This is part two of a four part report. Over a four day Labor Day weekend in 2019 I climbed 17 of 21 13ers in the La Garita Wilderness. You can find all parts here:

• August 30, 2019 San Juan Sentries: Organ Stew (Organ Mountain, Baldy Alto, Stewart Peak, "Column Ridge", Baldy Chato)
• August 31, 2019 San Juan Sentries: The Farthest Baldy of Them All (Point 13,034, Point 13,111, Point 13,020 D, "Baldy Lejos")
• September 1, 2019 San Juan Sentries: A Coward's Climb of the San Luis Southern 13ers (Point 13,300, Point 13,180 C, Point 13,155)
• September 2, 2019 San Juan Sentries: Baldy Cinco? Baldy no es Cinco? Baldy es Muy Confuso ("Baldy no es Cinco", Baldy Cinco, Point 13,162 A, Point 13,501 A, Point 13,020 C)

Today's climb would be by far the most involved of the entire weekend. While it would be the shortest I knew from reading multiple trip reports that it would contain a lot of scrambling on extremely sketchy rock in no-fall terrain. Little did I know it would be probably the worst rock I've ever been on.

The night after doing the "Baldy Lejos" group I attempted to drive up East Willow Creek to the trailhead there. This is the trailhead used for the standard route on "Phoenix Peak". I had considered doing an absolutely massive loop getting Point 13,300, Point 13,180 C, Point 13,155, then making a long traverse over to Point 13,015, Point 13,402, "Phoenix Peak", and La Garita Peak. I was a bit apprehensive about attempting to tack in the latter four peaks onto a day I knew was already going to be full of difficult scrambling. It turned out to be a non-starter since the East Willow Creek Road was washed out, including at least one bridge, so not only could I not drive to the trailhead but I didn't want to hike all the way over there not knowing just how bad the true extent of the damage was and end up getting stuck on the far side of something I wasn't sure if I could cross to return to my car. I'd have to save the "Phoenix" group for later.

I drove back to the Equity Mine for a second night and got another late start in the morning, this time because my phone had somehow almost entirely discharged overnight and I needed to charge it for pictures; it's not like I could actually make any calls in this area, even from the peaks! Whatever, this was only three peaks and I'd be fine.

I hiked up the road once again and hit the actual trailhead, then started north on the San Luis Pass trail. This trail split and I took the right path which leads to San Luis Peak's south ridge route. I obviously wouldn't be going to San Luis but I'd cut off from the trail to reach Point 13,300 and it was faster to follow the trail a ways than just go direct off-trail.

I followed the trail up to where I thought I should turn off. Really almost anywhere is fine, the north slopes of 13,300 are incredibly broad and inviting from everywhere.

There were a couple of folks sitting on top of the first knoll and I got excited thinking there'd be a couple of others on this ridge traverse to help with route finding. I popped up right in front of them only to discover it was a pair of hunters and I was right in front of their scouting operation. Sorry, guys. Continuing up the slopes to the edge of a vast basin I was treated to an incredible view of the terrain I'd be climbing through.

This was going to be pretty hairy. The ridge was studded with small towers and it looked like there'd be a lot of up and down along the way. One more shallow saddle led to the upper summit plateau, but not before it took me past some of the most incredible, smooth slabs I've ever seen.

The closer I got to the technical section the less good I felt about it.

Upon reaching the summit plateau I noticed there was no cairn. Well, there was, but it was way off to my right and obviously lower in elevation than I was already at, which itself was obviously not the summit. The real summit was on the ridge before an abrupt dropoff. I wandered over to the cairn anyway to sign the summit register, which to my chagrin didn't exist, and then I made my way back to the summit proper.

Things quickly got real on this ridge. It was about sixty seconds from nearly flat tundra to extremely steep, loose, exposed scrambling that was at least Class 3, perhaps Class 4.

This ridge was pretty awful, to be honest. Most of the trip reports I read said to drop down on the south side since the ridge itself didn't go - I found that out quickly as it dropped off into extremely loose and complicated terrain with huge falls on both sides. The option to drop down was hardly appealing either. I down climbed to hard packed dirt that was difficult to get purchase on, even with trail runners. Loose rock for hands and little traction on dirt for feet. Did I mention the terrain below was more of the same, with a cliff?

I wasn't having any of this. The consequences of even a small mistake here were too high; any fall would probably be fatal and with the amount of loose rock I couldn't justify continuing this way. A gully I had spied on the way up Point 13,300 held more promise. It also didn't look like fun but at least it wouldn't kill me. Carefully I climbed back up to 13,300's summit plateau and then hiked back to the saddle before the plateau. I located the gully, which looked like steep, somewhat irritating Class 2, and started down.

I hoped there was a way up Point 13,180 C from the basin or this would be a short trip. The basin was almost entirely filled with talus, though it wasn't super loose like the ridge was! There was a saddle at the far side that looked steep but doable and I could just hike down to the Continental Divide/Skyline trail if I couldn't find a good way to the other two peaks.

The hike up the Class 2 talus to the saddle was by far the loosest - but not most dangerous - part of the day so far. It was sometimes so loose I'd literally lose two steps for every one I took until I found rock that was stable enough to make a few positive moves. It took me what felt like forever to get up the saddle, and I was definitely huffing and puffing up this one. From the saddle the hiking returned to easy and more importantly stable ground. In one direction stretched the ridge to Point 13,155. In the other a talus slope led to Point 13,180 C. It wasn't long before I was on the summit of the latter.

The ridge between 13,180 C and 13,155 was mostly easy. Mostly. There was a long stretch of Class 1 grass and then things got bad again, somehow even worse than before.

There was a bunch of volcanic hoodoos to navigate on the ridge before the ridge again turned benign, and then the summit block itself to get up. I approached the hoodoos with trepidation. These things looked absolutely disgusting to climb on. Big surprise, they were! I can't state enough how truly heinous this "rock" is. I put "rock" in quotes because it's barely even rock, in my opinion. This crap is loose as can be and soft to boot. Merely touching it caused it to crumble. Weighting anything, hand or foot, caused the rock to move almost without exception due to how soft it is. It felt like anything and everything could break catastrophically no matter how careful I was. It's basically just pebbles and stones embedded in melted together volcanic ash and dear lord I cannot state how utterly awful and scary it is scrambling on this stuff.

I started navigating the hoodoos slowly. I wanted to move quickly through this junk but it would have swatted me down for that. At first I tried ridge crest proper. Nope. Could barely even get to the ridge crest, let alone scramble along it due to how craptastic this stuff was.

I then tried going around it to the south/right. More of the same, and the runout on this side was exceptionally steep. It required crossing ribs and gullies and I got over maybe one or two before turning back as things steepened and the ribs got bigger and more exposed.

I tried one more time around the north/left side of the ridge. This was a little easier but turned out to have the same problem as the down climb off Point 13,300 - traversing on steep dirt (which was now soft and tractionless instead of hard and tractionless) with ridiculously loose rock to use as handholds. I tried climbing up a chimney that, were it solid, wouldn't give me any pause, but got part way up and ripped a huge handhold off. Absolutely no way was I going to continue to risk it on this junk. Only one of the other trip reports I read even came close to describing the seriousness and fear of this section.

I had the same dilemma I did coming off Point 13,300: where do I go? Do I abandon this peak? I took a look down the saddle to the Skyline Trail. It was crazy steep and loose, of course, but it might just go. I'm not sure I could get back up it if it proved to be too hairy to go down, but my only other option besides the hoodooed ridge was going way back to an easier saddle closer to 13,180 C. No thanks.

With a deep breath I started down towards the trail. I had to butt scoot the upper part it was so loose, basically steep talc-like dust/sand and pebbles. I would have felt a lot better doing this in crampons or microspikes and and ice axe; hell, climbing the hoodoos would have been better with crampons and axe too! I continued downward as the angle slowly relented and the talc-sand slowly turned to grass. I feel like it probably took me half an hour to descend just a couple hundred feet down this with how careful I had to be. A fall would probably be uncontrolled.

I hit the trail and breathed a sigh of relief. I'd at least go to the summit block and see how that was, so up the trail towards San Luis I went before cutting south/right up more easy grass on 13,155. Several hundred vertical feet of good, untrailed Class 1/Class 2 took me up past a rocky fin on the ridge, which I bypassed on the east/left side, and then to the bottom of the summit block. The summit block looked intimidating from afar, but for the first time today the rock was good and solid. It was unusual in that it reminded me more of eroded limestone; smooth with pockets and rounded features. It was almost like the block had been underwater. A short chimney scramble led to a small shelf below some boulders, then over the boulders to the small, airy summit. Other trip reports stated the block was Class 4 to the summit, but I didn't find anything I'd consider harder than Class 3. Ironic given how difficult I found the rest of the ridge.

I signed the summit register, quickly down climbed to 13,155's north slopes, and hiked back to the trail. From there it was a long hike to West Willow Creek. I passed north below all the terrain I had skipped, again glad I took the cowardly way. I still hit each summit so no big deal. I zipped down the trail alone. It was late enough in the afternoon that most people doing San Luis' south ridge had long since finished. I'm always happy for the solitude, especially in such beautiful terrain. There was a big chunk of elevation re-gain up and over Point 13,300's north ridge but otherwise the trail miles went by quickly and easily. I drove to Creede for what felt like the dozenth time and had an excellent brisket sandwich at Tommyknocker Tavern for dinner - the pickles are what made it. From there I drove west to Spring Creek Pass where I located camping for the night up a logging road just a bit farther north. Five more thirteeners to go tomorrow!

Statistics

Climbers: Ben Feinstein (myself)
Total distance: 15.43 miles (this day) / 53.41 miles (weekend to this point) / 71.38 (weekend total)
Total elevation gain: 4,833 feet (this day) / 17,104 feet (weekend to this point) / 22,798 (weekend total)
Total time: 8:01:26
Peaks: Three 13ers (two ranked, one unranked)

• Point 13,300 (13,285 on maps)
• Point 13,180 C (unranked)
• Point 13,155

Splits: