Colorado, Summer 2007

Just like last summer, we got to spend a month in Colorado over the summer. I worked on my dissertation proposal, and Nancy worked on filing for her Colorado teacher certification, but we got to spend evenings and weekends with friends and family. This album contains pictures of our trip to climb Handies Peak. For miscellaneous pictures, go here, and for our trip to climb Emma Burr, go here.

We chose Handies for our 14er this year. It's in the northeastern edge of the San Juan Range, and from its peak, you can't see any roads or towns (though from the slopes right below, you can). The isolation is one reason we chose it, but like all 14ers (except possibly some in the Sangre de Christo Range), it was crowded. We probably saw 20 people on the trail that day. I think the high 13ers may end up being more interesting climbs.

At 14,048 feet, Handies is the 41st highest peak in Colorado. We headed to Lake City and then south of town at the lake, we broke west towards Cinnamon Pass. At Grizzly Gulch, there's a trailhead for Handies Peak and for Sunlight and Redcloud, two 14ers just to the north of Handies. There's camping at the trailhead, but it was really crowded and we had Sadie with us, so we decided to find another spot and drove up a little higher. That evening, we walked up the road toward Cinnamon Pass, but didn't get anywhere near it. We had hoped to drive higher in order to do a ridge walk that afternoon, but we were unable to get a jeep, and the Taurus just couldn't handle jeep trails very well. The second day, we climbed Handies. From the trailhead, it's 3650 feet of climbing and an 8-mile round trip hike. The weather wasn't great, but it was just clear enough to get some spectacular views.

Click on any picture to go to the Picasa web album where you can download the full size image.

Our route started at the trailhead at the base of Grizzly Gulch. From there, you can't see the peak. After a while of climbing into the gulch, the peak emerges as you pass Whitecross Mountain. Above treeline, we followed the trail up to the ridge between Whitecross and Handies, and then to the summit. 3650 vertical feet of climbing (all at high altitude) in an 8-mile round trip hike. Someday, we'll be in good enough shape that that won't seem like so much.

Handies can't be seen from the trailhead, but after climbing up into Grizzly Gulch, this was our first clear view of the summit.

As we got above tree line, the wildflowers became prominent.

Some wild flowers by the creek.

Sadie and Nancy in some blue wild flowers with Handies in the background.

Some more wild flowers with Handies Peak.

Here's Nancy with Whitecross Mountain (13,542 feet) in the background as we climbed out of Grizzly Gulch.

Here's the whole family on the summit of Handies peak, 14,048 feet. There were 9 or so other people on the summit at the same time as us, which made getting a picture without other people in it tricky. Above my head, the jagged peak on the horizon is Wetterhorn, and the big lump of a peak on the right is Uncompahgre, which we climbed in 2004.

This is the view back down the way we came. The trailhead is all the way down in the trees n the valley below where you can see. From there, we followed the creek up. About where the creek is cut off by the foreground in this picture, we broke to the left side of the picture to reach the ridge and follow that to the summit. Across beyond the trees and up the other side are Sunlight and Redcloud. Sunlight is the highest peak on the right, and Redcloud is a little ways to th left of that (but still right of center).

This is a view from the summit towards Ouray. The highest peak on the horizon, the big triangle that sticks up to the right of the center, is Sneffels, which Nancy, Sadie, and I climbed last year.