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Tag: fourteeners

Handies Peak II

Saturday & Sunday, August 16-17, 2014

Diane has been hiking in the mountains with me all summer and was finally ready to try climbing her first 14er. She left the decision of which 14er we would climb up to me, so I decided we would hike up Handies Peak in the San Juan Mountains. Handies Peak was my first 14er back in 2010, so I knew it would be a good one to start out on. It’s also one of the easier hikes at 2.9 miles in length (one way) with 2,500 feet of elevation gain. She has hiked longer trails with more elevation gain with me before, so I was confident she would make it to the top. Since Handies was my first, I was also looking forward to climbing it again to see how much easier it would be for me the second time around. Plus I was looking forward to getting an earlier start this time so I could watch the sunrise with a better camera from near the top.

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The Decalibron

Tuesday & Wednesday, July 29-30, 2014

The Decalibron is a name given to a route in the Mosquito Range that allows you to summit four of Colorado’s 58 named 14ers in one 7-mile loop; Mount Democrat (14,148 feet), Mount Cameron (14,238 feet), Mount Lincoln (14,286 feet) and Mount Bross (14,172 feet). Some people do not count Mount Cameron as an official 14er because it is not ranked (the saddle between Cameron and Lincoln does not drop below the 300 feet required), but I have decided that I am going to try and complete the list of named 14ers and am going to count it (why short myself some Colorado high points?). Since my goal for the year is to summit five 14ers, I figured that this hike would be a good way to reach that goal after hiking Huron Peak a few weeks ago. Since this route is very popular and closer to the Front Range (Denver area), it can be very busy on the weekends. I decided to avoid the crowds by taking a day off from work in the middle of the week to attempt this hike.

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Huron Peak

Saturday & Sunday, July 12-13, 2014

This weekend I set out to climb my first 14er of the season. I chose to try Huron Peak since it’s in an area of the Sawatch Range that I haven’t really spent much time in, plus it’s not supposed to be too difficult of a hike which would be a good warm-up for me since I haven’t hiked at this elevation since last summer. At 14,003 feet, Huron Peak is ranked 52 out of the 53 ranked peaks over 14,000 feet in Colorado. I had originally planned to climb Huron Peak over the Fourth of July weekend, but unfortunately I got a pretty bad cold that kept me home for that entire weekend, so I was looking forward to making it up this weekend.

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Grays & Torreys Peaks

Saturday, July 21, 2012

I left work at 11:00am on Friday, finished loading up the Jeep and made my way east on I-70 to the Front Range. One of my personal goals for the year was to hike to the top of three 14ers, so I decided to try and hike the Grays Peak and Torreys Peak combo to knock two more off of my list. I made it to the Stevens Gulch trailhead around 3:00pm and found a nice campsite nearby. Had I arrived later in the evening, I doubt I would have been able to find a nice campsite right near the trail. There were a few sprinkles of rain in the afternoon, but they only lasted for a short time. I spent much of the evening reading and relaxing. The sky stayed overcast until I went to bed around 9:00pm, so I didn’t even bother taking any photos around sunset.

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