West Ridge Rising ... and Falling

Another Beautiful day in the high country, another amazing hike with friends, and another realization that I am not is as good of shape as I thought.

The office I work in has some amazing people in it and quite the hiking community. After a few years of not bagging any new 14ers, I needed to get on the horn, get myself into shape, and go on a hike with some coworkers. After a couple repeat 14ers and a 13er I thought I was ready. Tabeguache West Ridge was my idea. I had done Shavano before and wanted to get Tab without having to do Shavano again. A bit of research on 14ers told me that its west ridge was very doable. A couple of water cooler conversations later and I had two coworkers to go with me.

We decided to drive up the night before and car camp. Got to the trailhead around 7 PM and quickly got situated. Was greeted to a beautiful view of valley. Decided to call it a night around 8:30 and went to bed. Was a clear night and the stars were amazing. Saw some shooting stars in the August night and fell asleep pretty quick which is rare for me before a hike.

A note on the road: The road report on 14ers.com is very accurate. This is a level 3 road. I put my car into 4 low, probably didn't need to but it has some rough spots. Taking it slow and finding the right lines was able to avoid scraping on my Jeep Cherokee Trailhawk. One friend made it easy in a 4Runner, another made it in an older Acura MDX. He was struggling though.

Start of the Hike

We decided to get going at about 5:45 in the morning and started heading up the trail. The first mile or so is a great warmup. Following the better-than-expected trail, you gain close to 800' in about a mile and finally make it into the valley.

We got up into the basin right around sunrise at 6:20 am and had our first views of this amazing valley and the sun rising behind us.

Continuing onwards myself and the group were in high spirits. There were a few trails to choose from but we decided to follow the cairns and stuck closer to moraine on the East side of the valley than to follow the other trail into the willows. This easy terrain continues for a while and the entire time the group was laughing and joking as we steadily gained elevation. Nearing the end of the valley we got a glimpse of what lied ahead of us.

It was at this point of enjoying the hike that one coworker went "I'm so happy to be here, thanks for bringing me". She would soon retract that statement. Gaining the ridge was not too bad, the stretch of 200' of steep gravel was a slog but going up it was not bad. How I would hate that stretch coming down. But, we were on the way up and we were making good time so we soon forgot about that and enjoyed our first views out of the valley.

Getting to the Saddle at 7:45 am we were gifted by having a nice and shaded route. This continued till just before reaching the top of 13,936. This stretch though, started to sap the group moral a bit. It's a long steady gain from 12,600' and we all got a tad quiet as we made our ascent. The packed talus is pretty solid footing the entire way but it's a ways. Again, thank goodness we had the shade!

Just below the top of this "bump" we could finally see what we had left, and I was getting excited. Most of the vertical was done for the day, just some shallow class two ridges to go.

After a little refueling the group started to make our way across the ridge. Following the ridge, a nice trail had been worked into it and the footing was great. 150' down and about 300' up to go. Basking in the glory of sunshine, "Another Day in Paradise" by Quinn XCII playing in my head, we were high on life.

Just before the summit there is a stretch where one should leave ridge proper and skirt to the south to gain the final pitch to the summit. On top we saw mostly people taking the same route as us, guess we summited before the people heading over Shavano made it over. Summited at 9:40 AM. Finally got another one.

Enjoyed talking with everyone and taking pictures. Ate some more and life was good. Taking about 20 minutes on top to bask in the glory, we finally turned around and started to head down. Everyone in the group was feeling alright on the ridge walk back to point 13,936. Changing perspective showed us some routes around the high point that we could avoid that we had not seen going up. But eventually we had made it to the end of the high ridge and needed to start the main descent down to the saddle.

This bit is where I really learned I am not in the best shape ... Yet. Legs started to get tired, hips started to flare with the steepness, and the rock I though was great coming up was now threatening to twist ankles while coming down. There are a few scattered paths that we could now see as we headed down and leading the way, I tried to take the best ones. About halfway down there is a stretch of steep gravel and loose talus and thinking I stepped on a solid piece of talus, it slipped out from under me. Nothing to crazy, fell on the left hip and scraped up the hand. Not too pleased with myself I just continued. The descent felt like an eternity but finally made it to the saddle and took in the last views of the surrounding valleys.

Oh that 200' just below the saddle. Loose and steep, and getting sore, we just gravel surfed down it, hating every second of it. Gravel kept getting in the shoes and toe blisters that had been forming for a bit really started to scream. Finally, when the ground evened out, and there was dirt underfoot, I could take a second and relax again.

Coming back down the valley in light, we could see the many paths ahead of us and opted this time for the more grassy/willowy path for softer footing.

Finally getting to the end of the valley we made the final 800' descent to the road. Taking in the Aspen grove that I didn't really notice in the early morning.

Done and very dusty, we finished.

This trail is very nice for a Non-Standard Route. This site says its 8 Miles and 4000' of up and down, but my Gaia tracker says it was 7.3 miles and 3500 up and down. It doesn't matter, it felt like more than that.

I think in total this trail had 9 people on it through the day. Cell coverage was poor with Verizon until we were on top of 13,936.

Thanks for reading up till this point!

-Schwapps