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The alarm went off at 4am. We got on the road from Denver at 4:30. Driving through Leadville, we got our first glimpse of the mountain that we would see too much of that day. We got the on trail at 7:45 and snowshoed up the 4WD road. The snow was still hard enough that we weren‘t postholing (yet). The trail was buried beneath about 4 feet of snow so we improvised and made our own path through the trees. It took us FOREVER to get out of the trees! When we finally got out of the trees, we found what looked to be the trail and continued up. About 12,700‘, we took off our snowshoes. This would be the only dry ground we would walk on the entire day. Further up, we ran into two guys who had "petered out" at about 14,200‘. We decided we could make it to the summit, even though the wind was howling! We put our snowshoes back on just below 14,000‘ for the final push to the summit. At 3:40pm, just shy of 8 hours from the car, we hit the summit. The summit was AMAZING!!! After a brief snack and some pictures, we realized that we might run out of daylight so we booked it down. We kept our snowshoes on for the entire descent. We made good time until we hit treeline where the snow was soft and the postholing really slowed us down. The full moon shed enough light that we didn‘t have to break out our headlamps. We made it back to the car at 8pm -- exhausted but victorious!!
Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):
and congratulations. Looks like you guys had pretty nice weather. From your report the snow looks to be melting fairly fast. Wait till you have a 18 hour trek on a 14‘er!! 8)
I love the view of La Plata from Elbert‘s Summit.
Congrats! The photos of La Plata and Castle look great! Any chance you have a photo or two looking into the Box Chutes from the ridge? I‘m planning on skiing that soon.
Looks like you had a great day. I hope to get out there myself soon - and can only wish for weather and view like your pics show. Nice job!
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