MT. BELFORD
(14,197')MT. OXFORD
(14,153')July 14, 2007
By Tim Briese
Teresa wanted to climb a new 14er, so I suggested that Mt. Belford would be a good one, with its beautiful hike on a fine trail. We left home at 4 a.m. with our two labs and drove to the Missouri Gulch Trailhead. It was a busy Saturday morning, and the spacious parking lot was already nearly full. We hit the trail at 6:45 and immediately took on the relentless switchbacks that climb up out of the valley.
When we neared timberline and reached a point where the trail mercifully levels off, we noticed several backpackers camped in the woods on the left side of the trail. Two forest service rangers were talking with them, and when one of the rangers noticed our two dogs running about off leash, he called me over and explained that we were in violation of Collegiate Peaks Wilderness regulations. He wrote down my name and address in a notebook, and said that we were subject to a $75 fine, but that we would get by with a warning if we immediately leashed them up. I had only one four foot leash in my pack, and two dogs, but nevertheless proceeded to tie them up together on the one short leash. Everybody watching, including the rangers, had to know that such an awkward arrangement would immediately be abandoned as soon as we were out of sight. The ranger mentioned that the fine would still be assessed if we were caught again later, but he also told me in the course of our conversation that he and his partner were backpacking over Elkhead Pass, so I was quite sure we wouldn=t see them again, and we didn=t.
We continued up Missouri Gulch on this beautiful summer morning, and soon reached the junction where we turned left on the Belford trail. We climbed up the gentle grassy slopes of Belford=s northwest shoulder on the fine trail, pausing often to admire prolific displays of gloriously exuberant wildflowers along the way. Numerous other hikers were ahead of us and behind us. We reached the summit at 11:30 and joined about a dozen other exhilarated climbers on top. The weather was holding up beautifully today so we took our time to enjoy the fine surrounding panoramas.
We had planned on climbing only Belford today, but after gazing at Oxford a mile and a half to the east, and noting the fine weather, as well as hearing several other climbers talk about going on to Oxford, we decided to give Oxford a try as well. It would be another new 14er for Teresa, and a new route for me, since my only previous climb of Oxford was from the long Pine Creek approach. We left the summit about noon and headed down the trail south from the summit to the Belford/Oxford connecting ridge. Tom and Carol from Oklahoma, who were on their first 14er, talked excitedly about going on to Oxford, too, but soon abandoned the effort after following us a short distance.
We proceeded down the ridge to the saddle and then up the gentle slope to the broad, flat summit of Oxford, where we arrived at 1:15. There were seven other climbers lounging about when we arrived. It was exciting to climb a second 14er today, and even more so because we had not planned on it. After half an hour we left and hiked back across to the ridge south of Belford. We did not reclimb the 100 feet to its summit but instead bushwhacked down the gentle slope to the southwest to Elkhead Pass. I paused a moment there to admire the sea of peaks visible off to the south. From the pass we hiked north down the fine trail through beautiful Missouri Gulch, all the while gazing about at the splendid scenery glowing in the afternoon sunshine. It was about two and a half miles from Elkhead Pass back down to timberline. Teresa remarked that she had never had the wonderful and beautiful experience of hiking so long and far above timberline as we had today.
We took a nice break beside a stream flowing through a tundra meadow shortly before reaching timberline, then proceeded on down the trail. We were both getting quite tired as we hiked down the endless switchbacks, and the truck was a most welcome sight when we returned to the trailhead at 6:30. We covered about twelve and a half miles and climbed 5800 feet of elevation gain on our twelve hour hike today.
Dinner at Quincys in Buena Vista was definitely in order this evening, and we enjoyed a fine meal there. The Saturday night crowd delayed our dinner a bit, though, and busy traffic slowed us down on the drive home, so we didn=t get home until 10:45 that evening. Our nineteen hour day was the longest day outing for a mountain climb I could ever remember! We didn=t mind a bit, though, because it was a wonderfully memorable outing.
