La Plata Peak Trip Report 06/01/2009

Report Type	Full
Peak(s)	La Plata Peak - 14,344 feet
Date Posted	06/01/2009
Date Climbed	05/31/2009
Author	TriGirl

Four Seasons on La Plata
After attempting Grays Peak last weekend, Liz and I decided to climb La Plata this weekend. We drove up on Saturday night and camped in the truck about 1/2 mile above Winfield. The plan was to drive all the way to the top 4wd trailhead, but it was getting dark and the road was harder to navigate in the dusk, so we parked and went to sleep. We woke up at 5:00 am and were hiking at 5:30 am. The road up to the registration box was clear and easy to follow. We signed in, then headed up the trail. There were a few patches of snow on the trail, but they were easy to walk around. We were greeted with a rushing stream and small waterfall on the hike up. Right after treeline, we were greeted by a sea of bushes. Thankfully the ground was still hard, so the mud was solid with a few patches of running water to jump over. The sky was clear blue and it looked like a great day was coming. Here is the view coming out of the willows with the ridge up above us. The trail became buried in a snowfield as we approached the climb up to the ridge. We decided not to try to navigate the snowfield since it looked steep and icy, so we scrambled up next to one of the rock towers to get onto the ridge. Once on top of the ridge, we climbed up the first false summit. Locating the cairns up this hump was key to finding a good route to the top. We were greeted by this view once we got to the top of the hump. (The summit is still hidden at this point). The ridge was a fantastic, fun climb in the snow. We did not need snowshoes or yak traks on the ridge. There was a light wind, but the sun was still out at this point. It felt like we were in 2 seasons at once: winter due to all the snow and summer due to the hot sun. After about 1/2 hour of hiking on the ridge, we were on the summit. It took us 4.5 hours to summit. Here is a picture of Liz and I ON TOP!!!! There were some nice dark gray clouds building all around us now and another group on top said they were seeing lightning in the distance, so we enjoyed the view for a few minutes and headed back down. I have to say the view from the top of La Plata is awesome - a 360 degree view of all the snow covered peaks. It was amazing. We did some fun glissading on the way back down. Way easier and much more fun than slogging and postholing through the snow. There were lots of cute, fat critters along the hike. We thought this one was a statue until we got super close and he finally ran away. The sea of bushes had now become the "La Plata marsh". It was a soggy, mud-soaked, wet pit. We decided to hike down above the marsh and rejoined the trail at treeline. Just as we hit treeline, the hail, rain, and thunder started. We hiked really fast all the way back to the truck in the pouring rain, and drove into Buena Vista for some burgers, fries, and shakes. This was our first spring/snow 14er climb. I have definitely been bit by the 14er bug this year and am looking forward to climbing with Logan in 2 weeks Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):

Four Seasons on La Plata

After attempting Grays Peak last weekend, Liz and I decided to climb La Plata this weekend. We drove up on Saturday night and camped in the truck about 1/2 mile above Winfield. The plan was to drive all the way to the top 4wd trailhead, but it was getting dark and the road was harder to navigate in the dusk, so we parked and went to sleep.

We woke up at 5:00 am and were hiking at 5:30 am. The road up to the registration box was clear and easy to follow. We signed in, then headed up the trail. There were a few patches of snow on the trail, but they were easy to walk around. We were greeted with a rushing stream and small waterfall on the hike up. Right after treeline, we were greeted by a sea of bushes. Thankfully the ground was still hard, so the mud was solid with a few patches of running water to jump over.
The sky was clear blue and it looked like a great day was coming.

Here is the view coming out of the willows with the ridge up above us.

The trail became buried in a snowfield as we approached the climb up to the ridge. We decided not to try to navigate the snowfield since it looked steep and icy, so we scrambled up next to one of the rock towers to get onto the ridge.

Once on top of the ridge, we climbed up the first false summit. Locating the cairns up this hump was key to finding a good route to the top. We were greeted by this view once we got to the top of the hump. (The summit is still hidden at this point).

The ridge was a fantastic, fun climb in the snow. We did not need snowshoes or yak traks on the ridge. There was a light wind, but the sun was still out at this point. It felt like we were in 2 seasons at once: winter due to all the snow and summer due to the hot sun.
After about 1/2 hour of hiking on the ridge, we were on the summit.
It took us 4.5 hours to summit.
Here is a picture of Liz and I ON TOP!!!!

There were some nice dark gray clouds building all around us now and another group on top said they were seeing lightning in the distance, so we enjoyed the view for a few minutes and headed back down. I have to say the view from the top of La Plata is awesome - a 360 degree view of all the snow covered peaks. It was amazing.

We did some fun glissading on the way back down. Way easier and much more fun than slogging and postholing through the snow.

There were lots of cute, fat critters along the hike. We thought this one was a statue until we got super close and he finally ran away.

The sea of bushes had now become the "La Plata marsh". It was a soggy, mud-soaked, wet pit. We decided to hike down above the marsh and rejoined the trail at treeline.
Just as we hit treeline, the hail, rain, and thunder started. We hiked really fast all the way back to the truck in the pouring rain, and drove into Buena Vista for some burgers, fries, and shakes.

This was our first spring/snow 14er climb. I have definitely been bit by the 14er bug this year and am looking forward to climbing with Logan in 2 weeks

Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):

Comments or Questions

mattpayne11	Fun route 6/1/2009 10:06pm I like that route up La Plata, I recognized that ridge immediately. Thanks for the TR, I‘m sure it will aid someone in the coming days!
Aubrey	nice pics 6/2/2009 4:11am ”drove into Buena Vista for some burgers, fries, and shakes” ... K‘s, I presume! Nice write-up. Congrats on the summit. That‘s the route we took years back ... it has some brutal false summits. Some day I‘ll do the ”standard” route.
TriGirl	great to meet you also! 6/2/2009 4:20am Glad you had a good hike down also despite the rain and hail. I think that is standard on a 14er 8) Hope to see you all up there this summer!
Bodhi	Hooray for glissades! 6/4/2009 1:22pm We were up there the day before (same route) and the glissading was a nice treat. :D We got lucky and it started to rain right when we got back to the trucks. Another perfect weekend in the hills!
scott goldberg	great to meet you on the summit... 1/24/2013 3:47pm We had the same rain/hail/thunder combination our last 1,100 feet down the other side. But it couldn‘t take away from an excellent day on the mountain. Nice TR!

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