San Juan Range Date: After getting into Durango we stayed at a motel and ate at an excellent Mexican restaurant in the downtown called Franciscos. We got up early (for me) the next morning and took the early train from the station. We got dropped off around midday at the Needleton station and began our hike in. We took a nice casual pace going the 8 miles to our camp in the Chicago Baisin. We got up in the Basin at a great campsite right before the trail gets pretty steep, under the waterfall on the rock slabs. There was no one else in sight in the whole Basin until we hiked above the waterfall and saw a solo guy camped out. He had ski gear (Telemark? AT?) and crampons and was going to do Eolus the next day. He had a nice Bibler tent and the marmots chewed a hole through the bottom so they could eat his Therm-a-rest. We heeded his warnings, and anyone else going into there should also. We hung all of our gear in trees everyday when we went climbing but still had a few clothes get chewed on. We got our alpine start the next morning before the sun came up and worked our way up the sometimes steep trail to Twin Lakes. The lakes were still frozen over and were closed to camping at the time. We continued on trying to figure out which peak was which as we went into the valley between Sunlight and Windom. We made it to the South Slopes and had everyone go their own pace (I was last, I wasn't hydrated). It was a simple climb up the slope, but the altitude was slowing me down. I made it to the top of the slope and thought the famous summit block was right there. Ben appeared and said he went to the top already and it was a little ways away. Scrambling the 50 yards to the summit block was a little harder due to the snow and ice. I made it to the summit block and put my harness on, put a runner on a boulder, and made a carabiner belay. My oldest brother was the first to summit and went up the slab on the left side. Casey, my Dad Tom, and I went after him. It is rather exposed on the other side of the summit block so we did use the rope. Ben and I stood on the summit while Casey and my Dad sprawled out. We all went back to the snow slope and got our shells on for one of the most enjoyable glissades in my life. There were a few rocks and one small drop off to deal with, but it was very fun in the soft spring snow. At the bottom of the slope we started our climb of Windom Peak We started climbing up another slope of spring snow leading up to a semi-saddle between Windom and Peak 10?. Traversing back and forth helped save energy on this short snow slope. Once on Windom's West ridge we had an enjoyable hike up snow and rock to the summit. This ridge was easy, but interesting and soon led us to the summit. I once again followed everyone else and arrived last at the summit, which was an interesting array of boulders, snow cornices and cliffs. We started descending down the ridge and continued down the slopes to the valley, this time doing a lot of hiking. There had been an approaching storm when we were climbing up Windom that started thundering loudly when we made it to the lower slopes. As we hiked out above the twin lakes back to camp by brother Ben climbed up a snow slope for an "extreme" glissade. We made it back to camp ready for a nice rest day the next day before climbing Eolus. The next morning Ben and I decided we wanted to use the snowshoes we had lugged up to the camp. We headed up through the trees above our camp and soon made it to timberline. We took out the map and pointed out Columbine Pass above us and decided to go higher. We kept going higher and higher up the snow slopes until we decided to climb a peak in the region. I forgot my sunglasses today and was suffering pretty well for it. We continued up the snow until we got to some rock and ditched the snowshoes. We started scrambling up the loose San Juan rock and I started to get nervous. Every sizable rock was loose as we scrambled up steep scree. A fall here would send one of us tumbling down steep rocky slopes with no chance of arresting a fall. My fears aside, we continued up the scree to meet a ridge line. This wild ridge had exposure on one side and many interesting gendarmes that required route finding around them. It was on the ridge Ben found a rock the size of a water bottle that was unlike all the other rocks around there. He brought it with him all the way back to the train and still has it around. The ridge turned to snow the last couple hundred feet and Ben let me lead. This peak had certainly not been climbed that season so every step I took I was breaking new trail. We reached the summit, had great views of the three fourteeners and took some pictures. We descended the same route with some interesting scree skiing in the rock section. Once we got to the snowshoes we didn't have a great descent since conditions weren't conductive to glissading so I resorted to exhausting plunge stepping. We made it back to camp to get rested for the biggest climb of the trip, Mt. Eolus. We got an alpine start and started up the same trail we had followed before up towards twin lakes. Before the lakes we veering left into a big basin under Eolus. The basin provided low-angled simple hiking until we got to the top of it. At the top of the basin we looked straight up at the face we would be getting on later and headed right (North) up a snow field that narrowed down at the top. After climbing this slope we started ascending towards Eolus up to the saddle between it and North Eolus. At the saddle we got to the famous "catwalk" ridge and put a rope on for a little ease of mind (not needed). After the short airy traverse we were now on the east face close to the ridge. There are many random cairns on this route which we didn't follow closely up the face and had to do some 4th class moves. I was really scared at the prospect of falling considering this was my 4th fourteener and I wasn't comfortable in my clunky boots on the rock. I was really releaved to see my brother at the summit after some of the harder moves of my route. We did the usual summit routine and started descending down the face again. I closely followed the cairns this time and didn't have too hard of a time making it down. We descended to camp, slept another night and caught the train back to Durango the next morn. Back To Fourteeners Back to Dan's Basecamp |
| Sunlight Peak/Windom Peak/ Mount Eolus Trip Report |
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| Above: Me on Eolus. This part was more exposed than the picture shows. Below: Me on the summit of Windom. |