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Peak(s)  Capitol Peak  -  14,138 feet
Date Posted  08/16/2011
Date Climbed   08/14/2011
Author  beazleys
 Capitol Peak - Ditch Route in a Day   
A day climb of Capitol via the standard route:

http://culinaryhack.blogspot.com/2011/08/capitol-peak.html


Comments or Questions
D_Price
User
Nice job
8/16/2011 3:27pm
Great summary guys, looks like fun. We jsut completed Longs Peak last weekend and while there were talking about Capitol for next year. Have you done Longs before and if so, how would you compare teh two in terms of difficulty on the summit approach and the overall trail up?
RJansen77
User
Awesome!
8/16/2011 10:13pm
Great to see you guys got this one, was looking forward to this TR!
HOCKEYFAN
User
AWWW, CAPITOL
8/18/2011 4:37am
Gotta love the dialog!!! Nice frigin' job, guys!!!
beazleys
User
re: Nice job
8/18/2011 2:02pm
Nice work on Longs!

I'd be curious to see what others have to say in terms of comparing Longs and Capitol. In my opinion, the approach to the boulder field and Capitol is similar, that is to say,lengthy but with moderate grades. The Ditch Trail is often dirt though, with few rocks, which makes for happy feet. The similarities end there though as the knife edge provides more exposure than what you find on Longs, and the route finding is more challenging. I think if you climbed Longs with no issues regarding the exposure then Capitol, while tougher, is doable.
vorticity
User
Any need for MicroSpikes?
8/24/2011 2:41pm
Earlier climbers had discussed some hard pack on the way to K2. Do you see any need for crampons, an ice axe, or microspikes along the way? Thanks
beazleys
User
re:Any need for MicroSpikes?
8/24/2011 2:52pm
On the ascent we bypassed a majority of the snow by descending lower into the basin and then scrambling on the rocks to the climber's right as we climbed out of the basin. Thus, we did not need traction. On the descent I was glad to have the ice axe as we boot glissaded the initial snowfield and then cut across the remaining snowfields in the basin versus losing elevation. If I were to climb it tomorrow, I would skip the traction but still carry the ice axe.
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