Our first say of hiking in Colorado started just outside of Buena Vista (pronounced by locals as byoonuh vistuh) in the Collegiate Peaks Wilderness. We had decided to hike in, take a look at the conditions and decide on whether we would attempt Mt. Columbia, Mt. Harvard or a combination of the two. We planned to saty in the backcountry for a few days after the summit, and packed accrodingly (read: we had way too much stuff in our bags!)
We set off on June sixth (my birthday) about three miles from the North Cottonwood trailhead. Our rental van was not able to endure the bumps of the unpaved road that lead to the trailhead, so we parked, packed and started hiking around noon. Hiking on a road is not my idea of getting into the backcountry, but it was nice to have a bathroom stop and water fountain on the way to the trailhead. It was hot, but there were no dramatic gains or losses in elevation during that portion of the hike. Once we got to the North Cottonwood Trailhead we signed the logbook and went on for about another mile and a half. The first portion of the trail was uninteresting, easy hiking. We began to encounter snow, but nothing that went past our ankles. We found a huge area to set up camp and called it a day in the late afternoon.
It is important to note that we had not been in Colorado but two days at this point. The elevation of Media, PA is 299 feet. The elevation of Buena Vista is 7,294 feet and Mt. Harvard is 14, 420 feet. We were still adjusting to the thinner air...and the excessive weight on our backs. We had only hiked four and a half miles, but it felt like we had gone a lot farther than that.
We scoped out the peaks of Columbia and Harvard from camp, but couldn't really get a feel for the conditions. We decided to wake up early and head out with the intent to climb Columbia but the possibility to go up to Bear Lake, sleep and summit Harvard the morning of the eighth if the snow wasn't too bad. We had been warned by a few outfitters and ranger stations that most of the fourteeners were not climable at this time, for early June there was a ton of snow and without snowshoes or crampons they were too difficult to summit. With the little snow we had encountered, we were confident that a climb to the top was within our reach.
Things didn't start off too well. It took us an embarassingly long time to break camp in the morning and we started nearly an hour late. Nonetheless, we began hiking around 7am. The hiking was definitely intense and we came across snow almost immediately. It was fun hiking in snow and I loved the crunchy sound it made under my feet. It was very hard packed snow and not the different than hiking on regular trail. I loved bei
Maybe fifteen minutes after we took this picture, the snow began to change drastically. The crunchy snow we had been stepping on was suddenly very soft, and very deep. With each step we found ourselves postholing-- first up
to our knees, and then our
thighs, and finally our waists. But we kept on, undeterred. I think maybe we had a little bit of faith that the conditions would change before too long, that we had just hit a patch of soft snow.
Right around the time that we realized the snowy 'foot'prints that we had
been following were left by someone who had no idea where they were going, we ran into Doug from Dover Delaware. Doug was also a little turned around so we joined forces, and maps, to get back onto the trail. Doug has had more experience in the Colorado wilderness, and in the presence of fourteeners than the two of us, so we were very happy to have come across him. The snow was completely covering any evidence of the trail that existed underneath. Eventually we ran across some descenters- who had not made it to the sumitt- they pointed us in the direction of the trail and told us that the we were very close to the treeline. Bear lake is between 1 and 1.5 miles from treeline, which isn't too bad, and we charged on with new energy.Though the views had been stunning the entire way up, once we got to 11,500 feet and the trees were no longer impacting the scenery, I was struck by the beauty of all of the mountains around us. There were a whole bunch of twelve and thirteen thousand foot peaks, snow covered and massive, around us. At that moment it was hard to remember anything that matched the beauty we were wittnessing.
Hiking in the exposed area, I learned three things very quickly: 1) don't always trust the instinct of other hikers, no matter how experienced they look, 2) don't rely on a GPS, and 3) when frozen over, lakes are not that easy to identify.
We ran into a hiker who gave us false hope for the proximity of bear lake- and also mentioned that it was completely frozen over. Then, since we were convinced that we should be approaching bear lake any moment now, we believed that every huge open area below us was the lake. Each time, we took a look at the GPS where it confirmed our hope- yes, this is it! this is the lake!- and each time Doug took out his map, studied the shapes of the peaks around us, and politely indicated that maybe it was just over that hill over there. After three such encounters, we finally found the real bear lake. At this point it was three in the afternoon. It became very obvious that there were no good spots to set up camp (as the hiker had told us there would be). Everything was very exposed and covered in snow. Sean immediately started digging a spot for the tent with our snow anchor. Once the spot was cleared he started to set up the tent- but the wind was blowing it everywhere. We worked together, and using our ice axes, ski poles and snow anchor in conjunction with the stakes, were finally able to set up our tent. Doug had planned on a day hike and had no tent- but he bivwacked nearby and we all went to bed very early. (He is that green dot to the left of the tent)
We woke up in the middle of the night to the most beautiful clear sky imaginable. We woke up at six am to a complete whiteout. The summit would be impossible. Doug headed down before us (he didn't have the shelter we did) and we followed about an hour later. It had taken us eight hours to hike to Bear Lake on Saturday and it took us three hours to hike the same distance back (plus the mile and a half from the first day). Doug drove us back to our car and saved us the three mile hike.
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