7/8/06 – Keller Mountain – East Ridge

9.5 miles, 3780'


Erin and I had a wonderful trip to the San Juans before the Fourth of July, but we only had one day to climb on the following weekend before Erin left for Mexico and I returned to Pittsburgh. Both John Kirk and Kurt Traskos were on board for the climb. I struggled all week to try to decide on a peak. For me, it was much easier to choose when I was living in Colorado than it's been since I moved away. Do I go to the Sangres, and see if I can handle a 6,000-foot day on Columbia Point? Should I try something in the Front Range, like Elk Tooth and Ogalalla? Or maybe fulfill a desire to finally take a second trip to the Holy Cross Wilderness? Eventually I became paralyzed; with so many choices, so many conflicting desires, I couldn't make a decision.

Fortunately, our friend Kurt still lives in Colorado, and he came up with some great ideas. The one he was leaning toward most was Keller Mountain in the Gore Range. I had become familiar with Keller through Gerry Roach's site and through Jon Bradford's SummitPost page. Roach terms Keller's class-3 east ridge a "Classic", and Jon has some kind words for it, as well, so we all easily agreed on which route to take. The Gore Range is fraught with access problems along the Blue River on its heavily settled eastern flanks. The North Rock Creek drainage, however is one of the few exceptions, with a good road leading to a public trailhead, which keeps the round trip distance very reasonable. We all met at John's house that morning at 4:30, and we got to see his cool, new truck. Kurt was kind enough to give us all a ride in the expansive opulence of his Tahoe, and we yukked it up along the drive in.

The weather had been abnormal in Denver pretty much all week, with massive amounts of rain causing flooding and even setting loose a car-crushing boulder. I didn't get to see the Front Range from town for my entire trip! The weird weather was scheduled to continue during our climb, so we didn't have high hopes of avoiding the rain. We arrived at the trailhead, which is just 9 miles north of Silverthorne, and started the hike at 6:30. Almost immediately, a mosquito managed to bite me not once, but twice on the chin, an omen for the next hour. Erin and I fought to keep moving at a swift enough pace both to avoid the mosquitoes and keep up with John and Kurt. We arrived at the old mine mentioned in our route descriptions while in view of the other mine shown on the map, and here we saw a cairn marking the right-turn for the trail that gains Keller's east ridge. Once atop the ridge, we turned left and made the easy bushwhack toward treeline. Kurt was busy recapturing his musical youth with his new iPod. I'm hoping this is a fad for him because I'm not sure I like iPod-Kurt as much; he's hard to talk to! You gotta yell at him, and then he still might not hear you! :-D

We had arrived at the beginning of the talus climb, with the snaking east ridge allowing us a look at our goal, and at around 12,000' the wind was fast enough that the mosquitos finally died down. Now that we were really gaining elevation in earnest, Erin and I would spend the rest of the climb playing catch-up with John and Kurt. It's amazing what just a year at low elevation can do to you! It's hard to keep pace with our Colorado friends! The rock was wet and slippery, so I took great care as I ascended toward the first false summit on Keller's east ridge. Our beautiful surroundings would be typically hidden that day, but as we climbed that first section of the ridge that morning, we did get great views of "Peak Z" and the beautiful "Grand Traverse" peaks, as well as a tantalizing glimpse deeper into the core of the range. We met Kurt and John at the top, and then we began the fun part of the ridge. It started to rain, and the rock was getting wetter, which made the ridge a little spicier than I had envisioned. I found myself moving very slowly and deliberately on sections of the ridge that, on a different day, I'd cruise through. Once atop the second false summit, I knew from the route descriptions that the most challenging section of the ridge was now upon us.

To me this section of the ridge felt a lot like the traverse between Mount Helen and Father Dyer in the Tenmile Range, with its related geology and similarly notched ridge. If you liked climbing that Helen/Dyer ridge, you'd really enjoy Keller's east ridge as well. As we approached the crux notches in the ridge, I was now beyond my comfort level. I haven't done a ridge scramble like this in almost a year, not since my last climb in Rocky Mountain National Park in August, I believe. For my first ridge traverse in a year to occur on wet rock was not something I would have wished for. Erin was still within her comfort zone, however, and she took the lead from me during a few sections. It was nice to be relieved of the mental duty of routefinding for a while because John and Kurt had pulled so far ahead that I hadn't been able to watch where they were going most of the time.

Once upon the crux notches, we caught back up with John and Kurt. Kurt had gone up a tower that left him with a tough downclimb, so Erin and I slipped around the south side of the tower and into the notch. Meanwhile, John figured out a way to backtrack down to the notch where we were. Climbing out of this notch featured the toughest move of the day. I imagine we could have figured out a way to avoid it by staying on the south side of the ridge, but that option didn't look pleasant. The general consensus on this move was that it was fourth-class. I was the last to climb it, and I screwed up while I did it. I didn't test one of my holds, and it flaked off right in my hand. I had three other points of contact, so I was fine, but it definitely took me off guard.

Once out of this notch, I believe there were one or two more to negotiate before the ridge became easy again for the final 250' ascent to Keller's summit. Once there, we partook in Kurt's baba ghanoush, and signed the register, which no one had signed in all of 2005! There were a couple of parties who had already signed it in 2006, however. We spent a few minutes talking about our descent route. I was wiped out, and now I can't even remember if I faced opposition in this from anyone, but I do recall being resolute in my opinion that we not go back via our ascent route. We checked our maps and decided to descend Keller's south ridge briefly before descending loose-ish slopes, passing to the left of a large fin that protrudes from the slopes and heading toward the unnamed lake at 11,660'. We got in a number of fun boot glissades, passing by a beautifully narrow couloir on the left, and a more laid-back looking couloir on the right. We all took slightly different paths to get to the shores of the pristine alpine lake where we grouped up for the bushwhack.

I was leery of the forthcoming bushwhack, mostly because of some of Roach's hilarious comments about how a Gore Range bushwhack is different from those elsewhere in Colorado: "...you do not saunter gleefully through the open trees of a Bambi Forest." As it turned out, I think that Roach was talking about bushwhacking uphill in the Gore Range. Heading downhill, though not trivial, was nowhere near as bad as I had feared. That said, our pace was right around where he said it would be: less than a mile an hour.

From the lake, Erin found a game trail that led down to the open meadows below. All of our jaws just dropped as we entered the meadows. There was just so much water and so much green! The passing mists gave things a more intimate feel, and Kurt commented that it looked like the right amount of drama for a John Fielder photo. We all agreed. Kurt was unrestrained in his desire to hike along the creek as long as we could, so after making sure this made sense on the map, we followed along. Kurt was right; it was gorgeous and truly the highlight of the day. The falling rain only heightened the feeling that we were in a watery wonderland (the rain also had the beneficial effect of keeping the mosquitos away!). I can't remember the last time I've hiked a peak on such a wet, rainy day. I guess this is what it feels like to live in Washington state!

Endless pools, marshes, waterfalls, outcrops, and cliffs filled our senses for the next couple of hours, as we descended along North Rock Creek. There was a new surprise around every turn: the pair of separate waterfalls dramatically reaching a confluence; the low-lying, glaciated knobs and ridges that reminded me of Rocky Mountain Nat'l Park; the hidden pond seemingly dammed by large boulders; or the waterfall slipping over a cliff to join the main watercourse. John and Kurt were wearing shoes that day, so between the dripping-wet undergrowth, the rain, and the marshy terrain, their feet were completely waterlogged. Consequently they soon opted to simply hike directly through some of the pools we faced. They got interesting perspectives on some of the cascades, I'm sure! Erin and I, both of us wearing waterproof boots, held out much longer, but finally we faced a pool that blocked our path. We could either walk through it, or backtrack a ways to circumvent it. We went with the former; what a hoot! I only wish I had taken the plunge sooner!

Sadly, the time came when we had to leave the confines of the creek and head across the drainage to locate our trail. We entered a field dotted with red-orange Indian paintbrush before we reached a meadow that was completely choked with deadfall. It reminded Kurt of Spanish Creek in the Sangre de Cristos. The sheer power of the avalanches that must have contributed to this mess of felled trees awed me. It was tricky moving through this meadow, because you were never certain whether your foot was about to land solidly on some deadfall hidden by dense grasses, or if you were about to step straight through those grasses.

Next, we crossed some talus and found cairns, which helped us locate a social trail. I thought this section of trail was grueling, with numerous ups and downs and deadfall blocking the way just about every other step. It left me wondering if this trail was taking more effort than had we continued the bushwhack! Finally, we arrived at the mine where we had split off that morning, and then we only had a short hike back to the vehicles. We got back to the trailhead at around 2 p.m.

We all ate together at Dillon Dam Brewery that afternoon while our thoughts turned to Dwight and Sarah. We wondered how they had fared on the Pettingell/Citadel traverse in this sub-par weather. Quite successfully, as we were to find out! While we ate, Erin and I enjoyed the company of our friends while they talked about what they could climb the next day. All in all, this was a fun climb and coupled with the awesome hike out, I'd rank it among my top ten favorites. Thanks for the suggestion, Kurt, and thanks, John, for joining us and being so flexible with your plans!