Mt. Shavano Trip Report 06/25/2010

Report Type	Full
Peak(s)	Mt. Shavano - 14,230 feet Tabeguache Peak - 14,158 feet Mt. Princeton - 14,200 feet Notch Mountain - 13248
Date Posted	06/25/2010
Modified	06/26/2010
Date Climbed	06/21/2010
Author	joelmpaula

4 Peaks in 3 days
Total eleveation gain: 12626 Total days of climbing: 3 Days Hiking partners: Dan McCool Kat Paula I left my house in Avon Co at 230 pm on june 21st to drive to the trail head of Shavano. I got to the trailhead at 430 and as I packed my bag for the climb the next morning and made my bed in the back of my Subaru, a truck pulled up. I got out of my car to talk to him (Dan McCool) and see what his plan was. We talked for a few minutes and he brought up that someday he would like to watch the sunrise from the top of a 14er. It was already 900 pm. If we wanted to see the sunrise, we would have to leave the TH around 1230am. We got up at midnight, both having gotten about and hour of sleep. We started hiking at 1215am and it was a very quiet hike. We saw several sets of eyes in the dark on the trail; luckily, they we only elk. We summited at 420 am. The sun did not rise untill about 515. I fired up my JetBoil and made some nice hot soup. There was not a lot of wind on the summit, but it was cold. The sun started to rise so we started our way over to Tabeguache. This section of the climb was composed of very large boulders and small patches of grass. It was a very fun downclimb to the saddle of Tab. It took about an hour to get the summit. The climb up Tab is lose rock with a little bit of snow on the ridge. We spent a few minutes on the summit, took a few pictures. The walk back to Shavano was about an hour. Walking down the talus field from the summit of Shavano was a lot of work. Once we got below that field, it was smooth sailing from here on out. I took some pictues on the way down because it was dark on the way up. This was a great hike. Thanks to Dan for giving me the motivation to walk through the night to get to the summit. Princeton 6/22 I drove down the road from Mt. Shavano and all I could think about was what to climb next. Antero is next to Tab, but the road sounded like it was really bad so Princeton sounded like a good plan, only 10 miles away. It took about 30 minutes to get to the TH from Shavano TH. I drove up the 4x4 road just a little under a mile and parked. I woke up at 2am, ate some breakfast and was hiking by 3am. I got to the radio towers at 345am. I took a nice long break at about 11000 feet. I would like to thank the makers of the JetBoil. I hit the hiking trail at treeline about 430 or so. The trail going up was very fun- a combination of hard dirt/rock, lose rock, and medium talus. I got to the summit at 645am. Just a little wind on the summit. The only peope I saw on the hike up was a group of 12 girl all in summer camp. I was off the summit before they got there. The talus field took as much time to get up as it did to get down. I got back to my car at 930am. A very nice day overall. I got back to Avon at 2pm, then went to work. Notch 6/23 My wife Kat had off of work on Wednesday the 23rd and she wanted to do a hike. I had to work at 4pm so a 13er was a little easer to fit in. She got off work at 11pm and we drove to the Half Moon Campground/TH, going to bed around 12. We woke up at 530am and left to hike around 6. It was a pretty easy hike with little snow. There was one switchback that we had to cut near the summit due to snow. We made it to the church and took some pictures. There was one guy behind us who we met at the church (he made it 13100 feet and didn't have any need to summit -100 more feet?!). We looked around but couldn't really tell which part was the summit. We went to our left and decided that that was not it so we went to the right. There were some areas with loose rock and a good amount of medium talus. The last 50 feet to the ridge were large talus that required scrambling. The summit is a little farther down the ridge towards the notch. We took some pictures of the cross and started the downclimb. At this point my wife decided that she does not like talus and took forever. Once she made it down the rest of the hike out was a piece of cake. We got back to the car around 2 and chilled for about half an hour. Then we drove back to Avon and went to work. Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):

4 Peaks in 3 days

Total eleveation gain:
12626

Total days of climbing:
3 Days

Hiking partners:
Dan McCool
Kat Paula

I left my house in Avon Co at 230 pm on june 21st to drive to the trail head of Shavano. I got to the trailhead at 430 and as I packed my bag for the climb the next morning and made my bed in the back of my Subaru, a truck pulled up. I got out of my car to talk to him (Dan McCool) and see what his plan was. We talked for a few minutes and he brought up that someday he would like to watch the sunrise from the top of a 14er. It was already 900 pm. If we wanted to see the sunrise, we would have to leave the TH around 1230am. We got up at midnight, both having gotten about and hour of sleep. We started hiking at 1215am and it was a very quiet hike. We saw several sets of eyes in the dark on the trail; luckily, they we only elk. We summited at 420 am. The sun did not rise untill about 515. I fired up my JetBoil and made some nice hot soup.
There was not a lot of wind on the summit, but it was cold. The sun started to rise so we started our way over to Tabeguache. This section of the climb was composed of very large boulders and small patches of grass. It was a very fun downclimb to the saddle of Tab. It took about an hour to get the summit. The climb up Tab is lose rock with a little bit of snow on the ridge. We spent a few minutes on the summit, took a few pictures. The walk back to Shavano was about an hour. Walking down the talus field from the summit of Shavano was a lot of work. Once we got below that field, it was smooth sailing from here on out. I took some pictues on the way down because it was dark on the way up.

This was a great hike. Thanks to Dan for giving me the motivation to walk through the night to get to the summit.

Princeton 6/22
I drove down the road from Mt. Shavano and all I could think about was what to climb next. Antero is next to Tab, but the road sounded like it was really bad so Princeton sounded like a good plan, only 10 miles away. It took about 30 minutes to get to the TH from Shavano TH. I drove up the 4x4 road just a little under a mile and parked. I woke up at 2am, ate some breakfast and was hiking by 3am. I got to the radio towers at 345am. I took a nice long break at about 11000 feet. I would like to thank the makers of the JetBoil. I hit the hiking trail at treeline about 430 or so. The trail going up was very fun- a combination of hard dirt/rock, lose rock, and medium talus. I got to the summit at 645am. Just a little wind on the summit. The only peope I saw on the hike up was a group of 12 girl all in summer camp. I was off the summit before they got there. The talus field took as much time to get up as it did to get down. I got back to my car at 930am. A very nice day overall. I got back to Avon at 2pm, then went to work.

Notch 6/23
My wife Kat had off of work on Wednesday the 23rd and she wanted to do a hike. I had to work at 4pm so a 13er was a little easer to fit in. She got off work at 11pm and we drove to the Half Moon Campground/TH, going to bed around 12. We woke up at 530am and left to hike around 6. It was a pretty easy hike with little snow. There was one switchback that we had to cut near the summit due to snow. We made it to the church and took some pictures. There was one guy behind us who we met at the church (he made it 13100 feet and didn't have any need to summit -100 more feet?!). We looked around but couldn't really tell which part was the summit. We went to our left and decided that that was not it so we went to the right. There were some areas with loose rock and a good amount of medium talus. The last 50 feet to the ridge were large talus that required scrambling. The summit is a little farther down the ridge towards the notch. We took some pictures of the cross and started the downclimb. At this point my wife decided that she does not like talus and took forever. Once she made it down the rest of the hike out was a piece of cake. We got back to the car around 2 and chilled for about half an hour. Then we drove back to Avon and went to work.

Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):

Comments or Questions

JakeK

Good stuff Joel
6/28/2010 4:38pm

Good to see you‘re getting out there even though the snow is (mainly) gone! Nice job on getting the summit sunrise!

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