Ten Days in Colorado

This is the last of my “catch-up” posts for now, and this adventure with Samuel from 2018 is perhaps the most memorable trip we have done. While we have done longer trips since, this adventure had a combination of challenge and remoteness that were a stretch for each of us. We avoided crowds and enjoyed not just one, but two amazing trips that we strive to replicate: The Capital Creek Circuit and Fool’s Peak.

As I look back on the year, I don’t know how we squeezed everything in. Bailey started the year playing club volleyball and ended playing for her school’s varsity team as a sophomore. She started to drive and was on the Homecoming court. Samuel was very active in scouts with many activities and campouts, learning to SCUBA dive in the summer and completing his Eagle Scout project in December. He was Timon in the middle school performance of The Lion King. Samuel had multiple camps in the Summer and Janet traveled with Bailey and her friend Caroline to England. I had an intense year at work with trips to India, Australia, and throughout North America. Years of work came to a climax on August 1. We had family trips to Montana for Spring Break, Lost Pines Resort for Labor Day weekend, ended the year with a trip to Israel, and had an unplanned trip to England for my Dad’s funeral in October after I had spent time with him at the hospital in September.

Somewhere amongst that, Samuel and I wanted a backpacking trip. After completing Big Bend’s Outer Mountain Loop at the end of the previous year, we were hungry for what was next. The major milestone at work meant that a trip immediately after that could work, so we could squeeze in ten days at the beginning of August. The timing meant Texas was out and we were drawn to Colorado, especially as we were attending scout camp there earlier in the summer. My internet research for a 50-mile backpacking loop led me to “The Capital Creek Circuit” (aka Capitol Creek / Snowmass Loop). For example, this site. While a similar length to our Outer Mountain Loop trek, this was the opposite type of terrain and was relatively unregulated compared to a National Park. We had also wanted some scrambling, and a work colleague Paul Thomas had suggested Fools Peak. This included some out-of-this-world camping by an alpine lake and was very accessible. We had also planned to climb Mount Elbert, Colorado’s tallest mountain, but changed plans due to tiredness, which showed we made the most of our time!

While this account is prompted by a Shutterfly photo book I created shortly after the hike, so much of this adventure remains vivid in my memory. This Google map shows our locations and includes .gpx tracks.

Day 1: Arrive Denver Airport and stay at hotel
Days 2–6: Hike the Capitol Creek / Snowmass Loop
Days 7–9: Hike Fools Peak
Day 10: Drive up Mount Evans; fly home

A map showing our ten days with Denver Airport top right.

Preparation

There are three aspects to the preparation. The first was the itinerary and the internet helped me create a robust, detailed plan. While the Capitol Creek Circuit is not a formal loop, there were unofficial accounts that gave sufficient guidance. There are more now. We did not require any prior permits. Camping permits are now required in some areas. The second aspect is what to take. We had momentum on our equipment after Big Bend. We did not upgrade anything but purchased the required bear box. The third aspect is fitness. Our hectic schedules didn’t leave much time but kept me active. I squeezed in some practice hikes on the flat land around home but nothing hard core.

Our relatively heavy gear in conjunction with the bear box led to a combined dry weight of 38 lbs. I was still packing for some of my fears. The “luxury” item was a tarp shelter (1.2lb rainfly above) which was most welcomed in a couple of rainstorms, and I included an upgraded version in a subsequent Colorado trip.

Food! Some worked very well and some less so. On subsequent trips, I would try harder to reduce the future trash weight before leaving. Also, I later discovered that coffee triggers my altitude sickness, so I wean myself off that for future high elevation trips and take Diamox.

Preparing the food on my bedroom floor at home.

I started tracking the weight of worn clothes as you have to carry these and is somewhere I had “hidden” weight previously! We learned to love hiking poles, though I broke one on the second day of this trek. We were still in our heavy boots, and trail runners would have been fine, if not better, for all parts of this trip.

Day 1: Arrive in Denver

We stayed the first night at a hotel in Denver as it was 5400ft in elevation, so we had some initial altitude acclimatization. I was worried about altitude sickness as we would hike to over 12,000 ft and we didn’t have much time to adjust. We did not have prior experience at altitude. We picked up a regular 2WD hire car from the airport which worked well for our plans. We had checked our backpacks on the plane inside large tote bags for protection, but had been unable to bring fuel, a lighter, or bear spray.

Day 2: Final Purchases, Warm-up Hike, and First Night at Capitol Lake Camp

We arrived at the REI in Dillon when it opened at 9am to buy the supplies we could not fly with. This included two 3.5 oz gas canisters, though one sufficed. I also got bear spray which also ended up being dead weight.

I planned a warm-up hike from Dillon. The plan was to climb Buffalo Mountain at 12,781 ft to help acclimatization, using the strategy of sleeping below your highest point of the day. The hike started though some recently burnt forest from a June forest fire, which was a new experience for us. However, the weather was rainy, and we were keen to start the proper hike, so we turned around without reaching the summit. I’m unsure how much this hike helped but it was still fun.

Our hike part of the way up Buffalo Mountain. We hiked 4 miles over 3 1/4 hours from 9,747 ft to 11,254 ft., statistics thanks to my trusty Garmin!

The view back down to Dillon Reservoir showing the forest fire’s scarring

Bluebells growing back amongst the charred forest remnants, less than two months after the fire.

After the warmup, we drove via Snowmass to the Capitol Creek trailhead which is at the end of a dirt road that we drove with no issues.

The map of our route, starting at the trailhead on the far left. We headed out on the lower trail and returned on the upper one.
Note that “north” is to the left of the map

There were maybe twenty cars in the parking lot. I think most were for people camping along Capitol Creek or climbing Capitol Peak. The peak is the most dangerous Colorado 14er with fatalities each year. It was not part of our plan!

The trailhead with Capitol Peak in the background. My pack started at 30 lbs. and Samuel’s at 27 lbs. No advance permits were required for this hike though you needed to collect one at the trailhead. We chose to take the “Capitol Ditch Trail” from the parking lot as it followed a contour resulting in less elevation change.

Much of our hiking over the next few days was in Wilderness areas which have protections which helps keep them special, while also indicating they are worth visiting!

Given the remoteness of the area and it being a “wilderness,” we were surprised to find cows. These ones were too busy eating. We will revisit cows later!

There were plenty of these looking at us, and we later learned they are marmots, not beavers!

I like signs that confirm we are in the right place!

There was a designated campsite close to Capitol Lake. We arrived late so I think we were lucky it was empty. Now, it requires prior reservation. This picture shows the permit from the trailhead, hanging of my red backpack. It also shows the tarp shelter which is for a hammock (which we did not have). It was awkward and I later upgraded to a regular rectangular one. The picture also shows the bear box, which is required in this area, but we did not see any bears.
The hike into the campsite was 6.3 miles which took 3.5 hours. We camped at 11,520 ft. Even though we hiked twice in the day, we recovered well during the break between the hikes as we drove to Capitol Creek trailhead. However, we arrived at nightfall – this photo is from the following morning.

Day 3: Capitol Lake Camp to Silver Pass

In the morning, we woke to fantastic views of the sunrise catching Capitol Peak.

We decided to break camp and eat breakfast as we filtered water from the lake.

As we hiked, the view of the peak and lake opened up. We had to rock hop over a boulder field, and I inadvertently wedged a hiking pole between two rocks, and the rocks won! That pole became dead weight for the rest of this hike!

Pretty flowers find a way to push through the rocks.

We could hear and see rocks falling down the cliffs. There were climbers above us, and snow was melting.

The view back from Capitol Pass, and the view on the other side.

Looking back at Capitol Pass under Capitol Peak, that we had hiked through. We chose against taking a side hike to Avalanche Lake as we were a bit short on time and today was already going to be a long day.

More bluebells, or lupins as they are called locally. The flowers and the wildlife made the trip extra special. August is a good time to visit these mountains, though you need to be careful of the afternoon storms.

Nutella helped keep us going. We were in a bit of a rush to ensure we got over Silver Pass before any storms came.

After going over the second pass (between Capitol and Silver), the trail slowly descends before crossing over East Fork Avalanche Creek. This was the only time we went off trail on the whole trip (i.e. were lost). We were not routinely navigating by GPS, to save battery, and just recording with my watch. Our GPS track shows that, for some reason, I turned right when the trail did not. After a few minutes, we realized we were not following a trail, so we used the GPS to get back. Other than this mistake, the navigation of the whole loop was easy.

The view down the other side of Silver Pass. This was the highest of three passes we hiked over this day at 12260 ft (per CalTopo).
We had rushed to make this pass before storms came, and now we had to rush to get off the ridge!

We were fortunate to find a suitable campsite and set up our shelter and tent before the storm came through with plenty of thunder, lightning, and hail. We were very glad that we were not on the ridge.

Our campsite for the night, looking back up Silver Pass.
We had hiked 11.5 miles over 10.5 hours and had gained over 3,000 ft in elevation. We were happy to rest! Our plan had been to continue to Geneva Lake for this night, but we were happy to stop, and our plan was flexible enough to allow it.

Day 4: Silver Creek to Snowmass Creek

This was our longest day with a tremendous variety of trails and views. Our track shared the trail with the Four Pass loop for a section which is very popular and was the only time in the loop when we consistently saw other people. There is quite a bit of road walking along FS315 from the Silver Creek trailhead to the Geneva Lake trailhead (aka Lead King Basin Trailhead). There is a “Meadow Mountain Traverse” that avoids the roadwalk, but I did not know about it at the time. Routes on CalTopo show what others have done.

The walk to the Silver Creek trailhead and subsequent gravel-road walk to the Geneva Lake trailhead were straightforward with great weather and views.

From the Geneva Lake trail, you hear and see this outflow from the lake.

After a steep climb, Geneva Lake opens up in front of Snowmass Mountain. Snowmass was another side trip that I had considered but decided against.
We crossed the river that enters the lake at the top end.

There are several designated sites around the lake. We noticed tents in a couple of them. This had been our original plan for the night before and it would have been great, but I misjudged how long the hike would be. The sites now require prior reservation.

Crossing the creek at the top of the lake was cold!
We had brought shoes specifically for this crossing and later ones. Samuel brought some slides which absorbed water (adding weight), so that was a lesson for next time! If hiking in boots, as we were, we did not want to get them waterlogged as they would take too long to dry out. Now, we hike in trail runners which dry out much quicker, so I’m more willing to get them wet!

The hike up from Geneva Lake is in trees. After cresting the ridge, you can see across the valley to Trail Rider Pass, which is the highest point on this loop at 12,402 ft. This loop shares the trail with the busy Four Pass Loop between here and Snowmass Lake. We could see several groups of people on the trail.

We marched along the trail and up the hill to Trail Riders. After multiple days alone, we felt these other groups of people were tourists, so we had to power past them :). It seemed that most people were struggling with the climb/altitude/pack weight.

On the top of Trail Riders, Samuel was nearly blown away. Really!

The views are why the Four Pass Loop is so popular. Our loop sees the best bits!

Snowmass Mountain at 14,092 ft towering over Snowmass Lake at 10,980 ft. The area was busy. Our original plan was to camp here but we prefer solitude. We filtered water and moved on.

We were able to walk over Snowmass Lake’s outflow without getting our feet wet. The outflow is Snowmass Creek, which we followed down into the valley and camped next to.

The Four Pass Loop goes from Buckskin Pass to Trail Rider Pass via Snowmass Lake. Instead of heading to Buckskin Pass, we left the crowds behind and headed downhill into the Snowmass Creek valley.

The Snowmass Creek valley has a wide, flat floodplain with several lakes.

There were what appeared to be beaver dams in the river, though we only saw marmots like this one.

The trail crosses Snowmass Creek after several miles. There was a beaver dam at the same spot, but it looked insecure. We were very tired so took the low-risk route.

Our campsite was right next to where the trail crossed the creek.
We had walked 14.6 miles in a little under 12 hours with an elevation gain of 3,000 ft. It had been a long, tough day. My original plan had been to camp at Snowmass Lake, having hiked there from Geneva Lake. Even though we had walked to Snowmass Lake from further than Geneva Lake, the crowds at Snowmass Lake encouraged us to keep hiking. The campsite above, where the trail crosses the creek, was the first viable campsite after Snowmass Lake, and it had obviously been used previously.

We laid out all of the food that we had left. The largest pile at the bottom left of the picture is our trash.
We enjoyed a bigger supper than normal, but the highlight was lying down in bed!

Day 5: Snowmass Creek to Capitol Creek

We woke up knowing that we were more than halfway. The plan was to camp close to the car, and we were already closer to that than the plan. First, we made the most of the peace and a beautiful sunrise.

The early sun lights up the mountain tops first.

We didn’t get a shadow-silhouette picture this trip. But I was pretty happy with this reflection in the pool just above our campsite.

It was a relaxed walk following Snowmass Creek down the valley.

After a few miles, there is a left turn off the trail that goes through the river. We changed into our river shoes again for the easy but wet crossing.

After the creek, there is a long climb up to Haystacks Pass. Much of it was through beautiful Aspen forest.

We made way for this group of horses that were heading in to set up a “glamping” camp for some customers.

We made it to the top of Haystacks Pass at 11,645 ft., though it had been a 3,000 ft. climb. It was all downhill from here!

Downhill included a few obstacles. They seemed friendly enough, but we walked around them as much as we could.

We could see Capitol Peak again, so we knew we were on the final leg.

This sign confirmed we were on the final leg, but the face is saying that “all downhill” isn’t necessarily much fun!

As the land flattened out in the Capitol Creek valley, we noticed trampled vegetation. A herd of cows ran past, which got us concerned about where to pitch the tent.

This spot seemed to be a good spot to avoid a cow trampling!

Beef for dinner seemed appropriate.
And that was the end of Day 5 which had been a long 15.6 miles taking 12 hours with over 3,000 ft elevation gain.

Day 6: Capitol Creek to Trailhead; Eagle Best Western

Having avoided a cow trampling in the night, it was a short and flat hike out to the car of a couple of miles that took us about an hour. The only challenge was getting over Capitol Creek. Well, not much of a challenge for one of us!

Back at the car, our packs were 24lb and 18lb dry having started at 16lb and 22 lb. We had each “gained” a couple of pounds. That was probably a combination of trash (weighed with the food at the beginning), some clothing, and not measuring everything. It shows the ease of a pound of two slipping in!

Overall, we had hiked 48.7 miles over 4.5 days with an elevation gain of 12,869 ft. It had been epic!

This map at the trailhead showed most of our route, except for the final leg from Maroon Snowmass Trail to Capitol Creek Trail over Haystacks.

We were back on our plan which was to stay at the Best Western in Eagle as the location was convenient to Fools Peak. We enjoyed a fine dinner with desert at The Eagle Diner and enjoyed the hotel beds very much!

Day 7: Eagle Best Western to Lake Charles

It was time for adventure #2. Dziezynski’s Best Summit Hikes in Colorado describes the route that we took though he admits that he could not find the source of the name Fools Peak. We adjusted our packs a little, leaving behind a couple of things, restocking food, and adding our climbing helmets as we were looking forward to some healthy scrambling. We had a relaxed morning before driving to the trailhead at Fulford Cave campground. While most visitors are here for the cave, we were heading back into the Wilderness.

We were still feeling the effort from the previous days.

That rock looks like a great place for a nap!

When we arrived at Lake Charles, we walked to the top edge where we found the perfect campsite. This Google map shows our locations and includes .gpx tracks.

The map of our trip. The trailhead is off the top left corner of the map.

This was our campsite. The large log beyond the tent was where we cooked. This was our “basecamp” for two nights. We spotted a couple of other tents around the lake, but we felt like we had all of this to ourselves.

Fools Peak, which we named Kangaroo Rock due to the shape of some lingering show.
We debated whether it was a false peak, but Samuel has been more than happy to remind me how wrong I was as I thought it was false until we could see the tent from the top.

We aligned the tent so we could watch the sunset over the lake.

Good night!
It had been an easy day with 6.2 miles of hiking taking 5.5 hours with 1800 ft of elevation gain.

Day 8: Lake Charles to Fools Peak and Back

With the threat of storms always present and being uncertain about how long it would take to climb Fools Peak, we were up well before dawn so we could hike to the bottom of the scramble for first light.

This is our profile. We attempted a side trip to Eagle Peak but abandoned it.

Pre-dawn over Lake Charles from our tent.

Reflections of the cliffs below Eagle Peak in Mystic Island Lake. The reflections were near perfect as the water was so still.

The climb is a long Class 2 scramble which is what we were looking for. That means that you often required hands to climb but the risk of a dangerous fall was low, reducing any need for ropes. The helmet is mostly for protection from any falling rocks.
Samuel was in his element!

Once in the rocks, you found your own way. I had read route suggestions from previous people’s reports and had brought notes of the important ones.

As we climbed, the view of Mystic Island Lake, and her island, opened up. The sun had still not reached us.

This large snowdrift had not melted yet, but there was no snow or ice on the route we took. We broke surface ice to reach some water for filtering.

We reached the saddle between Eagle Peak and Fools Peak at 10am.

Dziezynski’s guide describes the hike to the 13,043 ft. Eagle Peak from the saddle as “a class 2 traverse covering 0.8 mile.” There was no sign of any storms, so it seemed too easy not to do!

We got about halfway to Eagle Peak when we both decided we had had enough. The whole route was large talus rocks, some wobbly, but all difficult. With our tired legs from earlier in the week, we did not fancy falling. It was a shame to turn around, but we still had Fools Peak to summit.

We made it over to Fools Peak without incident.

The view down to Lake Charles from Fools Peak. Samuel was convinced he could see the tent!

View from the top after signing the peak register.

Samuel’s snack had an appropriate motivation message!

After enjoying the peak for a while, it was time to descend. the descent was a cross between small talus and scree.

We decided to hike most of the way out as we still had plenty of energy.
This day we spent 12.5 hours hiking 10.2 miles with an elevation gain of 2,500 ft.

Overall, the Fools Peak trip was 16.8 miles over 2.5 days with an elevation gain of 4,500 ft.

Day 9 & 10: Frisco Holiday Inn, Mt Evans, and Home

We started day 9 with a leisurely 2-mile hike out to the car and then headed to Frisco’s Holiday Inn (now The Grand Hotel), which had space even though we had not reserved. We played chess for about two hours on Starbucks’s patio which had amazing views of the surrounding mountains. We also enjoyed the hotel’s pool.

The relaxation made us realize we did not have another big climb in us. The plan was a 2am start for a 4,000 ft climb up Mt Elbert before heading to the airport. We both realized enough was enough. However, we still wanted to summit our first 14er, so decided to drive up Mt Evans the following morning “on the way” to the airport.

Yes, I can climb a mountain in flip flops, if we drive 99% of the way…

We headed to the airport satisfied. We had completed two amazing hikes. I’m still not sure what made these two hikes quite so memorable as I try to repeat the recipe, but I think it was a combination of many factors that prevent it being so easily repeatable. Three years later, Samuel and I returned to Colorado to complete the 160-mile Collegiate Loop which was fantastic in different ways. With Samuel now based in Golden on the western outskirts of Denver for college, we need to make the most of this opportunity. With that in mind, I have some ideas for this August, six years after the above trip, and we will see if we can replicate the fun!