Mount Belford, Oxford and Missouri

[Nataliaguz]

I’m planning on doing all three, I don’t see a route on this site for all 3. There’s one on all trails app. I’m wondering if anyone has done it recently, what route they took, what time did they start and how long did it take?
I was planning on going up the switchbacks and doing Belford then Oxford, then taking Missouri gulch trail to Missouri mountain and then taking that down to the car.
I would love any feedback or suggestions.
Thank you in advance

[colingoodman]

You would do Belford + Oxford the normal way, then after Oxford you would take B3 ("Southwest Slopes") down towards the standard Missouri route (M1). It's a long day but pretty straightforward route-wise. Here's the map from the routes page for reference:


https://www.14ers.com/route.php?route=miss1

[Nataliaguz]

Thank you so much! How long did it take you to do all 3?

[osprey]

I did the Belford Oxford Emerald Iowa Missouri loop 5 years ago in 13 hours. Three 14ers and one ranked 13er in one trip. Doing the two 13ers added some mileage and elevation but did not seem like too much.

[Jacobbanks]

I did all three a few years ago. I took the standard route up Belford and over to Oxford then dropped back to the valley and up the Northwest Ridge route to Missouri. If I was to do it again I would take Elkhead Pass over to the standard route of Missouri. It took me around 10ish hours. This was the year we had a lot of rain and a few days before a major rock slide took out a portion of the trail.

[9patrickmurphy]

If I were to do all three in a day, after Belford and Oxford I would drop to the South side of Elkhead Pass and then take tundra slopes to the Iowa/Missouri saddle. The south ridge up Missouri from that saddle is very straightforward. Then standard route down. A little less trail, but it might save a small amount of mileage and lets you make a bit of a loop.

[Rdbamonte]

Does anyone have any experience with hiking all three starting from the TH at the end of the 4WD road near Clohesy Lake? So essentially, you’d summit Missouri first (i assume) then go on to Belford and Oxford (i think in that order)?

[MidsizeAl]

Does anyone have any experience with hiking all three starting from the TH at the end of the 4WD road near Clohesy Lake? So essentially, you’d summit Missouri first (i assume) then go on to Belford and Oxford (i think in that order)?

You would then have to resummit Belford and then essentially resummit Missouri to drop back down to Clohesy assuming you parked there. If you are really wanting to maximize vert (or suffering I guess), you could do this. But if you get tired or have to bail due to weather after reclimbing Belford, you are SOL unless you parked at the 2wd TH at Rockdale, in which case you STILL have an additional 2 miles of road walking.

The climb up Missouri from Rockdale is great, by the way, but it’s better to add Emerald and Iowa if you want multiple peaks from that direction IMO. We had a blast doing this last year!

[14ercooper]

Last fall I did the trio. Parked at Missouri Gulch TH, climbed the standard route up Belford, did the out and back to Oxford, dropped down to Elkhead pass and the standard route up Missouri, and then dropped down to Clohesy lake off Missouri and then just walked down the road back to my car. The road walking sucked a little bit, but it was a pretty solid day that took me through multiple basins and along quite the variety of different routes - was definitely enjoyable (and you could always drop back down the standard route on Missouri if you so desire).

[mountainero]

You would do Belford + Oxford the normal way, then after Oxford you would take B3 ("Southwest Slopes") down towards the standard Missouri route (M1). It's a long day but pretty straightforward route-wise. Here's the map from the routes page for reference:


https://www.14ers.com/route.php?route=miss1

Is there any reason I couldn't take that east ridge on Missouri direct to the summit from Elkhead pass and descend the standard route?

[14ercooper]

Is there any reason I couldn't take that east ridge on Missouri direct to the summit from Elkhead pass and descend the standard route?

The ridgeline from Elkhead pass is... not great. It goes at class 4, but the rock is very loose and rotten. I've done it before - it's not a pleasant experience and it'll almost certainly be faster to just drop down to the standard route, and if you don't have experience with rotten class 4, you should drop to the standard route. It's a classic case of "I wonder why there's not a route here" being answered with "oh, that's a lot more difficult than expected".
From Gerry Roach's book: "this route is so rotten that it is relegated to this author's nightmares."

[ccerling]

Does anyone have any experience with hiking all three starting from the TH at the end of the 4WD road near Clohesy Lake? So essentially, you’d summit Missouri first (i assume) then go on to Belford and Oxford (i think in that order)?

I did this a few years ago. We parked at the Missouri Gulch trailhead and started our day with the road miles up to Clohesy Lake. You'll likely have to get your feet wet going across Clear Creek if you take this route.
https://www.strava.com/activities/4178330242