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Approach: Three Mile Creek TH off Park County62 (Guanella Pass Road)
Length: About 7 miles RT
Vertical: About 2500 feet
Ascent Party: Solo
This report is not about "The Spearhead" in RMNP. That one is way beyond my capabilities - at least as they exist now. But, this was still a fun hike to a seldom visited summit with some nice views and a great summit register. In my research, I only came across one trip report (done by Derek) and it is worth the read here.
Any of you who have been following my trip reports know that I like the Mount Evans Wilderness area a lot and spend quite a bit of time there. Besides this report on Spearhead (which doesn't look at all like a spear), I have done reports on Bierstadt, Geneva Mtn, Arrowhead (which also doesn't look like an arrow) and Kataka - which, coincidentally is Navajo for "White man doesn't know crap about spears and arrows."
I had initially tried to hike up Spearhead the previous weekend and decided at the trail head to leave the snowshoes in the truck as I did not need them doing Bison the week before. Wrong. That mistake necessitated another trip WITH snowshoes.
The Three Mile Creek and TH is so named (I think) because it is 3 miles from US285. For any of you who have driven up the Guanella Pass road from Grant, it's that little pull off on the right not too far before the dude ranch. It could also be called the 18 Bridges Trail as that's how many times you cross the creek on log bridges. 20 times in the winter to avoid a steep hillside. But who's counting?
To the trek....
(Captions below the photos)
Starting out, the trail was bone dry. And I am taking snowshoes along??
But as you get along side the creek and into the narrow valley, there is a solid boot pack.
Anywhere the sun had any chance to hit, there was ice and I was glad I had micro-spikes. Although some of the ice could be avoided, I prefer to stay on the trail if one is there. No need to make this look like an old road.
The Bridges of Park County...
This one even has a Nature Made hand rail on the left side.
It started out being pretty cloudy but the weather cleared as the day went on.
My first view of Kataka - which can be climbed from this trail as Derek, et. al, did or from the Abyss Creek trail as I wrote in my report.
There are numerous rock formations and aspens along this trail that make it an enjoyable hike any time of the year.
You don't want to slip here..
Taken on the way down - An invitation for wet, cold feet (here is where there is an alternate route on the other side)
I finally got a little glimpse of Spearhead.
Spearhead peeking through the trees. How tough can that be?
But, before that, the boot pack trail ran out and I switched from micro-spikes to snowshoes and started breaking trail.
The fun begins
I chose to head along the north side of Spearhead for a bit and then cut up the north slope to catch the east ridge. This is a picture I took a week ago from my foiled attempt.
Looking south at Spearhead (on the right). I gained the ridge on the left about 1/5 of the way up.
The snow was sugar snow varying from 2 to 3 feet deep. It wouldn't consolidate at all and I did a fair amount of slipping, sliding, and uttering words I learned in the Navy. What I didn't do was take a lot of pictures on the way up.
But I did manage to take this one about a third of the way up. It is steeper than it looks.
This one is just short of the summit ridge where it is leveling out some.
And this is the summit. There was a small cairn and and the summit register noted in Derek's report was still there.
A fairly old register.
With some familiar names of 14ers.com rock stars!
And those guys did Kataka after doing Spearhead! But it should be noted that none of them were likely alive when this register was placed and the combined ages of the 3 of them is probably right near my age... So, I don't feel TOO bad about only making Spearhead.
As I stated earlier, this is a seldom visited summit. I counted only 15 entries since Derek, Clay and Dillon made the summit 3 years ago and only one of those occurred in winter. If you like solitude, go for the 11ers and 12ers - especially in Winter.
Summit shots...
Kataka.
Looking west.
Squaretop Mountain through the trees.
After spending about a half an hour on the summit enjoying the views and eating lunch, I headed back down.
Following my trench down.
The real crux of the day was getting back through these willows to catch the trail. Kataka in the background.
As I don't carry a GPS, this is an approximation of my route.
Thanks for taking the time to read this! Be careful out there.
Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):
Excellent write up my friend! Looked like a great day, happy you made your goal this time! Looking forward to getting out there with you soon. Keep it up brother!
.. and thanks for reading this, Brian. When I realized that this little bump of a mountain ended up between the reports by 14ers.com legends Furthermore and Yikes, I figured it wouldn’t get any hits at all!
hit this peak about three weeks ago on my way to Kataka but it was like walking in wet cement didn’t make it to Kataka darn it, have to get back there soon
posted a trip report on LOJ, interesting to see another perspective and report on this peak, thanks for posting (and I did have snowshoes)
Bill Middlebrook CAN be bribed. It takes a little bit of money and a promise to never say "Damn you, Bill Middlebrook". Ooops – I just said it. Guess this TR is gonna end up at the bottom of the pile...
haha – this is great! Brings back some memories... I remember that New Years Day well. Hit this peak the day before LaPlata (my 10th 14er or so ) – nice report! The only rock star here is you though. You earned this one. Looks like a fine day. Would be great to see you this spring and/or summer!
Mike: Thanks, my friend. We’ll have some fun this summer, eh?
Larry: Thanks for the kind words.
Dillon: Would love to join you for some sort of mountain adventure. Assuming I can keep up...
All: Thanks again for the nice comments and likes. MUCH appreciated!
some might say! Way to chuk the Spear! My snowshoes have seen more dust than snow and are starting to look really sad hanging on the basement wall. Thanks for the reminder of what I’m missing in winter!
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