Challenger Point Trip Report 02/07/2015

Report Type	Full
Peak(s)	Challenger Point - 14,086 feet
Date Posted	02/07/2015
Modified	08/08/2017
Date Climbed	02/01/2015
Author	Krullin_14ers
Additional Members	stevebremner, Gueza, ap snow, JulianSmith

Challenger Point - A Loaded & Bluebird Winter Ascent
Hey guys, here we are again with another trip report. This time, a winter ascent! My first report on a winter ascent. This trip was very special to me as the conditions were at an all time. We hit about a foot of powder on an absolutely gorgeous bluebird day! Willow Lake Trailhead Camp below headwall Ascent: 10 Hours (2H Saturday, 8H Sunday) Descent: 4 Hours Let us begin. Austin and I left B town at 9 am to begin the mission. We made our first stop in colorado springs to pick up homie Eric, a fellow ripper hungry for some hard earned vert. Once snagged, we began the second leg to Crestone. Upon arrival in Crestone, we found the gate to the trailhead to be locked. This would mean another 3 miles RT....Luckily a nice man in a Prius informed us there was another way to the TH! We packed our goodies back in the car and headed to the secret spot. At this point we met up with a couple gentleman that would be tagging along with us, Steve and Julian - and bless their dog! beginning The plan was to put in a couple hours of skiing on saturday, hopefully making it to Willow lake. more beautifulness ^^At the first opening, our two friends, Steve and Julian decided to call it a day here. They would head back to their car and meet up with us in the morning for the ascent. By this time, it was about 4PM, it was snowing and we were getting wet. It begin to come into question if we would make it all the way to the lake.....so we just kept moving! ^^Just before the lake, at the base of the headwall, we decided to set up camp. By this time, we had been skinning for 30 minutes in the dark and we were getting pretty cold. Any hope of getting to the lake was tooooo far fetched. We found a nice (semi flat spot) and set up shop. h20 sanitation ^^Here, Eric sterilizes some water that i would later drink, and then proceed to pee in at night for relief. sleeping bag ^^#3dudes1tent Austin brought us up this HUGE tent that was just so spacious.....as you can see, we were pretty crammed in this bad boy. Thankfully i was on the downslope of the tent, and was awarded around 10 inches of room to sleep in, up to a foot at times. It was pretty damn cold outside as it was still snowing and i figured we were around 11,500 feet. Also, I must mention that we had some great freeze dried spaghetti for dinner. Austin boiled us up some water and prepared the spaghetti, and it was then my responsibility to watch the pouches as we were setting up the tent. After i recall seeing a bear, or something similar of the nature, BOOM I spilled my spaghetti all over Austin's tent and pad! PARTY FOUL! I felt terrible, we had to do an immediate tent spaghetti evac! everyone out! what a dumb move, but now that I think about it, its pretty funny javascript:emoticon('') After a seriously restless night of sleep, and i mean restless, I did not sleep more than an hour. My ass was soaked from the condensation on the tent, I had 10 inches of room, and I was so pumped to summit the next day. We were hoping for a bluebird day with some fresh on the ground...little did we know we would strike gold... beginning the morning ^^We popped out of the tent to find ourselves under a star lit sky. This was something only the gods would put upon us. Jesus had literally descended upon the Sangres and sprinkled a little bit of heaven on us. Here, Austin skins up the final bit of the headwall, soon to be greeted by some ALPENGLOW! into da valley ^^Looking back into the valley, so damn gorgeous i can't handle it. stop. surroundings almost at the lake! lake trekking! ^^AHHH finally, we have arrived at the lake! From our campsite, it took us about an hour to get to the lake. THis was something that we realized in the morning would not have been a good idea the night before. We were getting so stoked for some bluebird skies and fresh powder!!!! looking back down ^^Looking back down on the lake and into the valley below. This is right before the ascent up Challenger. greeted by a nice sunrise GORGEOUS looking at Challenger (ish) ^^As you can see here, this is the only visible face of challenger (if you can even call it that)...but if you look closely, you can see the north couloir, the route in which we decided to place our faith. trekking ^^A few hundred yards past the lake, we had to hang up the skins, throw the crampons on and get to work bootpackin more trekkkking looking toward kit carson The Day was just beautiful digging pit ^^At this point we had a few options. It was either hike along the rock rib just to lookers left of the north couloir, hike up the north couloir or head lookers right and loop around the couloir. We determined all of these to be risky options. It had just snowed enormous amounts (18inches) in places the night before, and things were looking quite unstable. We dug a pit, tested the snow and only furthered our shaky snow hypothesis. Ultimately, we decided to boot up the north couloir directly. we did this by hugging, i mean hugging the rock wall on lookers left. ERIC, booted the whole way up this damn thing. Kid came straight outta the gates like the devil had just released him from hell. I mean were talking an up to the knee boot pack in 45-50 degree slopes. Kid str8 killed it. So G. getting steep up this couloir ^^here Austin is booting up hugging the left side. Pretty steep at times. looking down the couloir ^^About half way up the couloir looking down. I honestly diddnt know if i would be making a last step at anytime. I felt the snow was extremely unstable and could go whenever. at times i would look into crevasse between the rock wall and the couloir and could see about 5 feet of snow, intense. austin between a rock and another rock ^^Austin finds himself between 2 rocks LOL almost there ^^FINALLY, after about 3-4 hours on that north face, we made it to the top of the North Couloir! Once you pop out, you hook a left, climb up this face you see here, and simple walk to the summit. Its as easy as that. There is a bit of exposure on the right side as you will see in the pictures, other than that, its a fairly simple walk. looking back at the valley the summit the valley from the summit sup ^^Finally! We were on the summit! YAHOOOO what a day!....we were safe! Bluebird day with fresh powder! Now the question was, what do we ski???? We decided on the Kirk Couloir, as it looked like a safer option than the north couloir. Austin sent it first, all the way to the bottom. we all were expecting an avalanche and were fully prepared to go dig him out. Thankfully that didn't happen. Eric went next, then myself, then Julian Heres some footage of the line! WATCH IN "HD" the Kirk! ^^Looking up at the Kirk Couloir valley valley valley ^^What a satisfying ascent and descent. We were soooooo lucky to have made it out of this one alive. It was super dangerous and I'm so stoked on it. How many people get to ski a 14er in these conditions?!?? not many! Well, anyway, after the descent, we made it back to our tent, packed up and skinned out. MOON MOON MOON sunset peace out sangres! ^^Peace out Sangres, until next time! Overall it was an awesome trip. We had a really strong crew and skied one hell of a line. It was just a blast! Nothing is more satisfying that these trips. Im sure there will be more to come. Hope this helps anyone trying to ski the line in the future, let me know if you have any questions! Heres the line down the kirk one more time! WATCH IN "HD" Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):

Challenger Point - A Loaded & Bluebird Winter Ascent

Hey guys, here we are again with another trip report. This time, a winter ascent! My first report on a winter ascent. This trip was very special to me as the conditions were at an all time. We hit about a foot of powder on an absolutely gorgeous bluebird day!

Willow Lake Trailhead
Camp below headwall
Ascent: 10 Hours (2H Saturday, 8H Sunday)
Descent: 4 Hours

Let us begin.

Austin and I left B town at 9 am to begin the mission. We made our first stop in colorado springs to pick up homie Eric, a fellow ripper hungry for some hard earned vert. Once snagged, we began the second leg to Crestone. Upon arrival in Crestone, we found the gate to the trailhead to be locked. This would mean another 3 miles RT....Luckily a nice man in a Prius informed us there was another way to the TH! We packed our goodies back in the car and headed to the secret spot. At this point we met up with a couple gentleman that would be tagging along with us, Steve and Julian - and bless their dog!

The plan was to put in a couple hours of skiing on saturday, hopefully making it to Willow lake.

^^At the first opening, our two friends, Steve and Julian decided to call it a day here. They would head back to their car and meet up with us in the morning for the ascent. By this time, it was about 4PM, it was snowing and we were getting wet. It begin to come into question if we would make it all the way to the lake.....so we just kept moving!

^^Just before the lake, at the base of the headwall, we decided to set up camp. By this time, we had been skinning for 30 minutes in the dark and we were getting pretty cold. Any hope of getting to the lake was tooooo far fetched. We found a nice (semi flat spot) and set up shop.

^^Here, Eric sterilizes some water that i would later drink, and then proceed to pee in at night for relief.

^^#3dudes1tent Austin brought us up this HUGE tent that was just so spacious.....as you can see, we were pretty crammed in this bad boy. Thankfully i was on the downslope of the tent, and was awarded around 10 inches of room to sleep in, up to a foot at times. It was pretty damn cold outside as it was still snowing and i figured we were around 11,500 feet.

Also, I must mention that we had some great freeze dried spaghetti for dinner. Austin boiled us up some water and prepared the spaghetti, and it was then my responsibility to watch the pouches as we were setting up the tent. After i recall seeing a bear, or something similar of the nature, BOOM I spilled my spaghetti all over Austin's tent and pad! PARTY FOUL! I felt terrible, we had to do an immediate tent spaghetti evac! everyone out! what a dumb move, but now that I think about it, its pretty funny javascript:emoticon('

')

After a seriously restless night of sleep, and i mean restless, I did not sleep more than an hour. My ass was soaked from the condensation on the tent, I had 10 inches of room, and I was so pumped to summit the next day. We were hoping for a bluebird day with some fresh on the ground...little did we know we would strike gold...

^^We popped out of the tent to find ourselves under a star lit sky. This was something only the gods would put upon us. Jesus had literally descended upon the Sangres and sprinkled a little bit of heaven on us. Here, Austin skins up the final bit of the headwall, soon to be greeted by some ALPENGLOW!

^^Looking back into the valley, so damn gorgeous i can't handle it. stop.

^^AHHH finally, we have arrived at the lake! From our campsite, it took us about an hour to get to the lake. THis was something that we realized in the morning would not have been a good idea the night before.

We were getting so stoked for some bluebird skies and fresh powder!!!!

^^Looking back down on the lake and into the valley below. This is right before the ascent up Challenger.

GORGEOUS

^^As you can see here, this is the only visible face of challenger (if you can even call it that)...but if you look closely, you can see the north couloir, the route in which we decided to place our faith.

^^A few hundred yards past the lake, we had to hang up the skins, throw the crampons on and get to work bootpackin

The Day was just beautiful

^^At this point we had a few options. It was either hike along the rock rib just to lookers left of the north couloir, hike up the north couloir or head lookers right and loop around the couloir. We determined all of these to be risky options. It had just snowed enormous amounts (18inches) in places the night before, and things were looking quite unstable. We dug a pit, tested the snow and only furthered our shaky snow hypothesis.

Ultimately, we decided to boot up the north couloir directly. we did this by hugging, i mean hugging the rock wall on lookers left.

ERIC, booted the whole way up this damn thing. Kid came straight outta the gates like the devil had just released him from hell. I mean were talking an up to the knee boot pack in 45-50 degree slopes. Kid str8 killed it. So G.

^^here Austin is booting up hugging the left side. Pretty steep at times.

^^About half way up the couloir looking down. I honestly diddnt know if i would be making a last step at anytime. I felt the snow was extremely unstable and could go whenever. at times i would look into crevasse between the rock wall and the couloir and could see about 5 feet of snow, intense.

^^Austin finds himself between 2 rocks LOL

^^FINALLY, after about 3-4 hours on that north face, we made it to the top of the North Couloir!

Once you pop out, you hook a left, climb up this face you see here, and simple walk to the summit. Its as easy as that. There is a bit of exposure on the right side as you will see in the pictures, other than that, its a fairly simple walk.

^^Finally! We were on the summit! YAHOOOO what a day!....we were safe! Bluebird day with fresh powder!
Now the question was, what do we ski????

We decided on the Kirk Couloir, as it looked like a safer option than the north couloir. Austin sent it first, all the way to the bottom. we all were expecting an avalanche and were fully prepared to go dig him out. Thankfully that didn't happen. Eric went next, then myself, then Julian

Heres some footage of the line!

WATCH IN "HD"

^^Looking up at the Kirk Couloir

^^What a satisfying ascent and descent. We were soooooo lucky to have made it out of this one alive. It was super dangerous and I'm so stoked on it. How many people get to ski a 14er in these conditions?!?? not many! Well, anyway, after the descent, we made it back to our tent, packed up and skinned out.

^^Peace out Sangres, until next time! Overall it was an awesome trip. We had a really strong crew and skied one hell of a line. It was just a blast! Nothing is more satisfying that these trips. Im sure there will be more to come.

Hope this helps anyone trying to ski the line in the future, let me know if you have any questions!

Heres the line down the kirk one more time!

WATCH IN "HD"

Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):

Comments or Questions

BillMiddlebrook	Willow Creek and Kirk 2/8/2015 12:56pm That really is a beautiful place in winter. Great photos! "Austin sent it first, all the way to the bottom. we all were expecting an avalanche and were fully prepared to go dig him out. Thankfully that didn’t happen." ^I can’t tell if this statement was serious or you were joking. Hopefully the later.
ap snow	Nice! 2/8/2015 6:00pm Great write up my friend. That was such a fun mission and the conditions were all time!!!
Kevin Baker	Russian roulette 2/8/2015 7:12pm Isn’t the goal of winter mountaineering in Colorado to avoid deep, steep, fresh powder on north facing aspects? I am glad the Kirk couloir didn’t decide to let loose. I don’t mean to play mother hen, but you guys were playing Russian roulette.
MonGoose	2/8/2015 11:28pm Bold.
d_baker	This report 2/9/2015 12:01am reminds me of Mr. Waffles.
Krullin_14ers	^^^ 8/8/2017 10:22am So deep! So Steep! I love it!
adam1977	Kinda foolish don’t you think? 2/9/2015 2:45pm I’m sure you guys are all pro level skiers/snow stability experts but you are glorifying the dangerous conditions in this post. Not sure that sends the best message to the community. Bottom line, you shouldn’t be skiing north facing lines after 18 inches of fresh snow. Eventually you WILL get burned. Cool pics though
EatinHardtack	Nice pics 2/10/2015 3:14am Luck is a very thin wire between survival and disaster, and not many people can keep their balance on it. –Hunter S. Thompson Nice pics of your trip
Gueza	Just to clarify... 2/10/2015 4:05am This report contains a lot of satire. Alex was trying to make the report sound epic. Lol While generally it is a good idea to avoid steep N facing aspects in winter here in Colorado, under certain circumstances it is possible to find stable snow. It did NOT snow 18 inches the night before, it snowed only a couple with very low winds forecasted. It had been more than 2 weeks since the sangres experienced a significant snow event. CAIC had the forecast the week leading up to our trip at LOW avalanche danger for all aspects. The major avalanche concern was wind slabs but we we never encountered any. The secondary avalanche concern was persistent slabs running on the basal facets located at the bottom of the snowpack. In some places the snow was so faceted we were climbing up balls deep in sugar, there simply were no slabs. In others like the N couloir and the Kirk, the snow was so deep that our weight couldn’t reach that buried deep layer even if we tried. We made an educated decision to go based on evidence of stable snow. Hope this sets the record straight, cheers!
BillMiddlebrook	Thank You 2/10/2015 3:44pm Thanks, Eric. As I stated above, I was hoping he was joking but it was a bit difficult to tell. When people sometimes die climbing or skiing in conditions similar to what Alex described, I’m sure you can understand why some of us were concerned.
Steve Climber	Hell Yeah!!! 2/10/2015 4:43pm Nice work! Eric, I’ve always seen you as one of the smartest and most talented skimo folks around here...Keep on crushing, bud! Cheers! Sam
jmanner	Good write up 2/10/2015 5:59pm Enjoyable read. Glad you guys made it out OK. As previously said, much impressed with your Sangre climbing this winter. Some big weekends. Definitely, envious of your ski descents.
FireOnTheMountain	rad 2/10/2015 7:02pm sweet conditions! glad you guys had a blast!
timf	Just Curious..... 2/10/2015 7:44pm So you dug a pit and didn’t like what you saw and caught glimpses of 5’ of snow near the wall and after 18" of a fresh dumping. Not trying to be a wise guy here, but help me through where the decision was made to continue. Glad nothing happened, I’m just curious. Did I miss something?
moneymike	This tr gave me an idea for a cartoon show... 2/10/2015 9:12pm Reckless Teenage Ninja Snow–gansters. Starring Avy–Austin and his merry band of trail breaking bitches. I’m just kidding. Classic descent guys, and sick video!
Krullin_14ers	MoneyMike 2/11/2015 1:05am ^^^^hahahaha
BenfromtheEast	Joke’s on me, Brah 2/12/2015 1:52am I’m now glad I didn’t post a scolding comment a couple days ago, but can’t blame those who did. This report makes y’all look like a bunch of fools. Nice work! We should have guessed, though. With as hard as you guys sent it, the snow must have been bomber not to slide! Also, while I can’t get on board with POV GoBro footage (Somebody please figure out a way to make that stuff look normal!!), I really liked the 360 with Bro on the end of the ski. Send on. 8)
Aardvark	Great pics and video 3/5/2015 6:02pm Thanks for posting!

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