ascent of Pigeon Peak, woo-hoo!

[ilanarama]

That's me, on top of the 57th highest mountain in Colorado (13,972 ft). Wikipedia says of Pigeon Peak: In terms of local relief, it is one of the most impressive peaks in Colorado. Its most dramatic rise is over the Animas River to the west, over which it rises 5,750 ft (1,750 m) in under 2.5 mi (4 km). Also, its east face is a 1,000 ft (305 m) cliff. Also, it can kill you with its brain.

We took the tourist train along the Animas River to the Needleton trailhead - actually, we walked about a mile to the train station, then got on the train, which is pretty cool because hey, we get to climb a major peak without driving anywhere! Lots of backpackers got off with us, but they all headed straight for the trail up Chicago Basin to go climb the popular 14ers. We turned left instead, looking for the infamously steep and poorly-marked trail toward Ruby Creek, and instantly got lost. In fact, we got lost half a dozen times on the way and had to bushwhack. Which wasn't necessarily any harder than actually being on the trail. (I commented that calling the path we were on a "trail" was like calling a 110-baud acoustic coupler a "modem" - sure, you could use it, but it was terribly slow and the connection kept dropping.) But we persevered, and were rewarded with tremendous views back down to the Animas River; eventually, by dint of much hard uphill, we gained beautiful Ruby Lake (not the same Ruby Lake we visited last month, from which we took this stunning picture of Pigeon's southern aspect) where Britt, naturally, fished:



We continued through gnarly boulderfields and up a whole lot more elevation gain to a lovely high meadow where we camped under the dramatic spires of the sharp pointy granite peaks of the Needles Range - including Pigeon Peak, which is the hunk of rock looming above our tent in the left-hand picture below. (Speaking of hunks, the preceding link may not be entirely worksafe as Britt is gazing at Animas Mountain wearing nothing but his down booties.) A mountain goat visited us that evening, but it was dark by then and none of the photos came out, alas.



The next morning we headed up. (See the rocks in the left part of the meadow in that first picture? Our tent is the rightmost large "rock".)





(I always seem to have to include one obligatory snowfield picture, don't I.) Anyway, we went up. And up. Past mountain goats and wildflowers Our camp was at about 11,600 ft; we climbed steeply to the saddle between Turret and Pigeon at just under 13,100 feet, where we had a nice view of Pigeon's sheer east face. Then...we had to go down.

It was a little dispiriting to have to descend 700 hard-earned vertical feet (and a pain in the butt to re-ascend them on the return!) but we hiked down to a notch on Pigeon's south side, contoured under a rocky rib, and then climbed up the grassy ramps on the west side of the peak. 1000 vertical feet later we were at the beginning of the rock scrambling, around 13,400 feet; cairns marked at least three different routes, but eventually they converged, and we gained the summit where we snacked and gazed at the mountains around us, many of which we have climbed, and at the Animas River way, way, way below us. We even heard the train whistle.





(View NE, view N, and a closer look at Jagged Mountain, which we climbed in 2005 and the Rio Grande Pyramid, which I hope to climb over Labor Day weekend.)

We retraced our steps to our camp. The next day we did not retrace our steps - that is, we managed to lose the trail only twice - and hiked back down. On the way we stopped at Ruby Lake again to fish and gather mushrooms, and Britt (that crazy man) went for a swim; then we continued down to the river and met the train, which took us back home.



Or just go straight to the photos on Flickr here.

Comments

[starfishchick]

Wow, these are impressive and very beautiful!

(Plus, your husband's naked butt! Did he know you were going to put that on the internet for all to see?)

[ilanarama.livejournal.com]

Hee, I asked him if I could. I was nice and just put the booties one up - I also took a couple of pictures of him fishing naked (just before he jumped into the lake) and they were taken from much closer and were much more, um, butt-full.

[ignazwisdom.livejournal.com]

I also took a couple of pictures of him fishing naked (just before he jumped into the lake)

Did he catch any more fish that way?

[ilanarama.livejournal.com]

[obligatory joke about the size of the worm]