Continued...
Christian and Ingrid own a rustic cabin a few hours drive from Steamboat
Springs, in the southeast corner of Jackson County along Jack Creek. It is
close to the western edge of the Never Summer Wilderness and Rocky Mountain
National Park. We planned to spend a few nights there, hiking peaks on the
drive to and from the cabin, plus a full day in the Never Summer Mountains.
Our main goal today during the drive to the cabin was Clark Peak, a P2K, the
Rawah Wilderness HP and the highpoint of Jackson County.
Peterson Ridge
From Steamboat, we drove south and east on US40 across Rabbit Ears Pass, then
northeast on SR14 into North Park, towards Walden. Peterson Ridge and Owl
Ridge together run northwest to southeast across North Park, dividing it in
half. Both are fairly low, only about 300ft above the surrounding plains. SR14
goes over Peterson Ridge, just east of the highpoint. Though she and Eric had
both visited it previously, Ingrid suggested we should stop to allow Christian
and I to claim the easy ascent. It is an easy drive-up with a 1-minute stroll
to .
There are no trees nor shrubs and the rolling, grassy hills
are heavily used for cattle grazing. A modest telecom installation is found
there as well. Our visit was about 15min before sunrise as we had gotten a very
early start on the drive due to concerns about weather later in the afternoon
(that never really materialized).
Medicine Bow Mountains
This range lies on the boundary between Jackson and Larimer Counties, and forms
the eastern boundary of North Park. The eastern side of the range is part of
the Roosevelt National Forest while the west side forms the Colorado State
Forest. Access is easiest from the west, and conveniently the side we
approached from, heading southeast out of Walden on SR14. There is a $9 vehicle
fee at the entrance to the state park. We left one vehicle at the TH for the
Beaver Lodge Nature Trail and took the Jeep to the end of the rough Ruby Jewel
Rd. It was 7:45a before we on the Ruby Jewel Trail.
Our route roughly followed that posted on PB by Ben Brownlee. The first half
hour follows through forest, eventually
into more on the way to Jewel Lake.
is nestled in a broad cirque below Lewis and Clark, and it is
here that the trail ends. We to start the cross-country
trek up to the crest shortly before 8:30a. It would take about half an hour to
climb the to reach between the
two summits. We aimed left of the saddle to visit the lower Lewis Peak first,
its upper half a confusion of piled upon each other
and slowing progress. It would be almost 9:15a before the first of us reached
the summit, the others arriving over the next ten minutes. There are fine views
to be found, looking across North Park, along the
crest of the Medicine Bow Range, to Clark Peak and
down to Jewel Lake with the
Never Summer Mountains in the far background. Christian started down almost
immediately, wanting to get a jump on the traverse to Clark Peak, the rest of
us leaving soon thereafter.
between Lewis and Clark is standard class 2, more of the
same we had found in climbing to Lewis - a mix of . It
would take about 50min to travel . A rock-lined
and are found at the summit, but no
register on either Lewis or Clark. are similar to Lewis, with a
better view looking east across the Roosevelt National Forest and the Rawah
Wilderness. We from the summit, following
of the range for more than an hour and a half. We went over
informally named on our way to the more prominent
with more than 500ft of prominence. The hike is a fairly
easy one, almost entirely class 1-2 with stunning views off
of . Most impressive was the not-much-longer
on the northeast side of Pipet, much of it
exposed ice that could make for a nice practice ice-climb. The only other person
we would see while out hiking was found traversing on the west
side of the ridge heading to Clark. It was nice to have almost the whole area to
ourselves today. Peak 12,386ft had the only register we would find on the
outing, looking like of the
left by the CMC.
Eric had left us at the saddle between Pipet and Peak 12,386ft, returning back
across the West Ridge of Pipet to descend the original drainage we'd started
up in the morning. The last summit would put him over the edge, he worried, so
wisely chose the conservative option. From the summit of Peak 12,386ft, the
traverse back across Pipet's West Ridge seemed cumbersome and unnecessary. Why
couldn't we just descend down Peak 12,386ft's West Ridge and then into the
adjacent drainage? Our maps showed a trail running partway up the drainage, so
we thought it should be easier to make use of it rather than so much
side-hilling needed to get to the original drainage. And so we decided to try
it. It worked nicely enough, initially down ,
then northwest into over mostly .
It was a little brushy to the north side, but
we soon entered the forest and found ourselves following
down the drainage. We found shortly before finding
now serving as an unmaintained trail. We followed this
past more , eventually joining up with
we had driven in on. It wasn't until it was pointed out
that we had about half a mile to hike up the road to reach the Jeep that
I realized why others had not used this drainage on descent. Not a big deal
really, but a little unpleasant to be hiking uphill at the end of a long-ish
outing. We around 1:20p, finding Eric relaxing at the
Jeep, reading his book. We got out some beers, piled our gear and ourselves into
the Jeep and headed back down the rough road.
Bull Mountain
This was a bonus peak on our way out of the state forest. Eric and Ingrid had
visited it the previous year, but suggested it on the drive to give Christian
and myself a chance to tag it. The summit is found about a mile northwest of
North Michigan Creek Reservoir. An OHV road forks off the main road. We tried
one variation of the roads shown on the map, only to be stopped by a gate where
a yurt has been installed for visitor use. On our second attempt, we found the
road forking north from the reservoir to work nicely, within
a few hundred feet of the summit. The top of Bull Mtn had been
in the past few years, leaving much slash, a few standing trees, and as
yet, little re-growth. It was with no obvious
highpoint, weak views, and much debris to trip over in the process. The only
things it had going for it were the easy access and 500ft of prominence.
Owl Mountain
Owl Mtn is a P1K on the south side of SR14, a few miles from the state forest.
Eric and Ingrid had been to this one as well the previous summer, but seemed
happy enough for a second visit. It is mostly a Jeep driving exercise, though
any vehicle with high-clearance should have no trouble. We drove first to
east of the highpoint. The lookout tower has been
removed, leaving only the concrete footings. A small, solar-powered radio
antenna now stands where the tower once stood. There are in
most directions from the open summit. Another ten minutes of driving got us to
the highpoint about a mile to the east, or nearly so. The forest road goes
around the south side of the summit before heading northeast down the ridge on
that side. A of less than a quarter mile through the forest
gets one to with poor views. A Bob Martin register
was found, as expected. There had been only a single other
visitor since Eric and Ingrid's visit . It was after 3:30p
by the time we back at the Jeep. We still had more than an
hour of driving to get us to the cabin along Jack Creek some miles to the south,
so after driving back down to where we'd left the other vehicle, we headed off
in that direction...
Continued...