| Peak: | Mt. Harvard |
| Route: | Harvard and Columbia Traverse |
| Range: | Sawatch |
| Posted By: | salmanalsaif |
| Date of Info: | 10/18/2020 |
| Date Posted: | 10/18/2020 |
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Winds mostly above treeline and stronger near the summits. Had a few gusts that shoved me aside, but overall not a big problem as it was relatively warm (worse parts are in the shade). Up to Harvard and coming down from Columbia the trail is dry. However the traverse is mixed. I brought spikes but didn't use them because the snowy parts mostly felt like you just punch through them, no sure if spikes can help there. I tried to avoid the snow as much as possible, and it mostly worked. At the beginning of the traverse, I just skipped the first snow and went straight down. Next section after that was short so just walked it (one of the few where spikes can help). The next major snowy area, near the rabbit (~1 mile from Columbia), I totally screwed that up. In trying to avoid the snow ended up in extremely dangerous/unstable terrain, and still had to traverse a few snow fields. Near the Columbia summit, that snow field wasn't an issue. Avoided it as much as possible until the end, then I traversed about 30 ft on all fours. Basically, it's still very doable, just exercise good judgment. My errors ended up making it a 17 mile, 12 hr trek (and lots of scrambling, which I'm ok with). |
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