| Peak(s): |
North Eolus - 14,042 feet Mt. Eolus - 14,087 feet Sunlight Peak - 14,061 feet |
| Date Posted: | 08/09/2014 |
| Date Climbed: | 07/27/2014 |
| Author: | saxlover |
| Additional Members: | glodder, SenadR, wildlobo71, Shawnee Bob, Michael J, Oso Blanco, zdero1, saxlover, Cookiehiker, zsmith, Lady McClimbsalot, goingup, High_On_Thin_Air |
| Dancing on the Ceiling |
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Chuck Erle (He runs the hood of Highlands Ranch with me). Told me about this trip a few weeks prior. He told me about many trips in the past and none of them worked with my silly schedule. The stars aligned and I was able join this trip. This was a large group takeover of the basin. Nearly 20 people in the group. Todd, Steve, Mike W, Nathan, Matt, Bob, Zach, Senad, Maggie, Mike Z, Chuck, Noel, Jenny, Bill, Danielle, Reece, AJ, and myself. I drove down after a half day work on a Friday. Arriving in Durango around 5pm. The plan was to meet up at Carver's for dinner. At dinner I met a good portion of the group. Great evening with fellow 14er folks excited for the weekend ahead. Some drinks were had. When I first met Senad, I thought I was drunk because I couldn't understand a damn thing he was saying. Then I wondered if he was drunk. The ambient noise of the back patio and his Bosnian accent threw me off. If only I knew a second language, I'm certain people would be lost when I spoke, as many are when I speak English. Saturday morning we all meet at the train station for the ride in. My ticket was on a different car. About 20 minutes into the ride (after they checked everyone's ticket) I left my assigned seat and joined the group on a nice open air car. Spent more time meeting and getting to know peeps. Some beers were had on the train (heaven forbid). The train dropped us off and we gathered our packs off the train. Lots of hikers getting off and on. We gathered our things spent a few minutes getting ready and we on our way by 11:40am. I hadn't backpacked in for a hike for a couple years and was anxious on how I would do with a heavy pack on board. Beautiful hike in. Pain in the ass on several occasions. I hate backpacking in, and I dislike hiking below treeline. I slugged up the trail, after two hours I took a nice 15 minute break. I was hoping to make it to "first view" (on Gerry Raoch's Chicago Basin DVD) in 2 hours. That didn't happen so I cried next to a tree for a few minutes. Pretty soon Kay, Zach, Nathan, and Danielle showed up. After the break they we continued up the trail and our 'scouts' worked on securing a mini city camp site. Senad, Chuck, Noel, Maggie, and Mike Z were ahead of us busting ass to scope out viable spots. They scored gold and we secured a SWA WEET spot high up in the basin close to water. It had great views, lacked the stainless steel appliances that we asked for, but hey, beggars cant be choosers. We all set up shop and again enjoyed camaraderie of fellow 14er crazies. Sunday: I wanted to get and early start to give myself a chance to get all four peaks in one day IF the weather held out. The backpack in, beat my ass down, and I knew I would need an early start to even have a chance. My plan was to do the Eolus pair and re-evaluate once I got back down to twin lakes and decide if the other two were possible. Most of the group was there to do Eolus first as well. I was on the trail at 3:30am. I put my head down and zoned out for awhile putting one foot ahead of the next moving up the mountain. It was nearly a new moon, so it was nice and dark. I did enjoying looking behind me and seeing a string a lights below me. Nice feeling to know there were a bunch of people I knew behind me. I made it up to twin lakes not knowing it was twin lakes. It was dark out, I saw a small pond on my right but didn't think it was twin lakes. It looked too small in the dark. I didn't see the fork for the sunlight/windom trail so I continued on the trail that I thought went straight and headed up unknowling toward Eolus. I kept hiking up. Soon the sun started to give some light to the area. I got higher up and saw the ramp and thought, oh, I passed twin lakes quite a while ago. I followed the trail and was at the catwalk at sunrise, 6:11am. My iPhone was dead, but my camera was on. I took a picture of a glorious sunrise and it promptly died. The picture didn't save on the camera. As I began the catwalk, I saw a bunch of my camp partners below me on the trail. I crossed the catwalk, it was pretty straight forward except for one spot roughly in the middle. There is a small upclimb section that I almost decided to avoid. I ended up climbing up it and the rest of the catwalk was easy. On the way back I opted to skirt this by downclimbing around the section. Once across the catwalk I followed a trail that took a very small dip in elevation about a third of the way into the face. From there I started to work my way of the ledges. It's a little bit of a maze, if youre making a harder move than necessary, look around, there is likely something easier. I made my way up, near the top I ended up gong to far right and on the ridge closest to the catwalk. I was stuck considering a silly upclimb with exposure. I re-eval'd my route, backtracked a little and then made my walk back the the middle of the face. I saw a much easier route that came up just left of the summit. I was on the summit at 7am. Just a few minutes later Reece and AJ made it to the summit. I recognized them from the train. They ended up camping in a different spot than us but were in our group on the train. I asked them if they could take and share my summit pic since my camera was a no go. Reece and AJ grew up in Colorado Springs, as I did. After pictures I learned that they were hoping for all four summits as well. We joined forces and downclimbed Eolus together and in hopes of getting 4 for the day. Three Springs boys off to the races. We were on N. Eolus at about 7:40am. Easy scramble up from the catwalk. We were there for about 5 minutes and then headed down. Made it to twin lakes around 8:40am, filtered water and rested for a few minutes. We gathered the minds together and decided to give sunlight a shot and then maybe Windom. The uphill after twin lakes was exciting after the downhill from N. Eolus. My body was mad. Slow and steady. We left twin lake at 9am and at 10am we were halfway up that god forsaken gully in between Sunlight and Sunlight Spire. This gully, I shake my fist at you. Loose dirt, loose rock, steep, and no beer vendors. We passed a group of amateurs near the top of the gully. The route from the saddle to the summit took a little work. We looked around a few times to find the route and eventually found. Weather was building. Clouds were form above us, and there looked to be a big cell developing on the other side of the Eolus group. We were on a mission to get moving and get down. A couple upclimbs, and a window and we were looking at the summit block. Reece was pumped and went up first, he got on the block no problem. I took some pics of him and he was down. Now my turn, I had always reserved myself to climbing the block and standing on it. My legs were wore down from the backpack and the damn sunlight gully. As I went for the final move my legs were shaking and I decided to reach on top. Hug the crap out of the rock. Reece smiled and took and picture for me. I looked down at the leap of faith and couldn't get my brain and legs to agree so I slowly worked my way down. AJ arrived and dominated the block no problem as well. We summited at 10:40 and were off by 10:50. The way down took just as long (maybe longer) I hate that gully. We were still considering Windom on the way down. The weather seemed to be developing even more. The gully sucked. We decided to head back to camp instead of chancing being at 14k when the storm decided to open up. It started to rain when we hit twin lakes. I was sure it was going to rain the rest of the day. It rained for a few minutes and remained cloudy. As we approached treeline, the sk y was rumbling. Thunder was echoing nicely in the valley. We may have had time to do Windom, but I'm sure if we decided to go that way the weather would have decided to meaner. Made it back to camp, and it rained off and on the rest of the night til 3:30am. I couldn't sleep well. We had to dig a tiny trench to relieve a puddle of water under our tents. I was hoping to get Windom on Monday. I started up the trail and within 30 minutes I knew my legs were absolutely done with the uphill. The backpack in and the 3 peaks the day before were all I could handle. I turned around and headed to camp. My train ride was reserved for the 3:30 back to Durango. I decided to pack up and make the 11:15 train to Silverton and see if I could make the bus back to Durango. This would end up saving me about 3 hours, as I planned to drive back to Denver for work on Tuesday. At the train stop I met Steve and Jorge. Spent time on the train and lunch with them in Silverton. When I arrived in Silverton, I immediately got my pack and walked to the bus. The bus was completely booked. I went and had lunch with Jorge and Steve at the Alavanche. After lunch I went back to the same bus. As I was walking up he was selling three seats on the bus back to Durango. Slightly upset, I asked him what happened. He said some people cancelled and that he was able to sell the seats. I asked for any other seats he said he was full. The next bus arrived I asked if he had any seats and he said he was full also. They explained that it was peak season for them and that most of the buses are booked full. I wasn't going to let this get me down. I decided to hoof it with my full pack on my back to the Montayna rum distillery in Silverton and make best use of my time before my train. As I am heading up there a conductor asked me if I was coming or going. I said that I wanted to get to Durango ASAP and that the buses were full. He asked if I wanted to get on this train (which was leaving in 4 minutes). It would get me in 45 minutes sooner than my assigned train. I said yes please. He said run to that guy by the engine, give him your pack and hop on. I ran my weary legs down the train, gave them pack and hopped on. I loved this trip. Meet some great people. I had not done a new 14er in 8 years. I'm more off an introvert and prefer hiking alone. I have learned that on backpacking trips I need others around. So grateful I was able to make this trip. Thank you Chuck and Noel for keeping in the loop for this one! Reece and AJ, so happy to have met both of you. Let's plan to more hikes soon. Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow): 
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