Date Climbed: October 27th, 2013
Trailhead: Berthoud Pass- East side
Start Time: 7:53 am
Finish Time: 11:57 am
Climbing Time (round trip): 4 hours 4 minutes
Elevation Gain: 2,800 ft
Distance Traveled: 7.6 miles
WIND TRAINING DAY on Berthoud Pass! I should know best, spending a lot of time on The Pass in all seasons, that there are few days where the wind doesn't blow. Nevertheless, it is always a good equipment test and "get me toughened up" test.
My climbing companion Jeff and I set out for some training and neither of us had made the ridge traverse on the East side of Berthoud. We agreed this would be a good warm up to training as neither one of us had been at altitude in a couple of months. Our plan was to climb Colorado Mines Peak then traverse out and back to three 13ers: Mt. Flora, Mt. Eva, and Parry Peak. Our hike started from the main parking area on Berthoud Pass. The wind was calm here and the temperature was 29 degrees F. After donning jackets, hats, gloves, boots and my gaiters we headed up the service road to Colorado Mines Peak (12,497 ft). The road was filled in with snow. A snow cat had gone up to the weather station on top of Mines shortly before we started. This helped to pack down the snow nicely. There was close to a foot of snow on the road for most of the way. I'm slightly embarrassed to say that I had never climbed to the top of Colorado Mines Peak with all the skiing I have done on it's lower terrain. The wind started when we reached treeline and would not cease until we arrived back at the car. It took us about a hour to top out on Mines. I have always viewed the CDT ridge traverse on the northeast side of The Pass from US 40. I appears as a gentle high ridge. From the top of Mines the ridge line perspective is different. The East side of the ridge is abrupt with jagged cliffs and couloirs.
Jeff descending off of Mines to the saddle
The traverse from Mines to Flora took us another hour. The wind was consistently 20 mph with stronger gusts. Even with hat and hood I still had a headache from the wind. We reached the flat summit of Mt. Flora around 10 am. The windchill temperature was close to 0 degrees F.
Summit with Grays and Torreys behind me
The western Front Range and The Gore Range
North- Mt. Eva, Parry Peak, Bancroft and James(all 13ers)
Jeff and I hung out on the windy summit for 20 minutes and decided the wind was a little much to continue on toward the rest of the 13ers we had planned. We will save them for another training day; hopefully a less windy one!
Heading down the ridge to the saddle at the base of Mines. If you look close at the top you can see the weather station.
Once we were below treeline the wind stopped and the temp was pleasant. All in all a good morning. It felt great to be in the mountains. There were a couple of skiers skinning and skiing the lower east side of the old ski area- coverage is still too thin for me to think of it yet, next month maybe! Nine more months until we go back to Rainier. We are looking for at least 3 more climbers/mountaineers to join us. Contact me if you are interested: kevin@aboveitallpt.com
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