Departure - 8/10/22

Prior to this trip, I sat at 55/58 of Colorado's Fourteeners completed in just under 2 years. My only 3 remaining were Pyramid, Maroon Peak, and North Maroon Peak. Conveniently, I had two days of parking reservations for this August!

My trip to Aspen began when I met up with my climbing partners in Golden, CO. I was accompanied by George and Will, two friends and classmates of mine from Colorado School of Mines who also happen to be just as stoked on the outdoors as me. We have shared many adventures together and were excited for another epic trip. Will had literally just returned from a 4 day backpacking trip in the Sangres, George had returned a day ago from summiting 7 fourteeners in the San Juans, and I had just completed The Colorado Trail 1.5 weeks ago. We were feeling very ready to tackle these arduous mountains to say the least. Within 20 minutes of Will returning from his backpacking trip, we were off to Aspen with the Bells & Pyramid on our mind! Props to him on the quick turnaround.

Due to our late departure, we arrived in Aspen and set up camp around 10:30 PM. Our goal for the next day was Pyramid Peak. The weather was predicting early afternoon storms as per usual, so we opted to aim to start hiking by 5:30 AM. Admittedly we didn't feel like hiking in the dark.

Pyramid Peak - 8/11/22

Pyramid Summit - 3 hr 45 m

And we're off! It was surreal to finally be attempting these peaks, it felt like it wasn't too long ago that I had made my parking reservations back on April 25th.

As we turned off of the crater lake trail and began our ascent, we were gifted with a beautiful sunrise and alpenglow on the Maroon Bells. This section of gain before the amphitheater was no joke, we all felt a bit sore on the way up as it was pretty steep and our bodies had been through a lot in the past few weeks.

The amphitheater was beautiful and the name is quite accurate, any loud noise would echo like crazy. There wasn't much of a defined trail until we reached the green grassy slope. Throughout the amphitheater you had to be careful due to the constant talus hopping and loose rock. We mostly tried to take the path of least resistance to the green grassy slope.

The green grassy slope wasn't as bad as expected, but still required caution. There were several faint trails leading up the ascent that were easy to follow. The dirt seemed to be moist from overnight which seemed to help with traction on the steeper parts. It was here when we started to see mountain goats above us and were cautious as to not hike below them. They were very curious but also friendly. We met an Aspen mountain guide while ascending that gave us a pro tip:

If you ever need to lure a mountain goat anywhere, just pee where you want them to go and they will rush to it. They love licking human pee. Just make sure you pee on a rock as opposed to dirt/grass so that they don't destroy/dig the dirt/grass.

We used this trick quite a bit throughout the day when mountain goats were above us while we were climbing in dangerous spots or were getting too close.

We eventually gained the ridge and were excited to start the fun scrambling part!

The catwalk section was quite fun and nothing to worry about if you don't mind a little exposure. I didn't feel the need to hug the wall when walking across but it would help if you feel bothered by the drop. The "leap of faith" was not a big deal whatsoever and I feel like most people could just step across it if they didn't want to jump. Take this with a grain of salt though-- I am 6'5" with long legs.

The greenish rock and remaining terrain were a lot of fun, but route-finding is important here. The difficulty is a constant class 3/4, but can become a lot more dangerous if you don't stick to the route. We made it up the greenish rock just fine, but as we got closer to the top we found ourselves way too far climbers left of the standard route. Too far climbers left resulted in very loose rock on class 4 ledges that had potential for some class 5 moves depending on your line. All of these ledges required top-outs on loose scree that never truly felt stable. This section was pretty stressful due to the loose rock and dirt on no-fall terrain, however we felt confident in our climbing ability so we continued upwards instead of backtracking. We eventually reached the final summit push and the difficulty eased a lot.

We took some summit pictures, but opted to descend after a short break due to some darker clouds forming. The views of the Bells from here were incredible. Summit #56 woohoo!! The summit took us about 3 hours and 45 minutes.

After peeing on some summit rocks to distract the goats, we began our descent. We were easily able to follow pink tape and cairns down the ridge which kept us on the standard route. If you perfectly keep to the standard route, I felt that the difficulty is hard class 3/easy class 4. I think the issue with this mountain is that it can be hard to stick to the standard route and you can easily get into more difficult terrain. Oh, and the rock is loose everywhere :)

As we climbed down we lucked out with the weather and were rewarded with stunning views and beautiful skies.

Once we reached the saddle, we took a very long break. We didn't have any plans for the rest of the day and the weather was amazing, so we hung out for a while and appreciated the views and the stellar day thus far. During our break, we had at most 7 curious mountain goats surrounding us. It was very interesting to watch them interact with each other while also swiftly climbing up and down the nearby ledges. Several got very close to us as we were sitting. We probably stayed at that saddle over an hour.

We eventually worked our way back down to the trailhead. The Bells taunted us the whole descent with their dominating prominence. We were ecstatic to climb them tomorrow.

After reaching the car, we managed to get a first-come first-serve camping spot along maroon creek road. We set up camp and then headed to Aspen for the afternoon. Prior to today, I was continuously back and forth on whether I wanted to attempt the Bells Traverse. On one hand, I felt like I was totally skilled and experienced enough to handle the climbing and exposure. I had been thoroughly researching the route via videos and trip reports throughout the months leading up to July. On the other hand, I had somewhat of a mental blockade due to the fear of something going seriously wrong. This was due to five main reasons:

• I attempted to do the Crestone Traverse with a group back on 9/12/21. We were required to stop doing the traverse due to an ongoing SAR mission to recover a dead body from nearby the crux headwall. I presume they didn't want to risk rockfall from the traverse on the recovery mission. We ended up climbing the standard route of both peaks separately that day and watched the entire recovery mission during the process. We witnessed the entire recovery and were left with very sobering thoughts of how dangerous these mountains can be. News link: https://snowbrains.com/climber-killed-traverse-2-colorado-14ers/
• I had a scary experience descending a snow-filled c2 couloir back in June 2022 with my brothers where I felt that there could've been dangerous consequences
• While on the Colorado Trail in late July 2022, I took a "rest day" to meet up with some friends and climb the Wetterhorn --> Matterhorn Traverse for my 21st birthday celebration. While on this traverse I felt super uncomfortable at times due to the EXTREME loose rock on the traverse. I was nervous that the Bells might be as loose as that traverse was which would result in a miserable experience (Spoiler: The Bells were not even close to as dangerously loose as the Wetterhorn -> Matterhorn Traverse)
• While on the Colorado Trail in late July 2022 I witnessed a ton of helicopters searching for a missing hiker/climber nearby the Arrow/Vestal peaks. I later ran into his parents and best friend in Silverton. This was the first time I had witnessed first-hand the real-world consequences of a death in the mountains. It made the danger of these peaks all-the-more serious when I interacted with people who were deeply affected by this tragic event. He has still not been found: https://www.durangoherald.com/articles/search-and-rescue-mission-for-missing-utah-man-suspended/
• My mom has mutual friends with Dave Cook, a climber that went missing near the Maroon Bells in 2016 who's body has still not been found. She knew I wanted to climb all the 14ers, but always mentioned being nervous about me attempting the Bells due to what happened to Dave Cook. News link: https://snowbrains.com/deadly-bells-colorado-sar-performs-final-search-14000-peaks-missing-climber-dave-cook/

After the completion of Pyramid Peak, the group agreed that we all felt comfortable with attempting the traverse. The climbing sections on Pyramid went smoothly for us and spirits were high throughout the day. I mentally felt confident and comfortable to attempt the traverse, and that's what was the biggest factor for me. If none of us felt mentally comfortable, the plan was to skip the traverse and finish one of the peaks at a later time. We spent the afternoon getting some supplies and goodies for the next day and a potential 58/58 celebration. We then returned to camp, made dinner, and were fast asleep before the sun went down.

Maroon Bells Traverse - 8/12/22

South Maroon Summit - 4 hr 30 m

South Maroon Scrambling/Ridgeline Section - 1 hr 15 m

Traverse to North Maroon - 1 hr 30 m

Our 3 AM alarm clock quickly shook us all awake, ahh, it felt fitting to be starting in the dark for my last 14er as I had done on so many peaks prior. Great weather was predicted in the forecasts but we still wanted to get a very early start just to be safe. The stoke was very high to start off the day as we jammed to some Vulfpeck as we made our way to the trailhead. We were off hiking by 3:45 AM. The moon was very bright and provided a beautiful view of the Bells which only further increased our excitement.

We eventually reached the turnoff for Maroon Peak and began the anxiously awaited "2800 feet of suck". Leading up to this point, I was somewhat doubtful that this portion of that hike was as bad as people made it out to be. I thought to myself before beginning, "I've done 56 other 14ers, I'm sure I've experienced something somewhat similar to this before". I was wrong. The 2800' of suck lived up to the hype, and was definitely the steepest portion of any non-scrambling 14er trail I had been on. Regardless, we were feeling amazing (a lot better than the start of the Pyramid day) and cruised quite quickly up the suck.

A spectacular sunrise along the 2800' of suck definitely helped us keep a positive mindset.

As we reached the ridgeline, we were excited to be done with the suck as we knew we had a lot of fun scrambling ahead of us. We also knew that the terrain became a lot more dangerous from here on out, so we began to focus.

At the beginning of the scrambling section, we met another friendly group who had one member who had already hiked Maroon Peak. It was nice knowing that there was someone who had done the route before incase we got lost, but ultimately our group was able to follow the route with ease.

We opted for the 2nd gully, as we heard the rock was more stable there. We did not climb in the direct middle of the gully as it mostly consisted of very loose dirt and scree. We began ascending the gully by climbing to the right on mostly solid rock, then traversed over left when we thought we had came across the catwalk that leads to the robot rock formation. On this lower catwalk, there were cairns. However, the supposed catwalk seemed to lead to unfamiliar terrain with no robot rock formation, so we concluded that the true catwalk had to be higher up the gully. Instead of continuing up the gully, we decided to climb a cool looking class 4/easy 5 line up maybe 20 feet. This climb was extremely fun and we concluded that it was the most fun scrambling of the trip so far. It was a great warm-up for the traverse and an awesome confidence-tester on our climbing ability. The rock was very solid up the line however there was loose scree at the top out but it was easy to avoid. This climb can be seen from several angles above. Once we reached the top of the climb, we were happy to find out that we were right on the ledge that leads to the robot rock formation. This detour worked out perfectly and we were able to avoid more loose gully climbing! Highly recommend if comfortable with more difficult climbing and can find the first ledge we got to.

I didn't take many pictures on the rest of the route to the summit, but it went smoothly. The next large gully was a bit of a sufferfest due to what felt like every rock being loose. It wasn't very steep, so we never felt in danger, just tedious. The final section of climbing the pre-summit ledges required us to backtrack a tiny bit. We initially tried to just go very diagonal/take the straightest directional path to the summit, but we were met with steep, technical, and loose terrain that we opted not to climb. After getting past the ledges and gaining the ridge, we made the summit of my 57th fourteener! The summit took us about 4 hours and 30 minutes. The ridge to the summit (scrambling/route-finding section) after the 2800' of suck took us about 1 hour and 15 minutes.

We took a quick break to eat some food and rehydrate on the summit but chose to start the traverse quickly. While on the summit of South Maroon, I turned on my cell service for a moment. I saw a text from my little brother that asked if we were doing the "hard traverse" and mentioned that my family had watched a couple YouTube videos and were stressed out. I told him that was the plan and that we'd be safe, but didn't let him know we were about to begin as I didn't want my family on-edge for the next two-ish hours. I was feeling great all morning, but this made me feel a little nervous. While on the summit, we met a solo hiker named Mat who asked if he could do the traverse with us. Mat works for Colorado Fourteeners Initiative and is a super nice guy who was a blast to have join us. After our short break, we began descending down to the Bell Chord Couloir saddle. We descended farther hikers right as we felt we were avoiding a lot of really steep downclimbs. We were able to keep the difficulty at class 3 for most of the downclimb and avoid any highly exposed areas by sticking a bit further climbers right of the ridgeline. Shortly after greeting the friendly mountain goats pictured above, we ended up descending a somewhat-sketchy class 4 downclimb right before the saddle. This can be seen in the top right picture. I've heard from others that you can avoid this by sticking further hikers left once you reach the section where we met the goats, but we didn't see anything too promising looking back from the saddle.

Right after crossing over the saddle, the traverse immediately got spicy. We were faced with the first crux of the route, a low class 5 climb as seen in the two pictures above. Everyone felt super great on this climb and we all felt that it wasn't scary at all and was a fun line with great holds everywhere. It felt similar to the difficulty of the line we climbed after the second gully that I mentioned earlier. We continued across easier terrain until the second crux. Everyone was feeling amazing both physically and mentally.

The second crux was the portion of the traverse that scared me the most prior to the climb. While researching, I generally felt very confident about the first and third crux, but the pictures and videos always made the second crux look ridiculous. I knew the difficulty remained at low class 5, but it was so hard to get a sense for the exposure and general feel for the section from photos and videos. As we got closer to the crux, I felt a great sense of relief as it looked way way way easier in real life than I had seen on the internet. Even looking at my picture on the right makes me chuckle at how much scarier it looks.

I feel the need to explain this crux so that it potentially helps out other anxious people in the future. First, you descend the ridge to a saddle that has plenty of space to rest and catch your bearings. I put on climbing shoes here and we took a second to talk through how we wanted to handle this section. From here on out, it is a series of class 3/easy 4 ledges for a large portion of what you see in my picture on the right above this text. It is exposed, so a fall would be fatal, but it is very ledge-y the entire time so it doesn't feel like a ridiculous drop off. At each ledge you can stop and catch your breath before climbing another 5-10 feet. It's not as ridiculously vertical with no breaks as it may look from the saddle to the top-out.

After the class 3/4 ledges, you'll reach one final ledge. Between this ledge is the class 5 climbing that separates you and the top-out. The location of this ledge can be seen directly above the highest group of sun-exposed white rock on my picture of the second crux from afar. You can't tell from the picture, but there is actually plenty of room to stand. We had four people on this ledge at once and plenty of room to move out of the "rock-fall" zone of the climber going up the class 5 portion. The class 5 portion is not that difficult climbing, but is very exposed and a fall would probably be fatal. This was the scariest and most exposed portion of the entire traverse for our group. Mat, who had done the Crestone Traverse recently, mentioned that the class 4 headwall crux on Crestone Needle is significantly more exposed.

The class 5 portion of the 2nd crux features a crack/dihedral system that you pretty much go straight up. I felt that the second half of climbing this line was easier than the first half. The top out wasn't an issue for any of us. You can see the start of the first half of the line in the 3 pictures of me above. I had climbing shoes on for this section, so I felt comfortable on a lot of surfaces, but I think you would have to be a little more careful if doing this part in trail runners.

The picture on the left shows the ledge I mentioned earlier that we were all standing on. George can be seen at the bottom of the class 5 section while my feet/legs can be seen at the top. Hopefully this gives a good gauge for how long you actually have to climb exposed low class 5 for. I must warn though, the picture on the left was taken with 0.5x zoom on my iphone, so it looks a little bit skewed and more rounded than the climb actually is. The picture on the right looking at George ascending is a better image of how the upper half crack/dihedral system actually is. It's steeper/more straight up than how the left picture looks. The right pictures demonstrates this. Ultimately, I felt that this climb was still fun but I felt a lot more on-edge/focused than I did with the 1st and 3rd crux.

After getting all four of us up the 2nd crux, we took a brief moment to admire the view of Capitol and Snowmass from the traverse. I love those mountains.

We didn't have much of a break, as we were met with the third crux directly after finishing the second. We chose the first chimney as it was significantly shorter and significantly less exposed. There is a great platform for standing at the bottom of the first chimney that is great for assessing the line, watching your friends climb, and taking great pictures :)

The third crux went smoothly for our entire group and we felt that it was more fun than it was dangerous. The 5.7 rating is pretty fair for the top-out/upper moves, but it is a quick segment and most of the climbing leading up to the top is easier class 5/hard class 4.

In the pictures above you can see the area below the climb where Mat and I are observing Will.

This whole 3rd crux was awesome! We all loved it.

After the 3rd crux, the summit was very close! This section went by fairly quickly and consisted of mostly class 3 scrambling. We flip-flopped between staying ridge-proper and a little east (right) of the ridge before the final saddle. We concluded that ridge-proper pre-saddle was safer, less loose, and less-exposed. After passing over the last saddle, we stayed to the left of the ridge and climbed some final class 3 towards the summit. My 58th and final 14er was minutes away!!!

We made it!!!!! I am now a Colorado 14er Finisher!!!!! The traverse took us close to 1 hour and 30 minutes.

This calls for a summit celebration with some cupcakes :)

Yeah, they were as good as they looked. Yes, we did bring cupcakes and a full bottle of sparkling grapejuice to the summit. (We felt champagne was too risky with a class 4 downclimb).

Old habits die hard

Thanks to Will & George for being an awesome crew to tackle these mountains with! They were a blast to have along for this adventure and all of our previous ones in the past. We cruised at a relatively quick pace throughout all 3 peaks with good vibes and pure excitement. Our hard work preparing had paid off! With this summit, Will has now finished the Elk Range and is somewhere around 30 fourteeners. Similarly, George has now tackled 43 fourteeners and might potentially finish this Fall. Stoked for them!

After over an hour of hanging out on top celebrating (and calling my parents to let them know I'm okay) we began our descent.

The descent, as others have echoed before, is not to be taken lightly. The initial section is extremely loose and there is some class 3 downclimbing required. The crux of North Maroon, the class 4 chimney, was also pretty sketchy to downclimb. I felt like downclimbing this chimney was one of the sketchiest parts of the day. I also hate downclimbing so take that with a grain of salt.

Once you enter the second gully, there are a few ledges to navigate down that feel like a maze for a while. About halfway down the second gully, the difficulty eases quite a bit and we felt the descent was very straightforward from this point onward. Most of our group had hiking poles which made walking down on the steeper loose dirt a lot easier. The traverse over to the first gully was fairly obvious for us, but could be easy to miss if you are focused on your feet the entire time. Descending everything else was easy for all of us and before we knew it we were back at Maroon Lake. Pyramid dominates your view the entire way down and impressed me every time I looked up.

Back at the trailhead! These peaks amaze me so much every time I look at them. As we reached the lake, we were in awe looking back at the Maroon Bells and acknowledging that we had just climbed and traversed them. Looking at those peaks from the lake, it looks like they would be impossible to climb without a rope, yet here we are admiring that we had just been on top of them!

We ended off our trip by getting some food at the Grateful Deli in Aspen then headed back to Golden!

Closing Remarks

I can confidently say that the Bells Traverse was easily one of my best days ever in the mountains. As a whole, it felt like everything on this trip went perfectly/better than expected and I am so thankful for the experience that we got to share together in the mountains these past few days. As a whole, climbing all of the 14ers has been the biggest accomplishment of my life and I am so thankful for all the awesome memories along the way; some of the best days of my life have been spent on these mountains. These 14ers were such an amazing and iconic group to conclude on and I couldn't have asked for a better way/day/group to finish off the list!

Climb Dates

mm/dd/yy

2020:

7 summits!

1 - Mt. Bierstadt - 8/31/20

2 - Quandary Peak - 9/29/20

3 - Longs Peak - 10/3/20

4 - Pikes Peak - 11/3/20

5 - Mt. Massive - 11/7/20

6 - Mt. Yale - 11/22/20

7 - Mt. Elbert - 12/5/20

2021:

44 summits!

8 - Mt. Belford - 1/17/21

9 - Mt. Oxford - 1/17/21

10 - Mt. Sherman - 5/6/21

11 - Mt. Princeton - 5/21/21

12 - Torreys Peak - 5/29/21

13 - Grays Peak - 5/29/21

14 - Huron Peak - 6/6/21

15 - Mt. Shavano - 6/11/21

16 - Tabeguache Peak - 6/11/21

17 - Mt. Evans - 6/17/21

18 - Mt. Antero - 7/13/21

19 - Little Bear Peak - 7/17/21

20 - Blanca Peak - 7/17/21

21 - Castle Peak - 7/19/21

22 - Conundrum Peak - 7/19/21

23 - Challenger Point - 7/26/21

24 - Kit Carson Peak - 7/26/21

25 - Mt. Bross - 7/28/21

26 - Mt. Lincoln - 7/28/21

27 - Mt. Cameron - 7/28/21

28 - Mt. Democrat - 7/28/21

29 - Mt. Harvard - 7/30/21

30 - Mt. Columbia - 7/30/21

31 - San Luis Peak - 8/4/21

32 - Mt. Lindsey - 8/5/21

33 - Humboldt Peak - 8/6/21

34 - Mt. Sneffles - 8/13/21

35 - Windom Peak - 8/15/21

36 - Sunlight Peak - 8/15/21

37 - Mt. Eolus - 8/15/21

38 - North Eolus - 8/15/21

39 - Handies Peak - 8/16/21

40 - Sunshine Peak - 8/17/21

41 - Redcloud Peak - 8/17/21

42 - Uncompahgre Peak - 8/17/21

43 - Wetterhorn Peak - 8/18/21

44 - Capitol Peak - 8/28/21

45 - El Diente Peak - 9/4/21

46 - Mt. Wilson - 9/4/21

47 - Wilson Peak - 9/4/21

48 - Crestone Peak - 9/12/21

49 - Crestone Needle - 9/12/21

50 - La Plata Peak - 9/25/21

51 - Missouri Mountain - 10/31/21

2022:

7 summits!

52 - Culebra Peak - 1/16/22

53 - Ellingwood Point - 6/5/22

54 - Mt. of the Holy Cross - 6/22/22

55 - Snowmass Mountain - 6/26/22

Colorado Trail, July 1st -> July 29th

56 - Pyramid Peak - 8/11/22

57 - Maroon Peak - 8/12/22

58 - North Maroon Peak - 8/12/22

Just under 2 years :)

This has been over 5000 words and over 100 pictures, so I thank any of you that took the time to read all of this! This is also my first trip report ever, so let me know if there is anything I can do to improve/fix it. If anyone has any questions about the route, I'd love to share so feel free to comment or message me on instagram: jeffhodges11

Happy trails everyone :)