Introduction

The Kilpacker basin had trailwork done by CFI the last couple years, the standard routes for Mount Wilson and El Diente changed to Kilpacker from Navajo. Since it doesn't look like there's any trip reports on the hypothetically "new and improved" trails, we figured that was the motivation to write one.

At this point, my wife and I have done 40-ish 14ers, including quite a few class 3, but not much class 4. Since we're into "cardio" for some unknown reason, we decided the best way to tackle these two peaks would be to not do the traverse, but rather wait for a good weather window and hike both peaks---up and down---via the standard routes from the split at 12,600.

• Also, a hiker about our age and experience level died on the El Diente / Wilson traverse the week before we did this...
• Damn.
• That furthermore solidified our resolve to have a big cardio day rather than doing the traverse.

Since approach is "only" 3 miles / 800 vert---which we forecasted would take us about an hour to complete---we also decided 'lets just day trip the entire thing from the trailhead!'.

• OnX forecasted this to be ~14 miles, 6000 vertical feet.

We felt this was a large, but doable day for us.

For context, we've got a Suburban car camping setup we're quite fond of, so weighing that vs needing to rent backpacking gear makes the calculus for us favor big days. So while we're not "Chicago Basin Grand Slam" sort of crazy, we have done some big days others usually backpack:

• Mt Holy Cross: 12 miles / 5600 vert
• Kit Carson & Challenger: 15 miles / 6200 vert
• Blanca & Ellingwood: 16 miles / 6300 vert

Anyway, about a week out we noticed Monday, July 29 was forecasted to be simply beautiful. The Friday before, we decided yep: we're taking a day of PTO and heading down to the San Juans to finish off the range.

The Setup

We drove down Sunday, leaving Denver at about 10am. With a McDonalds lunch and a Dominos pizza dinner filling us up (talk about a healthy day), we arrived at the trailhead in the evening.

And... wow. Even from the TH you get a stunning view.

For the "big day", we had the following timeframe in mind:

1. Kilpacker approach to ~11,000 feet: ~1 hour
2. To the 12,600 split: ~1.5 hours
3. Summit of Wilson Peak: ~2 hours + 15 min at the peak
4. Back down to the split: ~1 hour
5. Summit of El Diente: ~2 hours + 15 min at the peak
6. Back down to the split: ~1 hour
7. Back to the car: ~2 hours

= 11 hours estimated.

While we knew we had a good weather window, we didn't want to push our luck and wanted back to Denver at a reasonable time for work on Tuesday. So that translated into a 3am start time for us.

So after admiring the view for an hour in our camp chairs, we took sleepy sleep drugs, set the alarm, and went to bed...

The Approach

...was uneventful, as the trail was exactly as described. We had a slight issue of getting off route at the big stream crossing, but besides that minor blip, we cruised.

So you know: the trail gets extremely rocky at tree line (so ~11.5k). While it's still decently well defined---and much better than what's ahead---there was the occasional spot where it wasn't immediately obvious where the trail went when the only source of light is headlamps.

Mount Wilson

...is what we decided to tackle first, since it was longer and looked to be the trickier of the two (hahahahaha...... more on that later).

Summarizing the trail as a whole:

• 12.6: the turnoff
• 12.6 to 13.2: trail segments
• 13.2 to 13.8: talus field
• 13.8 to 13.9: extremely loose gully
• 13.9 to the summit: alternate between class 3 & loose gullys

The Turnoff
We heard the turnout for Mt Wilson wasn't obvious, and that was the understatement of the year. At this point we were still at "too dark for anything but headlamps", but even in full daylight this isn't even remotely obvious.

So yeah, watch your GPS when you're getting close to 12,600, as there's nothing to signify you need to turn.


But hey we read that in a Peak Conditions the day before so we didn't miss the turn, rather just shook our heads and laughed at how unobvious it was.

12.6 to 13.2
When you're on the trail segments, this part is quite straightforward. The downside is those trail segments end randomly (hence, "segments"), and with only headlamps, it's tricky to find the next one. We got off trail a couple of times on the way up due to this, but the terrain is low consequence so it's more of a grumble grumble type situation. We were glad when the sun finally rose enough we could put away the headlamps.

13.2 to 13.8
This was probably our least-favorite segment. It reminded us a lot of the headwall on Castle & Conundrum, only crappier in just about every way.

We purposefully waited to do these peaks until the snow was melted and... that was arguably a bad move. The few snow patches we did encounter by this time were easier and preferable to the Talus field.

• A few weeks earlier a Peak Condition update mentioned "you can snow climb from 13 to 13.8"
• ...and in hindsight that sounds so much better than what we climbed.

Incase that photo doesn't convince you, take extra caution on the way down here. While the talus is mostly stable, a few surprisingly large boulders fell out from under us on the way down.

13.8 to 13.9
When the talus field ends, this loose gully is waiting it's turn to take you out. I found poles to be extremely helpful, both up and down.

Thankfully, this part of the hike is pretty short, and everything above it is better.


13.9 to the summit
No photos for this section, as it was exactly as described in the route (so look at those photos).

You alternate between fun class 3 climbing and loose gullies, but nothing as bad as the stretch written about above. This was our favorite part of the ascent.

The Summit

After a quick check of weather (awesome, still), we then made our descent back to the 12.6 split so that we could do...

El Diente

We got back to 12.6 at about 9am. After a snack and sunblock, we started making our way up El Diente.

Summarizing the trail as a whole:

• 12.6 to 13.3: trail!
  
• 13.3 to 13.5: some talus, some trail
  
• 13.5 to the ridge: fun, solid class 3 climbing
  
• The ridge to the summit pitch: fairly well defined
  
• The summit pitch: holy fuck

12.6 to 13.3

After trail "segments" at best on Mt Wilson, seeing actual, well-defined trail! was quite the breath of fresh air. It's quite stable, well-cairned, and generally easy to follow. Wow was that nice.

13.3 to 13.5

At about 13.3 the nice trail ends, but the talus field here has some trail segments through it, and is nowhere near as bad as what was on Mt Wilson. There's a few different paths through this though, all of which are cairned, but as long as you follow the general path of "avoid that cliff band" you'll do just fine.

13.5 to the Ridge

Hypothetically this part is cairned. However, once we got to the red rock rib at the end of the talus (~13.5), as best as we could tell, there wasn't anything to mark "the way".

Pretty much the entire way up, the GPX file was telling us "you're not even close to the correct route". So while we knew we weren't on the route, the rock was solid and everything seemed doable.

That being said, a lot of people were making the same mistake as us. Both up and down, we saw people even further to the left, away from the route.

Thankfully, on the way down, getting off the ridge and starting the grey gulley is much more obvious and well cairned, which is why one of our tracks actually followed the route.

The Ridge to the Summit Pitch

No photos here, as the 14ers.com route photos matched everything of note.

I will note that for the sole loose gully (photos 18 and 19 of the route), I found poles valuable for the way down.

The Summit Pitch

AKA: holy fuck. The exposure once you get through the notch and are doing the last moves to the peak (photos 24/25/26 on the route description) were by far the spiciest section of this route.

• It was far worse than anything we did on Mt Wilson, even though Wilson is rated as "High" on exposure, and El Diente is merely "considerable".
• In our opinion, those two ratings should be switched, and it's not even close.

The reason for this is off to your right is a gully which looks extremely slick, steep, and loose, such that if you fell into it... I don't think it would be survivable. See photo below, which I don't think really does it justice but gives you an idea as to what you're scrambling above.

Thankfully, the scrambling itself (above this gully) is quite solid.

But still. Gave us the hebbie-jebbies on the way up and especially on the way down. Don't fuck up these moves.

The Summit

The views up here were stunning, but all that was on my mind was safely descending down the "holy fuck" section. Felt way better once that section was safely behind us.

Finishing Thoughts

It was a big day! But a ton of fun.

We didn't see anyone else doing this "combo" of the standard routes.

• There were probably ~15-20 other people (surprisingly many for a Monday)
• All of which were either doing just one peak, or the traverse.

We did El Diente second under the idea of "lets do the hard peak first, when we're more fresh, before doing the easier peak".

Yet we found El Diente to be quite a bit harder, both on route finding (13.5 to the ridge), and for exposure. To the point where had we done El Diente first, we're not sure we would have had the guts to do Mt Wilson. We would have looked over at it going "and that's the harder one?!?!"

Also, if this is what the "new & improved" trail looks like after 2 years of CFI work, what the heck was this trail before it? There was pretty much no trail up Mt Wilson, so all we can figure is the trail work done was on the approach (which tbf, does cross quite a few talus fields with a nice, solid class 1 trail).

But anyway, make sure to turn around when you're making your way down the approach. Because, wow, this is a beautiful place.

Expectations vs Reality

We had the following timeframe scoped out:

1. Kilpacker approach to ~11,000 feet: ~1 hour
2. To the 12,600 split: ~1.5 hours
3. Summit of Wilson Peak: ~2 hours + 15 min at the peak
4. Back down to the split: ~1 hour
5. Summit of El Diente: ~2 hours + 15 min at the peak
6. Back down to the split: ~1 hour
7. Back to the car: ~2 hours

...and we generally met this. We ended up doing the approach a little bit quicker, but descending the peaks themselves slower: about 90 minutes for both descents instead of the 1 hour estimated.

But! We guessed it would be 11 hours car-to-car, and it ended up being 11h38m.