[Day 34] The Steeps

I woke up to frozen shoes. I stuffed my feet in — not much choice. I was packed and walking by 6:45am — not terrible, but not great. I cut up the mountain to 12,000 feet, and I began traversing around a large valley. Instead, I decided to cut across at the river below to save some time and mileage. After crossing the ice bridge over the Middle Fork of the Conejos River, I cut up the side of the mountain on the other side of the valley and hit the mountain pass on the side.

The outfitters had warned of the traverse down at mile 813, and I was finally there. Instead of traversing the valley on steep snow, I went for a chute down to the valley floor. Initially, I intended to glissade down the chute, but the snow was hard. I literally walked straight down the steep chute. This was as steep as your typical black diamond ski run. My microspikes on and my ice ax swinging in my right hand, I struck with my heel and set a deep hole into the snow with each step. The snow provided a dampening effect; I was supported in each step and had no concerns of losing control or sliding. I tried to glissade near the end of the chute, but the snow wouldn’t let me budge.

At the end of the valley, I crossed paths with the footsteps that had been in front of me since leaving Chama. I followed trail up on the other side of the valley, only to determine I was wasting my time slipping and sliding of melting south-facing snow. I glissaded to the bottom of the valley and instead walked a snowed over river up the valley to where the trail meets. Was there water running under the snow? Yes, and I had no concern of breaking through.

I snowshoed for a bit, until zip reached the steep slopes of yet another mountain pass. I kicked in steps on the slopes of soft ice fields. It was slow going making the trail, but I got to the pass. At the pass, I decided to hike the watershed divide line instead of following trail through steep snow traverses. The watershed divide offered a clean ascending topography up in a ridge line, typically with one face of the ridge without snow. The southwest face of the ridge I hiked was without snow. It’s always fun going off trail. At the summit of the ridge, a decaying register in a glass jar didn’t allow me to jot my name down. I inspected my routes: the divide line running east with some gnarly pinnacles or a snow covered ridge line running west back to trail. Either one would eventual converge back to trail, but the watershed divide line would certainly be the shortest path. After inspecting the divide line, I found the rock scramble of the minaret-like towers to be risky with my limited gear. I braved the deep snow of the west ridge line and headed towards the steepest traverse. I was in a bit of a hurry as a clouds began to accumulate and the winds picked up.

At the traverse, I decided the same attack as my previous chute descent: walk it. I successfully walked half of it. For the fun of it, I decided to glissade the final portion. I barely made 10 miles per hour in my glissade. I was excited to be through these “sketchy” sections and began hiking the riverside up the valley towards trail and the divide line. About a quarter mile from the end of the chute, I felt the bottom of my pack — my tent, which I strapped to the bottom of my pack, was gone. I ran to the bottom of the chute postholing deep into snow. I dropped my pack at the bottom of the chute and climb half way back up the chute with my ice ax to where I began my glissade. There my stuff sack was. I grab it and went of a speedy glissade down, taking on a little league pop-up slide position and sticking my ax into hill above me. I reunited with my backpack, rounded up my gear, and hiked another mile to a spot to break.

During my afternoon break, I evaluated the skies to see if a storm was going to evolve. It was hard to tell as clouds from the east and west converged on some peaks east of me. After an hour, I decided to keep walking. I climbed up a snowed river bed in my snowshoes; it was a killer 1,000 feet of climbing. I was stopping every couple minutes to catch my breathe.

Eventually, I reached a spot where the terrain flattened out and some patches of snow-free land were exposed. I exited my snowshoe bindings and began island hopping across snowfields. I continued this until a crossing with the watershed divide line presented itself. I walked the watershed as much as I could. It cliffed me out in a couple spots, but I found my way around with some fun glissading.

The walking ended with a long snow field. Islands of dry land dotted the land, and I picked a spot with small wind coverage in a beautiful valley. The night was initially calm, until the hailstorms came. At 10pm and 1:30am, I was hit my 20 minute intervals of hail and wind that ripped my tent stakes right out of the ground. I had to get out in the hail and reground my tent. I used the light shale rocks around to weigh down my stakes, but it wasn’t enough for the second storm. During the second storm, I was grabbed the main struts of my tent. I fortunately only lost one of my four tent stakes. I managed to fix it from within my tent, reenforcing the muddy ground with additional tent stakes and my trowel acting as foundation beams. I didn’t have any issues the rest of the night.

It was a big day: 6,600 feet of ascent, two long snow chutes, and two midnight hailstorms. But, I don’t feel much phased. Life goes on, and the landscape is much too beautiful to not be awe inspired.

Signing off,

Zeppelin