For me, I usually spend less time adventuring when snow begins to fall. This is not because I dislike snow, rather, I merely don’t have a lot of experience dealing with it. An REI gift card recently reminded me “adventure has no off season.” With this lovely adage in mind, I decided to try an […]
Read more "Going Coastal"My car whined and groaned in pain as we drove up the county road toward the trailhead of the standard route up Grays and Torreys Peak. “It’s OK, lil’ Subaru,” I reassured the struggling automobile, “you’ve done this before.” Grays and Torreys, by way of their novice and popular standard route, were my fourth and […]
Read more "Aurora Torreyalis"This past December, at the start of my last winter break, I struck out for a summit attempt of Horseshoe Mountain. This peak is aptly named for its horseshoe-like curvature and can be seen rising high above the South Park Basin, just southwest of Fairplay. It’s Colorado’s 72nd-largest ranked mountain, standing proud at 13,898 feet. […]
Read more "Leavick All Behind"Missouri Mountain, Iowa Peak, and Emerald Peak Grand Slam ~15.5 miles round-trip; 6,300′ elevation gain. The turn to Chaffe County Road 390 and its subsequent vexatious washboard ruts felt all too familiar. Five months ago, I had kicked off the 14er season with ascents of Mt. Belford and Mt. Oxford—two of the three 14ers […]
Read more "Sawatch Me Do Three"El Diente Peak. A high mountain summit within the San Juan Range named for its tooth-like visage (El Diente translates to “The Tooth” in Spanish). If this peak is the tooth of the San Juans, then these mountains have clearly forgotten their oral hygiene. El Diente Peak, and its neighboring summits of Mt. Wilson and […]
Read more "Tooth Decay"I vividly remember the first time I knowingly laid eyes on Mt. Ouray (pronounced ooo-ray). Last summer, the Overcast Adventurers had the opportunity to explore the vast reaches of Colorado on a biology class trip called Ecoregions (a blog for which can be found here). It was on the first day of that two-week journey […]
Read more "Labor Day Ouray Soirée"East Slopes. 14.5 miles RT. 4,500′ gain. 6 hours. 20 minutes. High above the iconic Colorado mountain town of Leadville stands Mt. Massive—an aptly named wall of a mountain and several of its constituent sub-summits. It is the third highest peak in the contiguous United States, which is certainly not hard to believe when […]
Read more "Massive Aggressive"The Crestone Needle and Crestone Peak Standard Routes: The South Face of both. To begin, I’ll say despite a myriad of successful summits before this weekend, I’m not a particularly experienced climber. Sure, I’ve done Wetterhorn and the Sawtooth Ridge, but my experience on class three and four climbs is reasonably limited. How’d this all […]
Read more "Trip Report: Sangre De Crestones"On August 30th we (Tyler, Skyler, and Tshering) hiked Wetterhorn Peak. It wasn’t the conventional route, but perhaps a more exciting one. We left from Gunnison, CO at about 3:30 AM. The drive up to Lake City, and up Engineer Pass, was clear. We parked at the fork for the Henson Creek Road. It’s possible […]
Read more "Trip Report: The Non-Standard Route"Mt. Sherman and Challenger Point. The Wednesday started as so many do: promptly waking up at 7AM for a dentist appointment and an oil change. I had requested both Wednesday and Thursday off, and I figured that after my morning appointments on Wednesday I could take a few friends out to the Sangre De Cristo […]
Read more "Trip Report: An Unlikely Pair"
The Overcast Adventurers 