Saturday night, Paul was crippled. Our original plan was to do a ski tour on Torreys Peak, a nearby 14er. With Paul's back the way it was, that was out of the question. I had just bought some new mountaineering boots, and one of my main objectives this trip was to test them before committing to them on Rainier in July. I've soloed routes on the north face of Mt. Evans before, and that was looking like a likely option. As I was packing, Stephanie expressed a little interest in going with me, and before she could retract her statements, Paul and I jumped on it and pushed for her to come along ("It'll be great training!" "Alpine climbing with no commitment!" "It'll be great to climb with someone other than your boyfriend for once!") and so, Steph packed for the morning.
Alpine climbing on Mt. Evans is about as off-the-couch as alpinism gets. You can drive up the Mt. Evans road all the way to the summit, and there's a parking lot at Summit Lake at 13,000 feet, just below the technical routes on the North Face. At 4:30am, we got a semi-early start and drove up. The drive up the Mt. Evans Road is absolutely fantastic, gorgeous scenery, wildlife, everything. We stopped briefly at an overlook to check out routes on the lower side of Spaulding and the Black Wall. Ice climbs near Badfinger look awesome at the moment, and rock routes on the Black wall look mostly dry, surprisingly.
We reached Summit Lake just after sunrise and had a quick conversation with some fellow climbers who had been up the day before. The approach to the North Face is pretty mellow, about 450 feet of low angle snow and easy talus. Once in the basin below the North Face, we roped up and prepared for technical climbing.
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| Approaching the north face across Summit Lake |
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| Mt. Spalding (13, 842') in the background |
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| Stephanie just below the north face |
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Roped up and approaching the technical routes on the North Face |
After beginning up the lower angle snow at the base of the North Face, it quickly became apparent that the nice neve we could see from the parking lot was in fact a re-frozen graupel crust over isothermic sugar. Every couple of steps we would sink up to our knees in loose, granular bullshit. Knowing we would never make the summit by our intended route, I asked Stephanie if she was feeling brave. With her answering the affirmative, we abandoned our straightforward snow climb and moved onto much more technical mixed terrain.
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| Stephanie at the first belay |
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| Mixed terrain on the first pitch |
The first pitch was fun, moderate mixed terrain, and that allowed us to gain another narrow gully that lead through a weakness in the headwall. This gully is much more shaded, so we were pleasantly surprised to find some real alpine ice that even took screws!
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| Leading up through the ice on the second pitch |
The ice gully lead us to the large snow-bench about 3/4 height on the North Face. The climbing thus far had been much more than Stephanie bargained for, but she handled it like a champ (dare I say, enjoyed?) I built a picket anchor and brought her through the ice bulge and then told our options. We could finish the North Face directly with 2-3 more pitches of mixed climbing, or we could traverse right along the snow bench and gain the summit ridge that way. She decided she had her fill of technical climbing for the day, and we traversed along the snow bench to a low saddle in the summit ridge. From there, it's a quick jaunt up well-maintained trail to the actual summit, where we were greeted by bikers and tourists who had driven up the road.
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| Stephanie heading up toward the snow bench |
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| Following the last pitch of steep snow before the snow bench |
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| Happy to be on easier terrain, the summit is so close you can almost taste it! |
We crested the summit ridge and un-roped. Mt. Evans is one of the highest mountains in the Front Range, and we had great views of many other CO 14ers. We could see Longs Peak to the north, Pike's Peak to the South, Grays, Torreys, Quandary, and Holy Cross as well as Mt. Elbert and Mt. Massive in the Sawatch. From the summit ridge, we quickly gained the summit. We were feeling pretty spanked at this point, and I had been dreading the decent down the Northeast Face in these snow conditions, so we hitched a ride with some tourists from Tennessee and were dropped off at our car 15 short minutes later.
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| She coils rope too!? |
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| Summit Selfies! Number 3 for her, and probably number 60-something for me |
This was Stephanie's 3rd 14er ever, and first by a technical route, and first in winter conditions! Quite a day of firsts! After being fed and rested and rehydrated, she recounted the tale of our adventure to Paul. Hindsight always blurs the misery but sharpens the joy, and since she was so enthusiastic I bet she'll be out there again in no time, ready for more.
