Maroon Peak 14156' - 1986 Trip Report
June 1986
Alan Silverstien
After a year of planning and trepidation, along with Ed Ogle and
Dave Morse, I climbed Maroon Peak (14156', the left-hand Maroon
Bell) on Friday, the Fourth of July. It was as long and
challenging as I had expected, but not nearly so hazardous or
scary. I suppose I'm getting used to these tough peaks -- is
that a good thing, or a bad thing?
We left Fort Collins at 0800 Thursday (July 3), and took our
time getting to Aspen via Independence Pass. As a result, there
were no campsites available in the Maroon Lake area at 1400.
They filled up at noon. Ed and his wife found a site at
Difficult, which is five miles west (the wrong way) out of
Aspen. My wife and I gambled and succeeded in getting one of
the overflow sites the camp hosts held aside, by being quick up
the road when it opened at 1700. We kept it for the three-day
limit, in fact, a very nice site (#43) just above the upper
parking lot.
Last winter was a bad one for avalanches in the Elk Range. One
came across the Maroon Lake upper parking lot and took out a lot
of the beautiful tall aspen trees below the lot. A sad act of
nature.
By 1830 all three of us were ready to take off backpacking --
Dave joined us in his Jeep. The hike in past Crater Lake took
the expected 1.5 hours. There is significant trail damage in
spots due to small avalanches, tree falls, and over-use, which
the rangers don't think they'll do much to repair. We studied
the east bowl below Maroon Peak at about 2000 (8pm), and
reluctantly decided to climb the mountain via the south ridge
instead of one of the steep, narrow saddle couloirs.
(Last year, after doing the first 90% of the height on the
ridge, I'd concluded that the only sane way to do the peak is
via one of the couloirs early enough in the year that the snow
is good, like last week. Now I'm not so sure of that. If you
backpack in as far as you can and get an early start, the ridge
is just as good.)
We found designated campsites in timber a short ways further on,
near Maroon Creek, and almost got a decent night's sleep.
"Almost", because in the middle of the night we had to fight off
porcupines that nibbled on boots, ice axe covers, and other
things. That was pretty scary. I was afraid the scratching
sound at the tent entrance was a bear, and was ready to fight
for my life with my ice axe. But, one flash of light, and a
bushy tail disappearing was all I saw.
At 0600 the next morning we started up-trail under some
scattered clouds. After about 15 minutes, at 10500', "fearless
leader" (me) decided it was time to start up the east slope of
the south ridge. There's no marked route; you just
cross-country up to the ridge. We should have gone a little
farther, to the place Borneman suggests in his book, as I did
last year, because the ambitious start up put us on irritating
talus for the first 500' or so.
Once on the higher grassy slopes we angled slowly up to the
south. You gain height fast, and it's not too hard, with many
places being firm, stair-step rock. It is a steep and tiring
climb, but the view gets better with every step. (Maroon Valley
must be one of the most beautiful places on Earth.) A number of
times we used ice axes to go straight up snowfields, which
varied from slightly icy to just right.
We attained the south ridge after almost four hours of climbing,
somewhat north of the real start, by route-finding a shorter way
to it. Suddenly, as you come over the top, Snowmass and Capitol
peaks take your breath away. They remain in sight as you work
north along the back (west) side of the ridge.
Having been on this ridge before, I could do some directing, and
found it not nearly as tough as last time. Still, it's a long
way, with many false routes and summits. It's complicated
enough that several times I could only toss up my hands and set
us all off looking for cairns. After almost two hours, at 1135,
we reached the 13700' south saddle, where I turned back last
year.
The clouds slowly thickened, so we wasted no time. The last
500' of vertical took us almost an hour, route-finding our way
up the back side of Maroon Peak. There are lots of cairns, but
they're hard to spot in a few places. The trick is that the
route veers sharply, onto the narrow summit ridge, twice, as you
reach rock walls. The ridge itself is a wide highway of fairly
flat rock, with terrific cliffs on both sides, quite a thrill to
hike on.
I reached the summit first, at 1222 (6:07 to climb 3650', with
some drops along the ridge). The summit is not as impressive as
that on North Maroon. Rather than being a pinnacle, as it
appears from below, it's a long, fairly wide ridge with cliffs
on both sides. There was a huge snow cornice on the Maroon
Valley side, so we had to go down to the north to see below,
which is quite a sight, however.
We spent only about half an hour on top, and departed under
light rain with a thunderstorm starting up ten miles away. The
trip down to the saddle was fast, reasonably easy, and
uneventful, taking only a half hour. After a long break there,
we agreed to descend the direct way, via the snow filled couloir
straight down to the valley. When you look at the peaks from
Maroon Lake, or on most photos of them, you see this as a broad
snowfield that looks almost vertical. But it's not; I measured
it at 45-50 degrees.
This descent was much the same as the last year, hard but
suitable snow for kicking down backwards, one step at a time,
using an ice axe as a brace. It's slow, tiring work, and it
took more than 1.5 hours to get to where it was easier to walk
down. Some things were different, i.e. the snow gullies were
not as pronounced -- not as many rock falls? -- and one
particular crevasse below a cliff was so wide (4') and deep
(20-30'), two of us went up and around rather than jumping
across. The snow lower down wasn't great for glissading either
-- a little too "fast" (hard packed).
The return to the trail took us almost four hours total from the
summit, until 1650, with some better rides towards the bottom.
The rain came and went, but no thunder-busters drifted over.
After returning to camp, Dave Morse elected to stay another
night; Ed Ogle headed out quickly; and I packed out in heavy
rain from 1810 to ????. My digital watch finally died by
drowning. It must have been about 1950 when I got back to camp,
to find my wife and daughter gone with Ed's wife, and our jeep
waiting -- with Ed sleeping inside.
So, we cruised into town for a late dinner and watched an
impressive fireworks display from the restaurant -- and a
phenomenal number of people packing into town for the
celebration. I took Ed out to his camp, came back up to Maroon
again (an eleven mile drive from town), set up a tent, and
finally crashed at 0030.
It rained a lot that night, most of the next day, and the next
night. We had the mountain to ourselves on the 4th, but several
parties were going in that evening. On the 5th, despite the
rain, a group of six climbed the steeper couloir to the center
saddle. While descending the same way, about 1430, one of the
party was struck on the head by a "basketball sized rock" in the
narrow part of the couloir.
I heard about it the next day from one of the other people in
the group. Apparently his helmet and climbing rope, strung over
a shoulder, saved his life. He slid unconscious so far that it
took an hour for his buddies to reach him, and he wasn't rescued
off the mountain, with a concussion, until around midnight. The
climbers only had about ten seconds warning from hearing the
first crack of falling rock, and the unlucky person had less.
Such are the risks of climbing these tougher peaks. We also
wore helmets (in my case, a bike helmet, being what I had
available), and were very careful about dislodging rocks, and
watching for them. It's just as well, I guess, that we didn't
climb the center-saddle couloir.
This article used with permission of the author.
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