"Kitty Kat Carson"

Route: Columbia and Obstruction from the East
Posted On: 6/24/2024, By: andy_schlichting
Info: (See my report from Columbia Point for photos) Here's my report from this weekend that included Obstruction Peak, Kitty Kat Carson, Columbia Point, Humboldt, Crestone Peak, and Northeast Crestone... Packed in Friday evening to South Colony Lakes and ran into a big thunderstorm about half way up the trail. I parked 0.8 miles below the 4WD trailhead in a Subaru Crosstrek--not sure if it's just me, but this road seems worse than in years past. It was an absolute adventure just to get there. A big wind and rainstorm hit about 7:30 pm and lasted for about three hours. I suspect this was the precursor for yesterday's mosquito infestation... Saturday morning hiked up Obstruction Peak, KKC, and Columbia Point. Summer conditions all the way. Sticking to ridge-direct after reading the Humboldt saddle works really well. You can keep it at class 2 this way, albeit with some exposure. Nothing to report on Obstruction--that's a really easy class 1 peak after that ridge. The descent to the saddle with KKC is just a choss pile, but mostly stable rock. Ascending KKC was fun. The rock was still wet from Friday's rain and that made it a bit more challenging when we chose to stay in the middle of the gully and climb the class 3 rock band. Descending, we stuck more to the ridge (skier's left) and nothing exceeded class 2 over there--it's just steep. Once we made it back to the Humboldt saddle, we decided to head up there (that's a new 14er for my sister, who was my partner for the weekend). Nothing to report here except there are SO many marmots up there. I don't think I've seen more marmots anywhere else in this state. I will say I forgot that route finding is a bit challenging about half way up Humboldt. We missed a cairns somewhere and ended up cliff'd out on on the left side of the summit and had to traverse back around to the ridge direct and right side of the summit to find the trail again. When in doubt, go right on Humboldt. Sunday we headed up Crestone Peak. Ice axe and crampons are a MUST on Broken Hand Pass. Very helpful for the ascent in the pre-dawn hours, but absolutely needed for the afternoon descent. We watched two climbers have a difficult adventure heading down behind us on the soft snow with just microspikes and an axe. Right now, there's a fun, sporty/mixed move to get off the snow and onto the rock feature on the pass. It's easier than it looks--just stem the rock and the snow. On the Cottonwood side, it's summer conditions, but crampons and an axe are really helpful on Crestone Peak. Lots of snow in the gully still and it's a lot of effort to avoid it. I added Northeast Crestone to this and that was super fun, but a bit sketchy. There's some snow in the north couloir down to the saddle that I planned to use my crampons and axe for, but needed to downclimb a bit of class 3/4 to get to the snow and decided to just downclimb the rest and stay off the snow. There are some low class 5 moves going down/back up this couloir if you stick to rock. Northeast Crestone itself was mostly class 3/4 with maybe a couple class 5 moves that I was able to avoid on the descent, but it can be very exposed. This completed my Crestones massif summits :) I cannot understate how bad the mosquitos got on Sunday. They were mostly fine on Friday and Saturday and it's like all the rain from Friday breeded a million mosquitos by Sunday. I grew up in Minnesota where we joke that the state bird is the mosquito and I have honestly never in my life been attacked like I was on the Sunday--continuously from Cottonwood Lake, to the top of Broken Hand Pass, and all the way down back to the car. TL;DR--bring crampons and an ice axe for Broken Hand Pass and Crestone Peak, and do not forget bug spray. 

Route: Columbia and Obstruction from the East
Posted On: 9/1/2021, By: supranihilest
Info: From "Obstruction Peak" the best, easiest route is sticking close to climber's right side of the concavity that makes up "Kitty Kat"'s east face. The rock is solid and the scrambling up "Kitty Kat" is the best on the route. 

Route: Columbia and Obstruction from the East
Posted On: 6/25/2021, By: mtnkub
Info: Summer conditions. One small snowfield on the cairned way around Obstruction point will probably be gone soon and can be safely skirted below. 

Route: Columbia and Obstruction from the East
Posted On: 7/24/2020, By: JasonKline
Info: Summer conditions. The winds were brutal. 

Route: East ridge
Posted On: 10/1/2016, By: Rockhopper2
Info: Dry on that day...