MT. HOPE
13,933 ft.
May 17, 2002
By Tim Briese
I left home at 4:30 a.m. and drove through a chilly, damp fog into the mountains. Conditions looked rather marginal for a climb today. I am always an optimist, though, and clung to the hope that the forecast for a drier air mass moving into the state’s central mountains would hold true, and that conditions would improve before I reached the trailhead. I was treated to a beautiful sight when I neared Wilkerson Pass, as the pink and orange light at sunrise danced upon the low clouds that drifted across the slopes and filled the nearby valleys.
The mountains reportedly held only a fraction of the snowpack that was normal at this time of year, promising the best early season climbing conditions in years. I was eager to see these snow conditions that I had read about firsthand, and had a couple of tantalizing glimpses of the Sawatch and Mosquito Ranges through the low clouds as I drove across the South Park. Indeed, the high peaks seemed to be largely barren of snow, at least on south-facing slopes. This lack of snow was almost unheard of for mid May. The clouds remarkably disappeared as I descended into the Arkansas River Valley near Buena Vista, and the giants of the Sawatch Range beckoned from across the valley under a deep blue sky.
I turned off of Highway 24 onto the Clear Creek Road and followed it about nine miles before pulling off on the north side of the road and parking in a flat area in the woods. At about 7:30 I left the trailhead and headed up the Sheep Gulch Trail with my two labs, Allie and Jorie. It was a glorious morning, clear and calm, with a rich blue sky above. This trail is also designated as a section of the Colorado Trail, and is a fine route that ascends sharply up out of the Clear Creek Valley on numerous well-built switchbacks. My plan was to follow the trail all the way up to Hope Pass, and then bushwhack up Mt. Hope’s east ridge to the summit.
I was in an unhurried frame of mind this morning. I sought a peaceful rejuvenation of my spirits while in the mountains today, after several weeks of frenzied activity at home. I hiked slowly and steadily upward, and was soon greeted by splendid views of the mountains across the valley to the south through the trees. Mt. Belford and Mt. Oxford soon became visible to the south, and Huron Peak and the Three Apostles lay off to the southwest. I ascended through groves of leafless aspens and dark green fir trees before contouring across a rocky area where the trail crossed to the east side of tiny Sheep Creek when I neared timberline. As the trees thinned out I could see Hope Pass above me to the north, my initial goal. There were a few banks of snow scattered across the open tundra above the trees, but the trail was nearly dry all the way to the pass, which was quite remarkable for mid May. Mt. Hope loomed high above to the northwest. I studied the route I would follow up its east ridge as I approached. The upper part of the ridge looked quite rough, and just to the left of the rough area lay a massive field of snow that I wanted to avoid.
At about 9:30 I reached Hope Pass at 12,400 feet, having climbed a stiff 2500 feet of elevation gain in the two and a half miles I had hiked from the trailhead. Quail Mountain (13,461') towered just above the pass to the east. There was an expansive view of Twin Lakes and points beyond to the northeast. I observed that the gentle south-facing slopes of Mt. Elbert were nearly free of snow. I studied the Colorado Trail as it continued down the north side of the pass into Willis Gulch below, past a frozen lake and into the woods beyond. Jorie flushed up a ptarmigan and chased it for a couple of hundred yards as I sat and rested. This was a wonderful spot to sit and enjoy the surrounding grandeur.
After fifteen minutes or so I resumed the climb and headed steeply uphill to the west on the lower portion of Hope’s east ridge. I soon encountered some rough outcroppings along the ridge that I bypassed on the south. I studied the route above as I ascended and selected a course that kept me on dry rock and dirt between fields of snow. The ridge looked considerably rougher above, from about 13,400 to 13,600 feet, and I wondered how I would get up through that section. Remarkably, though, I was able to find a route that zigzagged up through the rough rocky section with a difficulty of only class two. There was no defined trail on Hope’s east ridge, but worn spots here and there indicated that other feet had passed this way before. At about 13,700 feet I climbed about twenty feet across a bank of snow, scrambled up through one last rocky section, and found myself atop Hope’s gentle summit plateau. I strolled to the northwest around a false summit and continued two hundred yards further to the real summit, staying well clear of some cornices of snow hanging out over Hope’s impressive east face, for the safety of my inquisitive dogs.
I reached the summit at 11:15, having climbed about 4100 feet of elevation gain on the three and a half miles I had come from the trailhead. I did not need to wear a coat on the entire ascent, but I soon put one after arriving on top, because the temperature was only 34 degrees, and a light westerly breeze that greeted me was rather chilly. It felt grand and exhilarating to be atop a high summit again, for I had not been on one for a few months. It was fun to gaze about at the surrounding 14ers I had previously climbed. La Plata was particularly grand about three miles to the northwest. With my binoculars I could see all the way to Mt. Sneffels in the San Juans, a hundred miles to the southwest. I noted that the surrounding mountains were largely free of snow on their sun-drenched south and west facing slopes, while their north and east sides still retained a considerable mantle of white. The summit register showed that the most recent visitors were two climbers who had been here a couple of weeks earlier. These were the first entries since October of the year before. Perhaps others had been here during those seven intervening months, having not signed the register or even found it in the snow, or perhaps this lonely place had remained silent and unvisited for over half a year.
At about 12:10 I left the summit and retraced my steps back down the east ridge. At one particularly rough place Jorie stopped and whimpered a bit before courageously continuing down. When I returned to Hope Pass I sat down on the soft grass to stretch out my legs and rest for a little while. I noticed that the wind was beginning to kick up from the north now, and I felt fortunate to have been on the summit when it was nearly calm. I hiked lightheartedly back down the excellent trail, pausing at one point to listen to a cascade of water gurgling below a bank of melting snow in the valley below. When I reached timberline I hiked a hundred yards or so south of the trail to examine an old log cabin standing in the woods. It was probably a relic of the mining era, and was showing the effects of the passage of time.
At 2:30 I tramped back down to the trailhead. The dogs immediately leaped into the 4-Runner and curled up to take a nap. I sat in the back of the open hatch in the warm sunshine under the deep blue sky and relaxed for quite a while, soaking up the peaceful sights and sounds of the forest around me. I absorbed these soothing things into my mind, in the same manner as fresh air is inhaled into the lungs. I still felt very unhurried. The cares of the world at home could take care of themselves today! Although physically tired, I felt peaceful and recharged.
I thought, too, about how I like climbing these 13ers as an encore after the 14ers. They provide new adventures and challenges, new terrain, and new perspectives of other places I’ve previously been.
--”You will find something more in the woods and in the mountains than you will in books. The trees and stones will teach you that which you can never learn from the masters.” --St. Bernard of Clairvaux
