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Trailhead: Maroon Lake Route: Northeast Ridge Length: 8.25 miles Vertical: 4500 feet Partners: MtnHub (Doug), Brett Callahan, Crash (Eric)
This will be a different sort of trip report for me. JQDivide did a recent report here that does a better job than I could documenting the route. And daway8 has some very nice pictures and comparisons here. So instead, I will iprovide pictures and commentary that (hopefully) will give some of you a different view of what was one of my very favorite 14er hikes of all time.
Backstory... Three years ago, I connected with user NotTimid and we tried to get Pyramid. After making it up the 1000' of scree to 13K, an incoming storm made us turn around and head back down. Turns out that the storm went another way and we coulda made it but better safe than sorry (although NotTimid probably didn't feel that way <smile>) I vowed to come back another time.
The following year, Doug and I planned on giving it a go but the weather reports were less than stellar so we decided to do Mt. Sopris which Doug did an excellent job of documenting here. The year after that, Doug suffered an ankle injury which put the kibosh on that trip. But this year (finally!), Doug and I were joined by Brett and we made the climb at last. We also met Eric who joined us on the way down.
In looking over all the pictures that the four of us took, the ones that kinda stood out to me were all the goats. There are more goats on that mountain than you can imagine. My favorite goat picture is the one I used at the top of this report - Doug took that picture and I love it - Zombie goat, I call it. But there are lots of others that follow now. After the goat pics, there are some scenery pics, selected climbing shots, a GoPro vid I took at the ledges and this ends with a foursome pic that Eric took as we were almost back to treeline.
We couldn't have had a better day. Almost no wind, no threat of rain at all and we only met two other people on the mountain all day - Eric and one other man who was coming down as we were starting up (he was either VERY fast or got a very early start. Or both).
Goat pics
Where's my Mama?There she is...C'mon, little one.
Wait for me, Mom...
Brett and Doug on the summit
Jay on the summit
Jay not seeing what was looking down on him.
Scenery shots...
Da Bells
Snowmass andf Capitol
People shots
Jay exiting the green wallBrett and Jay on the ledge section on the descentAnother shot
GoPro vid of the ledges and the large step of faith on the way down.
Happy crew! (l to r) Jay, Doug, Brett and Eric. Doug is actually my height but he was leaning back on the rock he was on.
This was a fun, fun mountain I would do again in a heartbeat.
Thanks for taking the time to read this and please be careful out there!
Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):
Congrats from the universe to you on your successful summit! I know I will never be able to repeat what you accomplished. Will you do Capitol Peak at your first attempt?
@Doug - it is always fun hiking with you - I'm sure we will have more adventures.
@Rob - Yeah - those goats are something, aren't they? Doug & Brett took most of the goat pics and I got them all jumbled up with mine so I didn't give proper credit...
@Richard - Sincere thanks for your kind words. Not sure I will do Capitol - that pretty much requires an overnight (for me, anyway) and I sleep horribly at altitude. But, who knows? And we geezers still do OK in the mountains, don't we? One foot in front of the other...
Jay, great job getting this done.
Glad your shoulder did well.
We had planned Pyramid two times, and both times it dumped snow the weekend we scheduled. Yep, good to get to the top.
@Aaron - Yeah - if a person has goataphobia, this would not be a mountain for them... :lol:
@Glenmiz - Thanks! A nice compliment you give. :)
@JQ - My shoulder didn't cause me much trouble although I did end up having to face in on the descent in a couple spots where facing out would have worked better but the change allowed me to use my good shoulder a bit more. Thanks for your kind words - your TR helped a lot - although I think we made the ascent a tad harder than it needed to be - but that builds character, right?
...on a tough mountain. I'll echo the "go geezers"
comment made earlier. I like that you focused
on the mountain goats, which are very interesting
creatures. Congrats on a BIG accomplishment.
Didn't realize you had a nemesis mtn. Looking good on those ledges and the L.O.F. On the way up,
how was it once past the ledges. Is Wetterhorn any kind of comparison to this mtn's difficulty. Congrats Jay.
@MathGuy - Thanks so much for your comments - and yeah, we oldsters need to keep going so we don't need to use Medicare all that much.. :)
@Andrew - The views from the top are amazing and it would be worth your time to do a repeat with good weather. I would do that mountain again in a minute... OK, maybe several hours would be more accurate :)
@Paula - Thanks! Coming from someone who does ALL the tough stuff, that means a lot.
@Pete - Past the ledges, there really isn't much comparison to Wetterhorn IMO. The rock is loose compared to W and the amount of elevation gain is a lot more. Don't know if you've done Castle (and if you haven't, that's a great first peak in the Elks), but of the 14ers I've done, the rock there is as close as I can think of to Pyramid. Others have stated (correctly) that the route finding going up can be a bit of a challenge but coming down it is much more obvious.
Yeah - on our way down, a goat knocked a rock loose that started a mini rock-fall. It was well behind us but certainly let us know that they - not humans - rule that mountain.
...you redeemed yourself after a couple of false starts. I know how that feels and am working on a trip report now about redemption on a different peak. Congratulations on a successful day!
There's nothing more gratifying than finally getting a summit that you've been stymied by before. I can certainly relate ... Coxcomb was like that for The Man and I. Thanks for posting. Happy trails! :D
Jan - You've done Snowmass and it appears to me that is a tougher peak than Pyramid so I'm pretty sure you can handle it. Thanks for your nice comment!
Great report with wonderful photographs. I loved all of the goat pictures.
The views from this mountain once you get to the amphitheatre look incredible.
Thanks for posting this.
Thank you, Martin - I appreciate your kind words. It is a beautiful mountain for sure. But then there are a lot of them in this state, eh?
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