VERMILLION PEAK
(13,894 ft.)GOLDEN HORN
(13,780 ft.)July 24, 2003
By Tim Briese
I drove into Ridgway on Wednesday evening and joined Brian for our long-awaited climbing expedition in the San Juans. We enjoyed a splendid Mexican dinner that evening at the Adobe Inn, which is one of my favorite Mexican restaurants anywhere. We left Ridgway the next morning at 4:15 and headed for the South Mineral Creek Trailhead west of Silverton. Just before reaching this trailhead we left the main road and four-wheeled a mile up the Clear Lake Road to an upper trailhead that Roach describes and hit the trail in very faint light at 5:30. An unmarked trail took us west through the woods a hundred yards to an exposed stream crossing above a waterfall, after which we joined the main Ice Lake Trail which came up from below.
The trail climbed steeply for a mile up to the eastern edge of Lower Ice Lake Basin, where the terrain flattened out for a while and the trees opened up to afford us a dramatic sunrise view of Golden Horn to the southwest. Ice Lake Basin was a beautiful place, with lakes, waterfalls, cliffs, and lush meadows filled with flowers. I had eagerly looked forward to this climb in order to see this basin, for I had heard it described as one of Colorado’s spectacular places, and I was certainly not disappointed.
After crossing Lower Ice Lake Basin the trail climbed steeply past a headwall and then traversed across flowery slopes to the upper basin above. We paused at the top of the slope to gaze back down into the beautiful valley below. From here we hiked west for 200 yards across open tundra and reached the shore of Ice Lake at 12,300 feet. Two backpackers nearby were sitting outside their tent enjoying the grandeur of this incredible place in the early morning light.
From Ice Lake we followed the trail across Upper Ice Lake Basin a half mile south past a smaller lake to yet a third one, which lay at about 12,600 feet. Vermillion reared into the sky three-fourths of a mile to the southwest. From here we hiked west onto a grassy bench and then followed a climber’s trail southwest toward the Fuller Peak/Vermillion saddle. From some distance away we could see a trail up the scree slope to the saddle and we pressed on toward it. I did not look forward to the steep climb up the scree but the footing turned out to be surprisingly solid. In rather short order we climbed past a bank of snow and reached the 13,500 foot saddle, where we were rewarded with fine views of alpine grandeur on the other side.
From the saddle we followed a well-cairned trail along the rough ridge toward the summit, mostly on the left side of the crest. I thought this portion of the climb was particularly fun, as we made Class 2+ traverses around towers and climbs up rocky steps. Shortly before reaching the summit we climbed 100 feet up a steep dirt-filled gully to a notch, then scrambled up broken rocks to the top of the summit pyramid, where we arrived at 9:40.
The summit was an exciting and airy place to be, and the views were among the finest of any summit I had been on. The beauty of the San Juans surrounded us in every direction. The view to the north of Pilot Knob (13,738') and Golden Horn was especially impressive in the morning sunlight. To the west beyond Trout Lake lay the rugged Wilson Group, while fifteen miles to the southeast were the pointed summits of the Needle Mountains, where we would be backpacking the next day.
The sky was clear until now but a few white convective clouds were rapidly starting to puff up into the azure above. We stayed for 35 glorious minutes on the summit before deciding that we’d better move on. We rapidly hiked back down to the saddle, encountering a solitary climber going up along the way. We considered going on to climb Fuller Peak and then Golden Horn, but the rapidly building clouds convinced us to skip Fuller and go on to the latter, since we considered it the greater prize. From the Fuller/Vermillion saddle we contoured across to the Vermillion/Golden Horn saddle on a convenient bench that lay across Vermillion’s lower northeastern face at about 13,400 feet. Golden Horn looked much easier to climb from here than it had from Lower Ice Lake Basin! Nevertheless, it required a steep climb up the right side of the ridge on questionable footing for two-tenths of a mile to reach the pointed summit. Golden Horn’s summit was also an exciting place to be, and it was even more airy and exposed than Vermillion had been. We sat for a few minutes and enjoyed fine views of Vermillion and Pilot Knob. Rain could be seen falling from the clouds just a few miles to the south so after only fifteen minutes we left the top and began our descent.
We rapidly scooted back down to the saddle and tried to make a direct descent down to the basin below from the saddle but found our way barred by a cliff band in the reddish-brown rocks. We found it necessary to contour a hundred yards or so to the south before we found a cairned route down through the cliffs.
Once in the rocky basin we bushwhacked a few hundred yards to the northeast to regain the trail we had taken up in the morning. I marveled at the wide variety of color in the rocks that were strewn about in the basin directly below Vermillion. There were various shades of red, green, brown, and gray represented there, and I pocketed a specimen or two to take along to examine later.
The sky was completely clouded over as we hiked back across the upper basin, and a shower of rain forced us to put our rain gear on. Just after we passed Ice Lake a thunderclap ripped through the air, from a storm just over the ridge to the west, and it was followed by several more, which induced us to pick up our pace several notches.
The sun broke out again for a few fleeting moments as we hiked through the flowery meadows in the lower basin. I knew I wanted to come back and visit this beautiful place again sometime. We met a dozen or so other hikers who were strolling about in the basin soaking up its grandeur.
The rain began to fall again in earnest as we hiked down the switchbacks below the basin. There were still hikers going up, though, including a young woman with two little boys. They would have found the basin much prettier and more enjoyable in the morning sunlight, I thought.
We returned to my truck at 2:30, completing the nine hour climb. I estimated that we hiked about nine and a half miles and climbed 4000 feet of elevation gain on this outing. I thoroughly enjoyed this climb of Vermillion, for it is a fine peak in a spectacular setting, with a beautiful approach hike that ranks among the best I have seen. After the climb Brian and I headed to Durango, where the next morning we boarded the train to ride to Elk Park for our backpack to Vestal Basin, to visit another of Colorado‘s spectacular places.
