14,172 ft.

December 16, 1998

By Tim Briese

My goal of climbing a 14er in each calendar month of the year had reached one of its greatest challenges -- a December climb. Winter climbing is not easy, with a formidable array of obstacles including marginal weather, short hours of daylight, and limited access to trailheads. Cold and wind are the norm in the high country at this time of year, although exceptionally nice days can occur. With the sun setting at 4:30 in the afternoon, I prefer short climbs because a wintry night spent at high elevation could be dangerous, or at least very uncomfortable.

With these thoughts in mind I selected Mt. Bross for my December climb. I planned to climb the mountain’s gentle eastern slopes from a parking spot along a subdivision road near timberline that I had scouted out the month before. The climb involves 3000 feet of elevation gain in a roundtrip distance of about five miles. This is a simple enough climb in the summer, but it turned out to be a much greater challenge in December, for me at least.

I left home at 5:30 a.m. with my lab Allie and headed into the mountains. The sky soon became light in the east but the sun did not rise until well after 7 a.m. The winter solstice and the shortest day of the year was only a few days away. While this climb was technically not a true winter climb because it was not done during the official winter season, it qualified as a winter ascent in every other sense. The sky was clear and the forecast sounded reasonable, with a high pressure ridge firmly in control over the state.

The partially snow-covered slopes of Bross loomed ahead of me as I drove up Highway 9 northwest of Fairplay. I carefully drove across icy spots on the steep roads in the subdivision below Bross’s eastern flank and parked at a spot along Moose Creek at about 8 a.m. As I stood beside my truck preparing my gear a gust of wind blew my hat off, and I immediately knew that a windy challenge lay ahead of me.

I proceeded to hike uphill on snowy slopes through the last of the sparse trees at timberline. The snow was generally solid and crusty, and I was able to either walk on top of it or avoid most of it on barren sunny ridges. Above timberline there were large areas that had been scoured free of snow by the wind. There was no trail whatsoever on this route. I threw numerous sticks for Allie to retrieve as I hiked along, and she eagerly brought each one back, running down steep slopes of snow to pick them up and then running back up again.

The wind was very strong and gusty and got worse as I ascended. I climbed to a flat area at 12,500 feet from which I looked up at a long, narrow ribbon of snow in a gully on the east side of the mountain. I contemplated climbing up the gully but instead elected to climb a broad shoulder to the right that was nearly free of snow. As I hiked up the slope the wind was so ferocious that it knocked me down three or four times. Many other times I voluntarily dropped to the ground to avoid its ferocity. The wind was very gusty, and I repeatedly crouched down and waited for calmer spells in order to advance for twenty or thirty seconds before halting again in the face of another blast. Often when I crouched down Allie jumped into my lap and tucked her nose under my arm to get out of the wind. I estimated that the wind was blowing 75 mph or more during the gusts. It was a very strenuous challenge climbing uphill in the face of the vicious wind. It felt as if someone were rudely pushing me back downhill. To complicate matters the footing was loose in places, too. A climb that would be easy in normal conditions was very difficult now.

When I neared the summit I found it necessary to climb up a rather steep slope of snow for the last couple of hundred feet. My ice ax was priceless for this final portion of the ascent. Although I carried snowshoes along on my pack I never deemed it beneficial to use them. The wind was almost impossibly strong now, and I was thoroughly disgusted with it. I pressed doggedly on, though, for I dearly wanted to achieve my December 14er. I had to climb on my hands and knees for the final hundred feet because the ferocious wind denied me the option of standing up.

I finally reached Bross’s broad summit plateau at 11 a.m., after a three hour climb, and headed to the northwest to the rock shelter wall at the highest point about 200 yards away. The blasting wind blew with a more steady force on the summit, at a speed slightly less than the maximum speed of the gusts I had encountered below. The wind quickly numbed the exposed portions of my face with cold and I had to turn around and put my back to the wind a couple of times to protect my face as I advanced.

It was quite a relief to reach the rock shelter and sit down behind it out of the worst of the wind. The temperature was a brisk 21 degrees, and the wind chill index was certainly well below zero. The summit was largely scoured free of snow by the wind. A few old footprints in small patches of snow near the shelter wall indicated that others had been here in recent weeks, but perhaps not for several days or longer. I counted about 35 other 14ers visible in the clear and violent air, from the Crestone Needle to the Maroon Bells and the gentle giants of the Sawatch Range, all clothed in a mantle of white. I wondered how many other people were atop a 14er anywhere in Colorado on this December 16th. Given the vicious conditions and the fact that it was a weekday probably limited the number of other climbers to a very few.  Indeed, are there winter days, perhaps, when the 14ers do not see even a single visitor?

It was a grand experience to be on a 14er again, and the violent conditions made it wild and thrilling. My adventure today in this howling wind reminded me of Thoreau, who called himself a self-appointed inspector of storms, as he hiked out into their fury to see their raw power and revel in their grandeur.

I soon left the summit and began my descent. It was a pleasure to be pushed along by the gale that was now at my back. I selected the snowy gully for my route down and glissaded much of the way while using my ice ax for a brake. I rapidly slid down a thousand vertical feet in less than twenty minutes. The gusty wind swirled icy snow around me at times, grinding it into my face. I soon reached rocky tundra slopes at about 12,800 feet and carefully picked my way down from there. I was moving rather slowly because the grueling climb had drained much of my energy.

By 1 p.m. I was back down at my truck looking up at the majestic summit I had just been on. The climb now looked long and intimidating, at least under these conditions, and I was glad that it was behind me. This adventure widened my perception of what is doable for me.

It felt good to accomplish my goal of a December 14er climb. It was a thrill to explore a new route on Bross, too, in spite of the conditions. I thought I might come back to try this route again sometime, at a friendlier time of year.

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