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Castle Peak, 14265' - Trip Report

        From: Alan Silverstein
        Date: Fri, 10 Jul 87 15:48:17 MDT
        Subject: Trip report:  Castle Peak, 14265', overnight
        Newsgroups: hpnc.general

        Saturday and Sunday, July 4-5 -- After looking forward to it for
        a year, I  spent a night  on top of  Castle  Peak,  14265',  the
        highest  peak in the Elk Range, near Aspen.  Except for the cold
        (25  degrees and windy  overnight),  it was a grand  experience.
        Castle is a physically remote peak, not a long climb if you have
        4WD, but  surrounded  by nothing but other  mountains.  From the
        summit  at night  you can only see a  couple  of  lights  in the
        distance,  and at  sunrise  there  is  only  one  lake  visible,
        reflecting the skyglow.

        It took only 30 minutes  to drive from Aspen up Castle  Creek to
        the  start  of the 4WD  section.  I  spent  another  hour  or so
        ascending  the next  4.9  miles to the end of the  road  high in
        Montezuma Basin at 12400',  including giving some people a ride.
        The weather  remained  copacetic, just occasional low clouds.  I
        towed some  out-of-staters from a snowfield on the road...  They
        didn't realize those things get soft and deep at midday.

        By 1510 I'd prepared my old, squeeky  backpack.  Everybody  else
        had  left.  I  started  up alone on the last  1/4  mile or so of
        road, which is blocked by rocks.  Pretty soon I was climbing the
        wide,  wonderful  snowfield  from  12800' to the bowl at 13400'.
        From  there  it's a  steeper  snowclimb  west to the  saddle  at
        13800'.  Now all this snow may sound  yukky, but it covers a lot
        of  rotten  rock.  In fact,  the best  time to climb  Castle  is
        around this time of year.  Watch out for summer skiers!

        I  reached  the  saddle at 1700,  dropped  the heavy  pack,  and
        cruised  up north to  Conundrum  Peak,  14022'.  I followed  the
        ridge a ways  north  beyond the peak.  The map shows the peak to
        be 14022', but it also shows a high point above  14040'  further
        on.  I don't  believe  it.  I looked at that ridge  every  which
        way, and I think the map is wrong.

        It's about 1.3 miles  north along the ridge to  Cathedral  Peak,
        13943'.  I had hoped  earlier to make the trip and  return,  but
        had decided  before  starting the climb to forego this traverse,
        and take it easy  instead.  So I didn't  bring my  daypack.  The
        ridge  looks  do-able,  but long and  tedious,  with a number of
        places you would have to drop around jaggies.

        I returned to the saddle,  shouldered  my too-heavy  pack again,
        and  trodded  up  the  last  465'  to  the  Castle  summit  from
        1824-1852.  There's a good, but steep,  rocky trail on this last
        stretch.

        On top I found a degraded  summit cairn, a register,  and little
        else.  I  spent  an  hour  keeping  warm  in the  cold  wind  by
        rebuilding the rockpile into a shelter wall.  I cleaned up a lot
        of loose  10-pound  rocks that  littered  the small,  flat, dirt
        summit.  Brittle and colorful metamorphic  sandstone (?).  There
        is one nice large spot in the middle, with sharp  drop-offs  ten
        feet away in all directions but one.

        I watched and  photographed a glorious  orange sunset behind the
        Maroon    Bells    about   ten   miles    away.   Indescribable.
        Unfortunately,  even if  acclimated,  hypoxia  slows  down  your
        thinking so you can't  really  feel "all  there".  I cooked some
        noodles using slow but reliable sterno.

        After  dark  there  were  shadows  cast  by a  half  full  moon.
        Conundrum Peak reclined  gracefully to the north.  The night sky
        was full of stars and I saw occasional  distant flashes from the
        fireworks  going on in Aspen.  The surprising  remoteness of the
        peak made it a bit lonely, though.

        I managed to sleep fitfully, a couple hours at a time.  The cold
        was more a problem  than the thin air.  I had on 15  articles of
        clothing,  inside a  sleeping  bag,  under a tarp held down with
        rocks.  In the morning  there were chunks of dew-ice on the bag.
        Sunrise was nice, with the shadow of the mountain stretching out
        to meet the horizon  and the snow on the summit  reflecting  the
        pink sky.

        By 0730 I dragged awake and packed up.  The thermometer  read 40
        when I put it away.  For  variety I took a  different  way down,
        into a steep and  snow-filled  gully running from the ridge just
        below the summit.  I started  down the NE ridge of the  mountain
        at 0855 and into the gully soon  after.  Unfortunately  the snow
        was rock hard, so I had to very  carefully  descend  loose scree
        along the sides for about 30 minutes before reaching softer snow
        halfway down.

        From here the trip back was a real  kick.  I  glissaded  down to
        the upper  snowbowl  carefully,  then took several fast rides on
        wide-open, not-so-steep snow to the end of the road.  I was back
        at the Jeep at 1015.  It only  took  1:20 to  return,  including
        time spent chatting with a number of morning climbers.

        Funny how 4WD roads always seem worse driving downhill.  It took
        a full hour to get back to pavement.

        All in all I only gained  about 2125' on this climb, but it felt
        worse  due  to  the  heavy   pack.  That's  OK,  I  needed   the
        preparation for Challenger Point next weekend.  I spent 14:03 on
        the summit -- a new personal record.

This article used with permission of the author.

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