MT. TABEGUACHE
(14,155 ft.)MT. SHAVANO
(14,229 ft.)September 22, 1996
By Tim Briese
(Note: For a trip report on a winter climb I have made of Mt. Shavano, see the More Climbs page.)
I had hoped to do a late September climb of Mount of the Holy Cross, but a vigorous early season storm dumped a blanket of snow in the high country that thwarted that plan. After consulting a few National Forest Service offices about local snow conditions, I set my sights instead on a combination climb of Mt. Tabeguache and Mt. Shavano.
I picked up my friend Tim Figge at 5:30 a.m. and headed into the mountains on a clear Saturday morning. We drove up the rough but passable forest road past the Angel of Shavano Campground and reached the Jennings Creek Trailhead about 8:30. A large sign at the trailhead ominously warned about the difficulty of the long hike to Shavano over Tabeguache that we were about to undertake, and stated that it could take twelve hours to complete. We certainly hoped it would not take us that long, for the onset of darkness was only about ten hours away!
We struck off to the north up the trail beside Jennings Creek through some stands of aspen trees. The yellow leaves on the aspens had nearly all fallen off already because of the cold storm that blew through the week before. The weather promised to be reasonable today, except for a strong wind that was blowing stiffly out of the west. Soon we reached a pretty pond near the stream at timberline and headed to the right up a steep slope out of the valley. It was a very grueling climb up this slope, with poor footing on loose dirt and scree, as we gained about 1700 feet of elevation in less than a mile. (The Forest Service no longer allows climbers to use this route due to erosion concerns.) Tim is an avid runner, and one of the most fit companions I have ever climbed with, so my stamina was sorely tested as I tried to keep up with him.
It was quite a relief to finally reach the top of the slope at 12,900 feet. After a brief rest we began to follow Tabeguache’s curving southwest ridge around toward the summit. Tabeguache was visible about a mile and a half to the northeast, and Shavano lay to the east beyond the gaping depths of McCoy Gulch. The wind was howling briskly now, at perhaps 30 or 40 miles per hour. We followed a reasonable trail along the class two ridge, and contoured to the right around a couple of points along the way to avoid unnecessary elevation gain. A little snow from the recent storm had drifted into sheltered areas in a few places along the trail, but it did not impede our progress very much. At a small saddle just before we reached the summit there was considerable exposure where Tabeguache’s north face dropped sharply away. The gusty wind was buffeting me toward the edge, so I carefully stayed several feet away.
At about 11:30 we stepped atop Tabeguache’s windy summit and admired the views all around. There appeared to be more snow on the surrounding mountains than there was on the one that we stood on. We found a sheltered spot out of the wind below the east side of the summit and sat down to eat our lunch in the sunshine. Two or three other climbers soon arrived on top. After lunch we headed down the slope to the east and descended 500 feet to the saddle between Tabeguache and Shavano. From the saddle we followed the three quarter mile long ridge to the southeast toward Shavano, finding it most helpful to stay to the east side of the ridge below its crest to avoid the brunt of the wind.
We hiked briskly along, and soon reached the summit of Shavano. There was a party of about six other climbers there who had come up a route from the east. I admired the grand view down into the Arkansas River Valley, nearly 7000 feet below to the east. To the southeast lay the Sangre de Cristo Range, with the Great Sand Dunes piled against its western base. We gazed at the other high summits of the Sawatch Range stretching away to the north, and noted how the farther ones appeared lower than the near ones due to the curvature of the earth. Tim said that he would produce a mathematical formula when he got home that would determine the feet of drop per mile of the earth’s surface from a horizontal line of sight, and, sure enough, he used his engineering skills to come up with one the next week.
We soon retraced our steps along the ridge back down toward the saddle. Tim alertly noticed my camera when it fell out of my pocket onto the rocks, and I was very grateful for his sharp eye. As we climbed back up toward the summit of Tabeguache, Tim jokingly wondered if we could claim credit for climbing three 14ers today. There were several people now on top of Tabeguache, and two climbers were anxiously looking for a lost companion who had made a solo side trip to climb nearby Jones Peak (13,604'). We helped in the search by scanning the route to Jones with our binoculars, but failing to be of any help, we soon decided to leave, feeling that there was little more we could do to assist. I thought it likely that the “lost” companion had merely underestimated how long the traverse across the rugged ridge to Jones Peak would take.
We rapidly hiked back down Tabeguache’s southwest ridge, and practically flew down the long scree slope back into the Jennings Creek Valley. We paused to rest our legs and filter some water at the pond near the stream before pushing on down to the trailhead. We returned to the trailhead a little after 3:30, for a seven hour roundtrip climb of the two summits. We were pleased that it took us far less time than the twelve hours the sign warned about, and concluded that the sign had wisely erred on the side of caution.
