Castle/Conundrum direction

[tobiasfunke]

The standard route for doing these two in combo looks like going up the NE ridge of Castle, crossing the saddle over to Conundrum, and descending the saddle to between Castle and Conundrum. It looks like that descent has a lot of loose rock, and most of the pictures show the route with snow. How is this combo this time of year with all the snow melted? Does anyone prefer to ascend Conundrum first up that saddle and then descend over Castle's NE ridge?

[Justin9]

I was just there yesterday and ascended the standard NE ridge route. I think going up to the saddle first would be a more difficult option, mostly because every step you took, you'd slide back half of it...I also think you'd miss The best part of these mountains which is ascending the ridge. We did descend from the saddle. I'd recommend standard route for these guys.

[AdDoBe]

I prefer resummiting Castle and avoiding going down the saddle all together

[FCSquid]

I was also up there yesterday and descended from the saddle. When it's fully melted out, like it is now, you definitely would want to go down rather than up as the previous poster had mentioned.

The top section is pretty straightforward until you get to a cliff band further down. The top part of the cliffs is a Class 3 down climb, but there's plenty of hand / footholds to get through it. You'll traverse to the right, and then it's just a Class 2 controlled slide until you reach the talus below.

I was pretty worried about that stretch looking at it from a distance - but once I got into it, it turned out to not really be a big deal.

[HikerGuy]

Another vote for going back over Castle. Why take the risk in order to save a bit of time.

[alsrun]

The saddle without snow is one of those descents you say to yourself never again.

[E_A_Marcus_949]

Did the Castle/Conundrum traverse and descent yesterday - Originally we were going to go back over Castle but opted to do the Saddle, as most people we saw went that way. It's steep with plenty of lose rock... hard but doable... Can't say I'd jump at the chance to do it again. There was some snow down the saddle, which surprisingly helped with gaining some traction. Just be patient with the mountain and your skills, and you'll be good.

What was slightly disturbing on Castle/Conundrum yesterday was on the way down, in the boulder field area, we saw a dog (named Jax...looked like a mutt with min-pin like coloring and medium sized) left tied up on a rug with some water while his owner was going up the mountain. At least he had water and a carpet to sleep on, but this was disturbing...if you don't plan on taking your dog up the mountain, why even bring the adorable pooch with you? At least the dog wasn't left in the car... Still not good though.

Castle/Conundrum... on Castle there are a few "difficult class 2" areas that I would classify as easy Class 3- reminded me of parts of the easier scrambling areas of Longs Peak.

Fun day for these two peaks! Gorgeous hike mid-September too - lots of good fall colors along Castle Creek.

[ameristrat]

If you descend between the two without snow, wear a helmet. There is a section where you cannot see climbers above / below you and it is steep enough to become a shooting gallery for rocks.

[Tornadoman]

I prefer resummiting Castle and avoiding going down the saddle all together

This. When I did this combo, I went back over to Castle and watched the people descending from the saddle kicking rocks on each other, slipping and sliding, and cursing their way down. At the top of the road, I encountered a group of 4 that had gone down that route and let's just say that they were relieved to make it down without a serious injury.

[E_A_Marcus_949]

I'd recommend re-summiting Castle again if you can spare the time... there were a few parts of the ascent up Castle that would be tricky going back down though, so we took that into account with timing and the level of terrain we were up for at that point in the day. I do remember seeing one or two cairns on the saddle descent though. I saw a few groups with helmets, the rest (including mine) without. Most people were being careful about making sure each group was down before descending the saddle...it wasn't a busy day on the mountains, so that helped. We definitely staggered our way down and luckily no rock falls.