From: ajs@hpfcly.HP.COM (Alan Silverstein (visitor))
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.