Huron Peak (and a couple 13ers) From

Apostle Basin

This route is a great alternate way to climb Huron Peak if you love scrambling. I had done Lulu Gulch for my first Huron ascent and wanted something different this time around. From reading Colorado Fourteeners by Gerry Roach I had learned about combining unranked 13472 B (now Lidar ranked) with the Southwest Slopes route for Huron. It looked liked 13472 would be an easy out and back from the Huron saddle. Upon further research I then decided to add an additional 13er (13517 A) which is south of 13472 to make it a more traditional loop and a nice big day.

Day of Climb: September 30th, 2023

Peaks: Huron Peak, 13472 B and 13517 A

Trailhead: S. Winfield/Lake Ann

Mileage and Elevation Gain: Approximately 10 miles and 4,350 feet of gain

I left Fort Collins early that Saturday morning arriving in Winfield just after 6. My partner was already there and waiting for me at the lower 2WD trailhead. Caleb jumped in my truck and we drove up the rougher than expected 4WD road to the Lake Ann Trailhead. High clearance was definitely nice to have here as I didn't see any other vehicles up there that weren't trucks or Jeeps. I had walked this road once before back in 2019 after doing the Lulu route and don't remember it being this bad.

We got ready quickly and were hiking up the Apostle Basin/Lake Ann trail by 7 which began right behind the trailhead kiosk. We were starting out on the Southwest Slopes route for Huron and were moving quickly right out of the gate on a well maintained trail. Caleb has done Sherman over 200 times, running it almost daily after work, so I knew it would be tough to keep his pace today.

At the Lake Ann junction we went left towards Apostle Basin. This is where the well maintained trail ended and there were lots of fallen trees to deal with from there to treeline. We would lose the trail on this section repeatedly only to surprisingly find it again and again.

A couple of cairned boulder fields came next while going in and out of trees a few times. We then left the Huron Southwest Slopes route and started angling right towards our first 13er, 13517. After a short bushwhack through a thick willow patch we had the gully in sight that would take us to the ridge for our 13ers.

It was a typical steep, loose gully but pretty straightforward, and it didn't take long to reach the ridge. However, at the ridge, I quickly realized I had made a big mistake and we had ascended the wrong gully. Oops! This was a really dumb error on my part and I wasn't even close. Our planned gully was to the northeast and would've put us on the ridge very close to 13517 with only a short scramble to reach the summit. Instead, we found ourselves near the saddle with North Apostle and now faced a long, complicated ridge scramble to reach the summit.

I couldn't undo the mistake so off we went up the ridge. We had no beta on this bit and hoped it went without too much difficulty, and for the most part it did. With careful route finding we were able to stay close to ridge proper and kept it a class 2+/3 scramble. The one exception though was a short, exposed class 4 downclimb to get through a notch which I butt scooted like a champion.

This ridge seemed to go on and on forever with more than a few false summits and lots of scrambling, but we finally summited 13517 to our relief. My little detour was very costly as far as time, but a big bonus for fun factor!

After a quick lunch we set off from 13517 for 13472. Right off the bat there was a short scramble to get off the summit and then a fin to climb over. We then started descending on the east side of the ridge towards the saddle and were ultimately aiming for some grassy ledges. Thanks to a Mtnman200 report I had some really good beta on these ledges and was excited to tackle them.

From a distance the grass ledge area looked horribly exposed and probably not much fun. As we neared them though they didn't look bad at all and we began to carefully make our way across. It was narrow and very exposed in some spots, but we found the crossing enjoyable and not overly difficult. We exited the ledges at the higher of 2 notches and climbed through. Once on the other side we ascended a challenging rock rib to reach the summit ridge.

Once at the ridge we still had some distance to cover but it was all over easy terrain. We made the summit very quickly for our second peak of the day and the views all around were magnificent! We didn't linger long though as storm clouds were developing all around, and we began our descent to the Huron saddle in earnest. At this point, we still had aspirations to climb Huron and decided to reassess the weather once we reached the saddle where we could bail into the basin if needed.

Thankfully, the descent off 13472 went without any difficulties over easy class 2 terrain. I had had enough scrambling for the day and was happy for this. At the saddle, the surrounding showers seemed to be getting a bit closer but not to threatening, so we decided to go for Huron. This was an easy decision since we didn't relish the idea of a steep scree slope descent back into the basin. Plus, we figured summiting Huron and descending it's standard route would probably be faster and easier anyways.

From the saddle we had about 1000 vertical feet to reach Hurons summit and it would be our longest sustained climb of the day. It was all class 2 terrain with a steady mix of grass and rock but steep for most of the way. I stayed on or near the ridge for the best path and sometimes found a climbers trail to follow.

I thought I was moving fairly quickly, but I found myself lagging behind Caleb and the summit was eerily quiet and empty upon reaching it. I had the summit to myself! There was no wind and I was surrounded by darkish clouds that seemed to be closing in.

This was probably the only time I haven't stopped to enjoy the views from a 14er summit and I walked straight across and down the other side where Caleb was waiting for me. It was all downhill from here and we quickly descended Hurons standard route back to the car. We saw one group of 3 on the descent and that was it for the entire day. This was a wonderful day of scrambling with incredible views and lots of solitude.

Thanks for reading!