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Peak(s)  Maroon Peak  -  14,163 feet
Date Posted  08/31/2012
Modified  09/03/2012
Date Climbed   08/18/2012
Author  RiceSnob
 Maroon Anniversary   
Five years ago, we got married and visited the Bells for the first time. I fell in love with the view like many others, it's a magical place so this year my husband ask me what would I like for our Anniversary. I simply replied I want to summit Maroon Peak, we knew this peak isn't walk in the park - it requires a lot of times research and preparation so we did the best of what we have. ( Darn...Bill Middlebrook thanks for the route and many others put up the TR & You Tube). So for our training we hiked Castle & Conundrum the day before. We spend the night at the overnight parking and slept in our jeep.

We are slow hikers so we start at 5:00 a.m., there few others party already heading out before us. The slog up the East slope was tough, but the view from the ridge was awesome.
Image
Chimney Entrance
After the chimney and white rock band, we climbed what I thought was the second (recommended) gulley, but turned out to be the first. It was steep but not so bad. We then followed cairns across ledges to enter and climb the wide gulley (not as steep).
Image
Approaching Entrance to Wide Gulley
I starting feeling awful at this point, but the thought of re-climbing that East slope - and a prayer with my wife - made me continue.

After crossing more cairned ledges, we found ourselves in the area shown in route photo #26. We turned right here and followed faint trail segments up to the ridge and then the summit. How cool, celebrating our anniversary on a great 14er!
Image
Summit Shot
Thanks so much to Mark!! (his group reached summit just after us) - he helped us with route on descent, I was wiped out and nowhere near 100%.

Hopefully Helpful Notes
1. Studying the route description and taking elevation notes for major features helped with routefinding.
2. Maroon Lake and West Maroon Creek Trails are easy to follow by headlamp.
3. Water is available for filtering near the right turn off of West Maroon Creek Trail (just before starting up the East slope.)
4. The trail up East slope crosses shallow rocky gully as seen in route photo #5, don't miss the crossover like we did.



Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):
1 2 3 4


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