Summary at the top: Elyon's Ridge

At a minimum, completing this traverse injury-free is more likely if you have already successfully completed the 4 other major 14er connecting traverses in CO and summited the 14ers they connect. With this level of skill and experience, it is more probable to do this route without problems (injury-free). But, there's always the unexpected...

Here, let's echo the words in the post of a previous Cap-Snow finisher. This traverse is a serious undertaking. You and you alone are responsible for your decisions. Make good ones.

Details:

We completed the Cap-Snow traverse (formerly 'satan's ridge') going from Capitol Peak to Snowmass Mountain on Wed, 9 Sept. 2026. It took us ~10hrs from ~8am to ~6pm peak to peak.

These 3 factors took the most time:

1) Loose rock instability across nearly the entire distance of the traverse (making slow careful foot placement necessary for safe forward progress).

2) Notches between traverse ridge segments. Many of these each took longer to down-climb and then to climb back up to the next ridge segment than crossing the ridge segments themselves.

3) Technical portions we chose to solve and climb through instead of bypass (spoiler alert: these mostly occured at the last ridge segment before beginning the ascent to Snowmass). We did bypass (by down and then up-climbing) a final gendarme on the last ridge segment that was beyond our free-solo climbing ability (we brought very little climbing gear, some webbing and a couple of cordelettes, but chose lighter packs in favor of bypassing something not free-solo climbable by us). Had one good 5.7 free-solo that popped my adreneline a little up a follow-on ridge sement after a notch. My glasses came off 1/2 way up, so I was juggling finding holds while trying to save my shades. Would have sacrificed the shades if I had to ... didn't have to this time. Note: this 5.7 climb is not necessary to complete the traverse.

My pack weight, including the 4 liters of water that sustained me w/out needing to refill across the traverse, was 20.7lbs.

If I had it to do over again I would have brought more real food and less packaged bonk-nosh. Also, grateful to my buddy for the extra agua down the West slope of Snowmass. I was running low, not out, but getting there.

Our party consisted of 2 men, 23yrs and 46yrs old. Together, we prayed each peak. Nothing too complicated, The Lord's Prayer found in the book of Matthew Chapter 6. In this case, 2 are definitely better than 1.

Vehicle Logistics:

Two 4-wheel drive vehicles. We placed one vehicle at the Geneva Lake TH in Lead King Basin just outside of Marble, CO and then drove the 2nd vehicle to Capitol Creek TH.

Comms: Rocky Talkies

We started in the night/early morning, taking the ditch trail in to Capitol Peak and summitting the peak at sunrise to maximize the amount of daylight travel time on the traverse.

We traversed all ridge segments w/ zero injuries and created a .gpx file of our route that gave us the basic statistics of our traverse.

Distance Peak to Peak: 2.87mi

Avg Speed: 0.3mph

About 4hrs moving time & 6hrs stopped time

After summiting Snowmass Mt at ~6pm we down-hiked the West slope route and took the trail past Geneva lake back to the TH. This is about 4mi: ~2mi down to the creek in the valley; then ~2mi back to the TH. We completed the first 2 mi in waning sunlight, and the second 2mi on the trail w/ headlamps. I was physically exhausted at the base of Snowmass and running on fumes on the way back to the vehicle at the TH. My younger counterpart had some still left in his tank. He led the way back to the jeep.

From TH to TH the entire route took us ~24hrs. I took a few breaks going up the switchbacks from capitol lake to the saddle, and from the saddle to the peak. My hiking partner and I staggered our start times from Capitol Creek TH b/c we knew from previous hikes that he's faster than I am. We agreed to meet at the Capitol summit between 6am and 7am, so we could each plan our sleep, start time and pace separately on the initial longest leg.

Obviously, we aren't breaking any records or making any new discoveries on this traverse, just 2 average dudes successfully completing the traverse w/ minimal gear in a single day.

Hoping to remove fear from other future hikers and climbers, and the myth of daunting impossibility that seems to cloud the minds of those considering hiking this traverse.

Our Keys to Success

1) Body Condition: We had good physical conditioning.

2) Weather: We had perfect weather. We checked the Wx and planned accordingly.

--there is a bailout point into Pierre Lakes Basin at the low saddle a little before the 1/2 way point on the traverse ... when we crossed this saddle there was a white climbing rope anchored to the saddle that went over the edge down into the basin

3) Technical Skills: We were able to do the ~5.5 - 5.6 initial down-climb at the start of the small ridge just off Capitol Peak to gain the start of the first ridge segment of the traverse.

--in the pics below note the pic of the old peton w/ the newer 'black diamond' caribener attached: this is placed at the ~1/2 way point on the initial down-climb from Capitol Peak--we both free-soloed this down-climb (w/out using any gear). I got a little amped on the downclimb, but calmed down as I transitioned from L to R, finding good foot placement along the way.

--Imho, being capable of accomplishing this down-climb, is a key indicator that you possess what is necessary to complete the entire traverse.

4) Patience: We took it as slow as we needed to ensure no serious fall injuries. Unless you're FKT-ing in some aspect, no need to rush. SIS/SIF

5) Attitude: We Enjoyed overcoming the traverse between Capitol and Snowmass--Cap-Snow--unofficially referred to, and formerly known as satan's ridge (he doesn't have a claim to it anymore, we, along w/ many of those who have gone before us, have consistently and reliably re-dedicated it by action to its rightful owner upon completion). This ancient, narrow way is not as foreboding if you have the correct mindset.

Cheers

Respectfully,

outrundeath

may your hiking/climbing on El Elyon's ridge be filled w/ joy on El Elyon's Ridge

p.s. tried to upload the 24.3kb .gpx file to this report from my phone, couldn't get it uploaded, don't know why ... unlabeled error

Elyon's Ridge Elyons Ridge

not satans ridge not satan's ridge