Crestone Peak

The 7th highest at 14,294ft.

My 7th successful fourteener climb!

7/95 Failed w/ Rick, Norine, and Vance

Rick, Norine, Vance and I started up the jeep trail in a Land Cruiser. The problem was Vance and I were sitting in the back on the side seats. Vance and I are both over 6 feet tall and our heads lined up really well with the roll bars. If you’ve ever been up South Colony Lakes Road (road?) or any jeep trail like it you know it’s a bumpy ride. Vance and I had to put on hard hats to prevent getting concussions! Needless to say, Vance and I were very happy to get out of the Cruiser at the trailhead. I don’t recall what the start time was but I do remember that it was later than we had hoped for. We hiked past the base of Broken Hand Peak and on to an early lunch at South Colony Lakes. We continued on past the break off point for Humboldt and into a bowl. Going up the side of the bowl to Bears Playground was tough (but not as tough as getting down; more later!) We got to the couloir on the Northwest side of Crestone Peak. There was a great deal of snow and ice. At the top of the couloir we needed to use a rope to avoid a very icy spot. We sat on the ledge and observed that the rest of our route was a solid sheet of ice. We all had ice axes but only Rick had crampons. (We didn’t know it at the time but we were only 100 feet from the top!) As we tried to decide what to do, a heavy fog rolled in and then it started to rain. This is where I learned a lot about myself. I realized that I could make and accept difficult decisions. As it continued to rain on us, we decided that it wasn’t worth our lives attempting to climb an icy couloir in the fog and rain so we started to downclimb. We had heard about many people getting injured and/or killed on Crestone Peak and we were certain that we were at the location of many of those injuries. We followed some cairns but they ended up leading us to a dead end. Because of the dense fog and the fact that it was starting to get late we had very little visibility. When we finally made it back to Bears Playground it was dark. The only flashlight that we had between us was Vance’s penlight! When we started to climb back down into the bowl we apparently picked the wrong trail. We got to a spot where we couldn’t tell how steep the cliff was so we threw down a rock. It took way too long to hit bottom. We then backtracked and chose another trail. Another cliff. This continued for a while and we were all starting to feel sick. We all had some combination of worrying about each other, altitude sickness, and just the stress of being on the mountain much longer than we had anticipated. We were starting to get clumsy because of fatigue so we thought we’d just try to sleep a little under a tarp in the rain. This was only the third mountain I had attempted to climb so I hadn’t built up a large collection of mountaineering equipment. I didn’t even have a decent jacket for such weather. None of us had planned on being on the mountain at night. Norine tried her cellular phone but we were sheltered from the outside world. This is where a funny story occurred. I suddenly got concerned that I couldn’t get in touch of my wife. She was expecting me home at 10:00p.m. and it was much later than that. I announced to everyone, "we need to get in touch of Julie or she’s going to think something’s wrong." Vance then came back with, "Jeff, something is wrong. We’re on top of a mountain, it’s 1:00 in the morning, and it’s raining." See to me, no one was injured. We were just stuck on the mountain. Looking back now, we were in pretty sorry shape. Any one of us could have gotten hypothermia. No one could sleep. I was getting colder by the minute. I don’t know if this was a good idea or not but we split up. Vance and I needed to get off the mountain. We started off by taking turns throwing rocks and downclimbing cliffs. I finally had had it and my nerves caused me to get sick. After that I felt a little better but not enough. Cliff after cliff we finally stumbled on to the trail. We shouted back to Rick and Norine to give them an idea where the trail was. We finally got to the bottom into the bowl (told you going down was harder!). This is the trip that has caused my mother to worry about my climbs and now forces me to take my dad’s GPS (Global Positioning System). I wish I’d had that GPS for this trip. Vance and I continued on down the trail. Vance was about 20 yards in front of me. I looked up and saw him walking with someone. About the same time, Vance looked back and saw me walking with someone. The problem was, neither of us were walking with anyone. Either the Sangre de Cristo Mountains truly are haunted or Vance and I had had enough fun at the high altitude and our brains were fried. True to the trip Vance and I got off trail. We had to skirt across the lake around this very large boulder to get back on trail (another ½ hour wasted!) We finally got back to the Land Cruiser at 3:30a.m. and munched down on some food I had left in the car because I felt I wouldn’t need it! We then fell asleep. About a half hour later, Rick and Norine pounded on the doors. Vance and I got in the back and put on the hard hats and Rick started driving down the trail. This next part is the hardest part of the story to believe. Down this bumpy trail that jerked our bodies all over, Norine fell asleep and slept all the way down. A few times I think Rick also fell asleep and he was driving! Norine’s cellular phone finally got a dial tone at 5:50a.m. I gave my wife a call to let her know that we were all okay. She had been up half the night worried. She had decided that if she hadn’t heard from us by 6:00a.m. that she was going to call Search and Rescue. Thank goodness we had good timing! We drove down the road a bit and pulled into a Hardys. They had an all-you-can-eat special going on. I had never eaten so much! This trip taught me many many things. Some people ask why I pack so much in my day pack. Now they know why! That Christmas my wife bought me a wonderful gift. I got a very warm climbing jacket! I always take too much food on climbs now. I will never go hungry. This story does have a good moral: If you are given a difficult choice, think about what is important to you. Choose your spouse and family. There is always next year to make it to the top. As you read the next story you’ll see that I did summit Crestone Peak, exactly one year later!

7/16/96 climbed w/ Rick and Vance

Again we took a trip up the jeep trail in the Land Cruiser, only this time I got to sit in the front seat. We got to the trailhead (much more pleasant ride in the front seat) and prepared for "take two" of Crestone Peak. We hiked past the base of Broken Hand Peak and on to an early lunch at South Colony Lakes. We continued on past the break off point for Humboldt and into a bowl. Going up the side of the bowl to Bears Playground was just as tough as I had remembered it. We got to the couloir on the Northwest side of Crestone Peak. There wasn't as much snow and ice going up the couloir and there wasn't snow at the point that stopped us a year earlier. We rested on the ledge that had been our turn around point and then headed to the top. 100 feet later we summited (had we known how close we were a year earlier we might have risked it). We enjoyed the top of the peak and took a few pictures. We decided to drop down the red couloir and try for the Needle. As we got down the couloir the clouds started to come in and then then downpour started. It seems like I always get wet around the Crestones. This is where the story changes to a typical "Sangre de Cristo Mountain Range Jeff on a hike" story. As we got down from the red couloir, the rain was coming down hard enough that the rocks were getting to wet to attempt Crestone Needle. Now we have to abort the Needle climb but we are on the wrong side of the ridge. We started to climb over the ridge just south of the Needle but kept finding cliffs too steep to downclimb the other side. We finally found a spot to get to the other side. We then had to climb up the saddle between the Needle and Broken Hand Peak. Once down that side, we headed back to the South colony Lakes trail and out towards the Cruiser. I once again had the dry heaves, probably because of the relived stress of downclimbing wet rocks. We made it back to the Cruiser and drove back home. The next summer I returned to the Crestones to attempt Humboldt and the Needle.

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