July 26, 2022

By Tim Briese

11.9 miles, 4100’ elevation gain, 10:05 roundtrip time

Byers Peak is a popular and fun peak to climb in the Byers Peak Wilderness Area a few miles west of Winter Park. Brian and I followed county and forest roads out of Fraser to the trailhead on this beautiful July morning. There is scant room for parking close to the trailhead but there is a one-way loop in the road there along which dozens of vehicles can potentially park at this popular place. From the trailhead we embarked at 630 and walked up a gentle road behind a gate almost two miles to the start of the actual trail, just beyond a bike rack.

the route initially followed the road beyond this gate

the road ends here and the trail starts beyond the clearing

From there the trail ascended abruptly through the trees to the south. We played leapfrog the rest of the way with a party of three fellows and a woman who were celebrating her birthday on this climb today. We also encountered a young woman from Nevada who raced around us near timberline and we visited with her later on top. The good trail went right up the crest of Byers’ north ridge. It was pretty steep in some places but not bad.

brian and i near timberline with byers' ridge beyond at the left

the trail up the ridge

getting close to the top

We stepped on top at 10 am after hiking 4.4 miles and climbing 2900 feet from the trailhead. It was a beautiful morning to be on this scenic summit and we spent nearly an hour there, lounging around and visiting with other climbers.

brian on the summit

view to the south from the summit

Several other hikers were coming up the ridge as we hiked down.

Our plan was to climb only Byers today but on the way down we gazed over to the north at Ptarmigan Peak and unranked Bottle Peak and succumbed to the lure of going after them too. The great weather today was certainly a factor in this decision. Just as we entered the trees on Byer’s north ridge we left the trail and began bushwhacking down toward a saddle in the direction of the other two peaks. We searched for an elusive trail through the trees to follow, with checkered results, but once we reached the saddle a trail didn’t matter because the trees opened up and we were soon on open tundra.

we hiked down to the saddle in the trees and then up to bottle, on the right, and ptarmigan, on the left

we hiked up the tundra to bottle at the right, then over to ptarmigan at the left

a nice view looking back at byers from just above the saddle

From the saddle it was a straightforward 600 foot climb up the slopes to Bottle, where we arrived about 130.

brian on bottle peak, with ptarmigan peak beyond

After a few minutes we left and hiked down to the saddle between Bottle and Ptarmigan and then made a steeper 400 foot ascent up the mostly grassy slope to Ptarmigan. The weather was still holding nicely and we spent a relaxing half hour on the summit. On the return we went back down to the Ptarmigan/Bottle saddle and then contoured across the tundra back toward the Bottle/Byers saddle.

admiring the view of byers peak  (photo by brian schultz)

We didn’t go all the way to the saddle but thankfully found a nice trail that switchbacked down a rough steep slope through the woods down to the road we had hiked up in the morning. We hiked the rest of the way down the road and tramped back to the trailhead about 430. It was a long day but a lot of fun climbing these three peaks.