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Thirteen years ago I stood on the summit of Castle Peak, but my parents had carried me most of the way to the summit. It seemed to have agreeable symmetry to complete my fourteener quest at the same place where you could argue that it had started. My dad (Stuart), mom (Toni), elder sister (Anna) - all fourteener finishers themselves - and I left our Ford Explorer at the Pearl Pass junction parking lot at 11,200 at about 6:30. My sister and I pulled ahead of our parents, and our party split into two as we expected it would. Feeling no hurry, we took our time up to the end of the four wheel drive road and into the first basin. We crossed a large snowfield and opted to head up talus on the left side of the basin as we intended to take Castle's NE ridge to its summit before traversing to Conundrum.
Throughout the entire hike, the sky was littered with stratus clouds, which boded well for no thunderstorms, but became quite annoying as a thick fog descended and smothered us. We were off trail a little bit and decided to just barrel up the slope rather then futilely wandering around in the thick fog in which we couldn't see more than 20 feet ahead of us. This steep and direct ascent up to the NE ridge was decidedly unpleasant.
Looking up our ascent route
The rock off trail on Castle is really quite loose, and this slope epitomizes this fact of life in the Elks. My sister and I kept knocking loose rocks on each other, and decided to take two paths side by side up the mountain to minimize the chance that we would hit each other.
At long last we reached the ridge crest just ahead of a man and presumably his daughter. The remainder of the climb up the ridge seemed quite mellow and solid compared to the horribly rotten slope we had ascended, but there were probably a few class 2+ moves near the summit.
Me on the ridge
Passing a small false summit, we pushed up the steep last pitch and the summit appeared as a pleasant surprise at about 9:10. After pausing on top to sign the register and eat a power bar, my sister and I descended into the thinning fog towards the Castle-Conundrum saddle.
This ridge is probably slightly easier than the NE ridge, but neither is particularly tricky. After reaching the saddle, we climbed the gentle slopes up to what appeared to be the summit of Conundrum.
Me somewhere on Conundrum
I had a feeling the actual summit was farther along the ridge, and we persevered along an annoying string of rolling hills along the summit ridge. Sure enough, the true summit was further along the ridge, marked by a trusty summit register canister. After signing in on that wonderfully thrilling unranked summit, my sister and I headed back to saddle with the intention of descending the snowfields from the saddle.
Looking back towards Castle I think
There is a 50 ft pitch of dirt and rock blocking easy passage to the snowfield, but Anna and I, battle-hardened from our ascent to the NE ridge didn't mind this section at all.
I took out my ice ax for the first time and did a series of sitting and standing glissades to reach the odd but brilliantly blue lake that rests in the bottom of the upper basin.
The cool lake
The sitting glissades were particularly cold because I was too lazy to put on rain pants, so I did them in my shorts. At this point the fog was clearing and I could see the easy trail that ascended to the NE ridge and was rather put out about that.
The trail to the NE ridge from a distance
Our ascent route to the NE ridge
The summit of Castle shrouded in fog
Castle‘s upper basin
We glissaded another snowfield and made our way over to the four wheel drive road.
Castle‘s upper basins
Walking down this gentle road was annoying but we actually beat a car down that left at the same time as us from the same place, so no complaints there. We finally reached our car at about noon, and sat down to eat lunch and wait for our parents to get back.
Me looking challenged
Having Castle as a 14er finisher seemed rather anticlimactic, but it was pretty stress free which made it an enjoyable climb. I felt a sense of relief that I had finally finished the 14ers, because I could now focus my efforts on climbs that were decidedly more difficult than the standard routes on Colorado's fourteeners.
Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):
Quite an accomplishment at such a young age! Awesome job! At your age I was just sitting around drinking beer and the thought of hiking up ANYTHING seemed absurd to me! If only I‘d known then what I was missing. That‘s so cool your parents got you into this stuff!
I know what you mean about being relieved of ”the list” to pursue other goals. I‘m sure you‘ve got a bright mountaineering future ahead - good luck!
to the latest NM/Los Alamos 14er finisher! Great job on the Bells traverse as well. Looking forward to hearing about future great mountaineering accomplishments from you and your sister!
Thanks guys! Scott - I probably seen you around somewhere - LA is a pretty small town and I‘m been prowling the local crags lately. Tell me if you ever want to climb.
hey daniel, unfortunately i haven‘t made it out to the local crags very much this summer, but will definitely look out for you if I do! what‘s next for you as far as CO peaks go?
Pleasure to share the summit with you 8/13/2008 1:55pm
I am the man who, with my daughter, were on the summit with you and Anna on Saturday. Congratulations on your accomplishment. Sorry we didn‘t have a nicer day to enjoy the views. 20 more and I can finally pursue something other than the list!
Congratulations--sorry about the weather. I sure wish my own parents had started me down this path at such an early age! (BTW, you‘re also quite fortunate to have parents, and a sibling, who could share a finisher like Castle with you.)
What a great way to finish, with your family, on a peak your parents took you up when you were a baby, maybe I should try that :D
Seriously though, great job! You have a long climbing career ahead of you. Its so cool that your family is all finishers too!
Scott- I‘m not sure if I‘m heading back up to colorado this year but if I do it will probably be the Crestone traverse. Next year I‘ve got LB/Blanca, Ellingwood Ledges, Kieners, Rainier, Jagged, and some others on the list.
Kangell - You guys were clearly better route finders than us! It was tough in the fog but oh well.
I like how you‘re half the age I‘ll be when I finish this month.
Los Alamos represents well around here, no?
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