists were descending the trail as we were ascending. We arrived at hanging lake with relatively few tourists.

Humboldt Peak. September 28, 2014.

The next day, I headed down to the Sangres for a Humboldt hike with my dog, Penny Lane, hiking partner Kimberly, and her German Shepard, Meekah.

The peaks of the Sangre de Cristo range were engulfed in clouds, whereas everywhere else was blue bird. Under gray skies, we hiked the standard route to the saddle and then up the west ridge.

On our way up, we passed a gentleman who asked us if we had seen his wife. She had apparently bailed on a summit attempt while he continued on. If his wife had come down the proper trail, we should have seen her, but unfortunately we had to tell him that we indeed had not seen his wife at their camp or on the trail. He continued down the trail, looking for his wife, and I continued up, after promising him we'd keep an eye out for her.

Within an hour, we came across the woman, descending from the saddle. She apparently became disoriented in the clouds and descended the wrong side of the saddle. At some point, she realized something was wrong and climbed back to the saddle and started to descend the correct trail. She was very worried, but I assured her she was now on the correct trail and that her husband was looking for her and will probably be shitting his pants (I didn't use those words exactly) when he discovers she is not at camp.

Relieved that we had found the missing woman, we pressed on into the clouds, rain, and snow.

Shortly below the summit, Meekah lost her confidence hopping the large boulders. Instead of stressing the poor girl out, we decided just to forego the summit and descend. And so we descended out of the snow and clouds and into the pouring rain.

Conundrum Peak. October 5, 2014.

Thrilled to be out in the mountains again, I immediately started planning a trip to climb Castle Peak. After seeing that more than a foot of snow was forecasted for later in the week, I knew my hike would end up becoming my first ski trip of the season.

Saturday, Oct. 4, my friend Eric (Gueza) and I drove out to aspen and up Castle Creek road to Montezuma basin. The creek levels were low and so the crossings were easy. Although the snow began showing around 10,000', the road was mostly melted out and we drove up to nearly tree line and set up camp.

At 6 a.m. Sunday morning, we drove up the 4x4 road to nearly the upper parking lot. We encountered enough snow lingering on the upper portion of the road (approx. 12,300') to not want to attempt going all the way.

The original plan was to hike Castle's NE ridge and ski the Castle/Conundrum saddle out. However, once we saw how much new snow was lingering, we decided to check out the Conundrum couloir. Sure enough, the couloir looked to be in prime conditions and we made our way up. Some portions held deep new snow, but most of it was shallow enough that we could easily push through to the permanent snow. Cramponing the permanent snow base was remarkably easy and we made our way to the top in a matter of minutes, for the quickest couloir ascent of my life.

Gueza and I climbing the couloir. Photo by jrs1965, taken from Castle's NE ridge

After taking a couple pics at the top, we clicked into our skis and prepared for our first ski of the season. Before committing to the couloir, I made a few hop turns on the flat snow at the top, just to make sure I remembered how to ski after a long 4 months of not skiing (yes, I know I'm spoiled, living in CO). Confident I knew how to ski still, I dropped into the couloir over a diminished cornice. Soft, shallow powder greeted us at the top of the couloir, making the first few turns spectacularly beautiful. Midway down, in the narrows, little new snow covered hard icy permanent snow. Jump turns here were made very carefully in order to edge the icy slope.

Skiing out onto the apron, we were super psyched to have an extreme ski descent as our first ski of the season, and in good spirits we headed over to the snow field below the Castle/Conundrum saddle. We met up with two other skiers, Ted Mahon, and his ski partner "Joey."

Our tracks. From left to right: Joey's, Ted's, Mine, Gueza's

After chatting with Ted and Joey for a bit, they headed up Conundrum couloir and we headed down the permanent snowfields to the road.

The lower headwall held absolutely amazing powder! We definitely did not feel guilty about tracking up the powder that a mess of other skiers were climbing up to ski.

A short ski/hike out, brought us back to the car where cold beers awaited us.

Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):

Comments or Questions

TakeMeToYourSummit	We were bound to cross paths... 10/7/2014 5:50am ...sooner or later. Let me explain: I'm from Glenwood Springs. (I've probably been up to Hanging Lake a dozen times.) I live in Snowmass Village now. (Castle Creek Road is one of the closer TH options.) I was on Humboldt on 9/28/2014. (Guilty as charged... we did cross paths!) Thanks for keeping an eye out for my wife! Full story here: https://www.facebook.com/brad.hulslander.1/media_set?set=a.310371699165960.1073741873.100005793962815&type=1 Great trip report too! It's never too early to get the snow gear out!
MatB	Nice 10/7/2014 7:46am That didn't take long... this is making my departure to sea level even tougher. Keep it up.
SoCool	Cool pics! 10/7/2014 2:25pm The first pic of Hanging Lake looks awesome. BTW, for any newbies reading this TR: A Conundrum Couloir snow climb is safest in very stable late spring/early summer consolidated snow. (Obviously these skiers know what they are doing.)
bergsteigen	Sweet! 10/7/2014 4:35pm Dang, surgery at the wrong time! Wish I could have gone Now, if you would stop with this mogul foolishness in winter, your knees wouldn't be so old! Once I stopped and focused on luscious powder, my knees felt better
moneymike	Thanks for reading 10/8/2014 3:06pm TakeMeToYourSummit:I never thought I'd do this, but I registered for fb (a fake account, mind you) just to read your story. I'm glad everything worked out ok. I was very relieved when I saw her, but at the same time, I imagined the fear you must have been experiencing. MatB: You can always come back to 14ers to live vicariously through us SoCool: Although slick in the fall, it was nice not having a monster cornice hanging above us bergsteigen: I swear it was the marathon running, not the mogul skiing. I will keep hitting the moguls until I physically cannot. Hope to get out with you soon. nkan02: You're welcome. I'm definitely stoked for this season!
Gueza	On point 10/8/2014 3:24pm Nice report Mike! Definitely stoked for this season!!!!
claybonnyman	Access to Humboldt? 10/9/2014 12:47am Nice photos - those are some clear trout! So you did Humboldt in one day - may I ask where you started? I've been trying to get in and do Crestone, the Needle and Humboldt for a couple years (did Kit Carson last year) but access is the issue, since I don't have a vehicle with way-high clearance. I'd love to hear that it's not as hard to get into as I've been thinking. Thanks.
moneymike	Eric, 10/10/2014 2:26am Fo sho! I'm definitely stoked for ski season now. That was much better stoke than a Warren Miller film. claybonnyman: With my xterra, I was easily able to make it to the 4wd parking lot (I think it's around 10k'). Even from 2wd parking and in snow conditions, Humboldt is easily done as a day trip (my partner had never been above tree line in her life and she had no troubles). I've also done the Needle from 2wd parking and in snow conditions, but that was a much much longer day. I say go for it! jmanner: That's the whole point of trip reports...to make others feel lazy and to inspire jealousy
jmanner	jealous 10/10/2014 6:11pm ...and now I feel lazy. edit: Also great write up! I have beheld the face of Moneymike and been clenized by it.
SnowAlien	Thanks for the stoke! 4/2/2015 7:45pm While I stubbornly stick to dry Sangres ridge runs (postponing the inevitable) and meekly hoping for enough snow to ski near a hut in December, you go out and do THIS! Seriously awesome, way better than a TGR movie.

Caution: The information contained in this report may not be accurate and should not be the only resource used in preparation for your climb. Failure to have the necessary experience, physical conditioning, supplies or equipment can result in injury or death. 14ers.com and the author(s) of this report provide no warranties, either express or implied, that the information provided is accurate or reliable. By using the information provided, you agree to indemnify and hold harmless 14ers.com and the report author(s) with respect to any claims and demands against them, including any attorney fees and expenses. Please read the 14ers.com Safety and Disclaimer pages for more information.

Please respect private property: 14ers.com supports the rights of private landowners to determine how and by whom their land will be used. In Colorado, it is your responsibility to determine if land is private and to obtain the appropriate permission before entering the property.

14ers.com

Social

Mobile App