Displaying items by tag: Mount Massive

I had fully intended to climb the Centennial French Mountain this weekend, but plans change. My climbing partner Sarah and I left Colorado Springs at around 3:45 AM and reached the North Halfmoon Creek Trailhead at 6:15 or so. A pretty late start for this guy! In order to climb French Mountain, we would need to cross North Halfmoon Creek and head south. When we reached the creek, it was easily up to our waist and I had no intention of driving my Jeep through that deep of a creek crossing. A decision was quickly made to abandon our attempt on French Mountain and head up the scenic and steep Southwest Slopes route for Mount Massive. Since I had done this route back in October of 2009 (trip report here), I knew the way and was fine with repeating it, especially since my partner still needed to climb Massive. We parked the Jeep and packed up and readied ourselves for our first climb of the year. I was hopeful that I would make it to the top (you might think I'm joking) because the last mountain I had ascended was Pyramid Peak, which was my 14er finisher last year. I was also quite eager to test drive my new photography equipment, since I had not really had a chance to take it on a real climb yet. For this hike, I wielded my Nikon D800 and my Nikkor 24-70 f/2.8 lens, a heavy combination to be sure. Would the extra weight of a full-frame DSLR and the quite heavy yet amazing 24-70 be worth it? I was hoping so.

Sarah posed nicely for me so I could document the day's beginning and in turn she took a shot of me, looking weary.

For the sake of ease, I decided to leave my tripod behind. The sucker weighs 5 pounds and I figured it would not be something I could use a whole lot on this hike. Good choice.

Sarah and I traveled up the basin towards Mount Oklahoma, which I climbed last year. I was beginning to get quite familiar with this area! Mount Oklahoma was looking quite nice and seemed to be holding quite a bit of snow as compared to last year, which was nice to see.

Mount Massive's south slopes are pretty darned steep but also a very pretty backdrop to the Colorado blue skies that we have been sorely missing due to all of the wildfires this year.

As we continued up the basin, we stopped periodically to look back up the basin that we would have gone up to climb French Mountain, pictured here.

The trail going up towards Oklahoma and the turn-off for Mount Massive is very straight-forward and well- maintained. For a season starter, it was a nice change of pace. 

We finally reached the turn-off for Mount Massive, pictured here where Sarah is pointing up.

This trail gets you up Massive in a hurry, no doubt about it. It is fairly steep, but in very good condition almost the whole way up. I think that Colorado 14ers Initiative did some work on this trail some time back, and it certainly shows. The trail switches back up the side of Mount Massive several times and affords awesome views of the valley below and the awesome peaks across the way, including Colorado's highest, Mount Elbert.

As we approached tree-line, we decided to stop for a snack and water break.

I have Sarah take a photo of me posing with my Rocky Mountain Field Institute (RMFI) water bottle. I'm a very proud member of the board of directors for RMFI. If you're not familiar with RMFI, you need to check them out! If you've ever climbed Humboldt, Crestone Peak or Crestone Needle, then you're familiar with the work they have done in the backcountry.

After re-fueling, we decide to keep on trucking. The trail winds steeply up the slopes and kept on delivering us with awesome views to our south of Deer Mountain and Mount Champion.

The whole valley below made for a very nice panoramic. From left to right - Mount Elbert, French Mountain, Unnammed pointy peak (but Sarah and I later dubbed this a very foul and childish name to keep up entertained), Mount Champion, Deer Mountain and Mount Oklahoma.

We took our time going up, being the first climb of the season. We enjoyed the views, the company, the conversation, the wilderness.

We were even able to locate some wildlife, albeit your normal fanfare of chipmunks and marmots. 

Getting a day to spend with Sarah was awesome. She's one of the most dynamic and fun people I've ever met. Our personalities go together quite nicely. It is also great to see her in high spirits when we're hiking.

We took a lot of stops to soak in the Sawatch Range glory, and the weather was holding quite nicely.

Here's that stealth marmot. I think he thought if he layed down I would not see him. Nice try pal.

Finally the tips of the distant Elk Mountains were coming into view. They seemed like they were holding a lot of snow as well.

And looking back, Twin Lakes was starting to come into view.

This is always my favorite part of hiking. Above tree-line, no wind, sunny day. What more could you ask for than a day like that on the side of a 14er? Sarah seemed to be enjoying the views as much as me.

We stopped for a bit to enjoy the killer views of the Elk Mountains, which are some of my favorites. The tips of the Maroon Bells, Snowmass and Capital were poking above the top of Mount Oklahoma to the west.

From here, the trail continues up the southwest slopes and crosses east at the ridge. The town of Leadville comes into view to the east.

And of course the summit of Mount Massive to the north, with a lot of people coming down.

After a quick stroll over to the summit, victory was ours. We were able to almost completely avoid snow for the entirety of the hike up, minus a few snowfields below and some minor snow at ths summit. This was Sarah's 24th 14er and my 60th I think. It was awesome sharing the summit with Sarah again. 

On the top, we ran into a group of gear testers from Osprey packs. We were immediately filled with envy that their job was to test the comfort of packs while hiking 14ers.

From the summit, I decided to try out some long exposure photos using a 9-stop ND filter, specifically, the Hoya ND400 77mm filter. Esentially, an ND filter is a black peice of glass that goes over you lens, which allows your shutter to stay open for a long exposure in daylight conditions. This allows you to capture photos of the clouds moving, and other awesome effects. Since I was shooting for a 30-second exposure, I would need my camera to be sturdy. To acheive this, I fashioned a flat suface out of rocks to rest my camera on.

I was also able to perform a hand-held panorama at 70mm looking west at the Elks.

And here's a larger version looking south to north at 70mm:

And lastly, the 360 panoramic taken at 24mm:

I had Sarah snap off a few shots of me before we head back down.

A solo gentleman joined us for the descent, mostly because he was looking for the trail, which he had lost on the way up the same route we came up. I could have sworn this guy was Taylor Lautner from the Twilight movies. A few notes about my camera and lens selection. I felt like the pairing did well. While they were heavy, it was easily mitigated by the front-loading Lowe Pro pack I used and the quality of the photos was superb. The Nikon 24-70 afforded just the right amount of flexibility in range, I rarely felt myself wishing for a longer lens. Had I saw some true wildlife, I would have loved to have my 300mm f/4 lens with me, but it would have added weight to an already heavy set-up.

After taking summit photos, we head back down pretty quickly. I wanted to travel quickly, so I put my camera bag in my main pack and did not take it back out for the rest of the hike down. Once back at the trailhead, we saw a Toyota FJ cross the stream. Go figure.

We drove back out towards Leadville and stopped to take a few photos of an amazing flower field in front of Mount Massive and an idyllic abandoned cabin. I hope you enjoy my parting shots:

Panoramic version...

Abandoned cabin...

This concludes the first trip report of 2013. I apologize for the lack of updates lately. I have been quite busy working on my photography business, where I sell prints of my work. You can check it out by visiting www.mattpaynephotography.com

Mount Oklahoma is often forgotten by many, including myself, for a variety of reasons. There's nothing very remarkable about the look or feel of Oklahoma or the route to climb it. As Gerry Roach explains in his guidebook for 13ers, Mount Oklahoma is dwarfed by its neighbor to the east, Mount Massive, which is the 2nd highest mountain in Colorado. Despite this fact, Mount Oklahoma is more than OK - it offers solitude, unique views of mountains in all directions, and a fresh perspective on the art of "peakbagging." 

Mount Oklahoma is not a mighty mountain, nor is it meek - rather, it is fairly average in stature for the Northern Sawatch Range - rising 13,845 ft. in a valley full of giants. Indeed, Mt. Elbert (14,433 ft.), Colorado's highest mountain, towers over Oklahoma to the south and east. Other higher Centennial peaks also adorn the skies nearby, including French Mountain (13,940 ft.), Casco Peak (13,908 ft.) and of course the Mount Massive massif (14,421 ft.) right next door. 

Knowing that Mount Oklahoma is a fairly straight-forward and relatively safe climb, lacking anything harder than class 2 and with one of the easier levels of access for a 13er, I opted to head-out to climb it solo. While this is something I generally discourage, I felt the risk was manageable, plus my wife knew where I was going to be. Indeed, it did turn out that I did not run into a single other soul during the whole hike until well on the way back to the Jeep on the Mount Massive leg of the trail. So there it was, I left my house in Colorado Springs at about 6:30 PM on Friday evening and found myself at the North Halfmoon Creek Trailhead at 9:15 PM. There was an abundance of people up in the valley camping. Despite campsites being quite ubiquitous in the valley, I was left with no other option but to park at the trailhead and find a flat and comfy campsite within the trees. I set-up my sleeping pad and sleeping bag only and went to sleep right away. 

The alarm sounded promptly at 3:30 AM and I rose quickly to get a start for the day, as I knew my wife wanted me home relatively early so that we could go to my parent's house for a father's day dinner that night. The first thing I did was take a shot of the Milky Way above the trees and above the 13,221 ft. northern sub-peak of Mount Elbert. 

Click on the photo to see a larger version or to purchase a print.

I had been on this trail once before in 2009, having been here in the cold month of October to climb Mount Massive. What I remembered of this trail was that it was very straight and easy to follow below tree-line before the turn-off for Mount Massive, so I was very confident that I could make my way in the darkness with the aid of a headlamp. Adorned with my Ipod and my favorite Celtic tunes, including Solas and Altan, I began my journey in the dark.

I also decided to bring my Gitzo tripod - which is basically an older, heavier version of THIS one, with an Arca Swiss monoball affixed so that I could get some sweet sunrise shots and summit shots along the way. While this adds a great deal of weight to my pack, the effort is worthwhile and increases the types of shots I can get significantly. I've fallen in love with this tripod and monoball combination since acquiring them both on the cheap a few months ago on Craigslist. They are hands-down the highest quality photography gear in the business. I highly recommend both for anyone looking to upgrade. 

The plan was to follow the route as described by Roach, which is close to what actually happened - here is the map of my route - click on it to see a larger version.

I found the trail very easy to follow, even in the darkness, minus one section where the trail meets up with a very large rock formation and crosses it. I just kept my eye out for the trail and ensured I was on track at all times. The route description for Mount Oklahoma is pretty straight-forward according to Roach. After passing the Mount Massive trail junction, continue west-northwest until the trail begins to gain elevation and head north, at which point you are to leave the trail and continue west. That's just what I did, but it was somewhat sketchy in the dark - bushwhacking through trees and logs is a great time. I quickly reached the two large stream crossings described by Roach - they were quite fast streams on a steep incline - I was very careful to cross, finding dry-ish rocks in narrow passage-ways. At this point - I began up a steep hillside per Roach's description for going up a tree-filled ridge to the northwest. Before I knew it, I had reached treeline and could make out my surroundings.

I encountered a deer at this point, which quickly ran off into the trees below. I could also make out a series of waterfalls in the Halfmoon Lakes basin below Mount Massive to my right - this was quite impressive and I made a mental note to return to those lakes someday - they seem to hold quite a bit of promise. I also was revelling in the fact that I was hiking solo in the Mount Massive Wilderness Area, off-route, while listening to great tunes and taking pictures of fantastic vistas. I really do love Colorado! Mount Oklahoma was clear as day above me, and the route seemed quite obvious from this point - go up.

Before  long, I found myself high above most of the trees just in time to witness the first light kiss the tops of Deer Mountain and UN 13,535 to the south and west. Moments like this made hauling the tripod up worth the effort.

I left my pack and wandered up a little way and found an area covered with really cool looking flowers. Turns out the flowers are known as Alpine Primrose - a really quite lovely looking purple and pink flower. I took quite a few shots from this spot and processed each a little differently.

Another version from the same vantage point...

I was even able to put together an 360 degree HDR panorama, which I've not tried in a few months. I was not overly impressed with the results of this one, but I'll share it anyways.

Having filled my soul with a dose of alpine sunrise, I was ready to continue on up the mountain. I followed what seemed to be a slight trail or drainage up the mountain and was aiming for an area to upclimb a grassy screefield.

At this point I stumbled upon a small pond at the base of a small snowfield below Mount Oklahoma. It made for a very interesting reflection in the water with the sun just hitting the tops of the southern ridge of Oklahoma.

I played with a few versions of this shot, and I think I liked the HDR horizontal version the best. I know HDR is a technique with many detractors; however, I like to play with it - it keeps me entertained and thinking.

At this point, I found the grassy screefield, and it was mighty steep. I was not sure if this was the right way to go, but it looked like the easiest way up to the ridge. I plowed ahead slowly, reaching the ridge after several long minutes of gruelling climbing up this nasty section. Once up, the views were splendid.

I continued to plow ahead slowly on the obvious route up Oklahoma to the north and west. As I climbed, the views improved dramatically.

It was at this point that I began to feel sick to my stomach just like I did back in 2009 when I climbed Harvard and Columbia. I was beginning to wonder if my lack of food intake or the water I was drinking were to blame. Perhaps I did not clean out my camelbak adequately? Perhaps I was eating too dense a food (Larabars) for my stomach to handle? Or, perhaps I was just suffering from a mild case of Acute Mountain Sickness? Who knows? All I knew was that I was moving far slower than I wanted to and making progress quite sluggishly. I worked my way slowly up the boulderfield until my eye was caught by some blooming flowers which happened to be quite near the summit. I took off my pack and prepared my tripod for some photos of some flowers. Also, I could finally make out the Elk Mountains to the west, including Snowmass, Maroon Bells, Cathedral and Castle - they were all quite impressive to be sure. I fixated on small field containing  a variety of colorful wildflowers and took some shots.

After taking my fair share of photos in this patch of flowers, I decided to move upwards. It took about 4 more minutes from here to reach the summit, which was a relief given my stomach issues, which had actually subsided significantly since I stopped to photograph the flowers. On the summit, I noticed that clouds were hitting the Elks with some light showers and that those clouds were headed this way. I had no intention of getting stuck in a storm, so my lofty goal to traverse to North Massive was out of the question. I set-up my tripod and set the timer so I could get a few shots of myself signing the summit register for Centennial #76 - only 24 more mountains to go!

The register was quite intact and filled with many familiar names. I was happy to add mine to the list.

At this point I used the tripod to take some photos to later be used in my 360 degree summit panorama.

I also toyed with a black and white shot from here, framing Mount Massive on the left part of the shot.

After a quick phone call to the wife to let her know I made it safely, I took an assessment of the weather. The storms rolling in over the Elk Mountains to the west did not give me a good feeling, so I decided to pack-up and head down. I decided this time to see about the small ridge that rolls down to the east of Oklahoma. Instead of going back down the grassy talus, I went down the long ridge.

Once down, I found a great spot at the end of the ridge to take a sweet pano from - Mount Oklahoma at center with Mount Massive at right with a small storm over it.

At this point, I saw a ton of cairns leading down the mountain towards the cliffs Roach warned to avoid in his guidebook. I decided to take the challenge and see where the breadcrumbs could lead me. Sure enough, they led me down the mountain's steep slopes, but it was not a terrible route, albeit harder than my ascent route (loose rock, etc).

Small storms were hitting the areas peaks, and it started snowing a little bit, but nothing too scary.

On the way down the steep terrain, I ran into some really nice flowers in a very strange spot amongst the rocks. Nature never ceases to surprise me...

Once down the nasty part, I was back on the grassy ledges near treeline. I decided to angle my decent more northeasterly so I could hit the trail coming down from Halfmoon Lakes sooner. This turned into a pleasant bushwhack into the forest, where I stumbled upon a small stream leading down from the lakes.

I found the trail again with no issues and found myself flying down the trail at a rapid pace. I reached the turn-off for Mount Massive in short order and took one last look back at Mount Oklahoma.

I was also pleased to see the large monument cross at the trailhead that was placed after the Blackhawk Helicopter crash in 2009 on Mount Massive.

In closing, I highly recommend Mount Oklahoma as a hike that gets you away from the crowds on 14ers and still allows for wonderful views and a decent work-out. I am certainly not usually a fan of the Sawatch Range; however, the northern Sawatch Range really separates itself vis-a-vis grand views of the Elk Mountains and a seemingly more rugged feeling than the Southern Sawatch Range. I'll leave this trip report with a creative rendition of my 360 pano from the ridge - Planet Oklahoma. I wrote a tutorial on how to make these if anyone is interested.

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Some fun information about this great hike:

Mt. Massive - 14,421 ft. - 2nd highest in Colorado; third highest mountain in the contiguous U.S.

8 miles round-trip via Southwest slopes route

3,950 ft. elevation gain

More snow than I expected...

I thought that my climbing season had ended after being snowed on in mid-September on Grays and Torreys; however, I got the itch to climb again this weekend. Serendipitously, a fellow climber from Colorado Springs, Rob, posted on 14'ers.com that he was going to Mt. Massive on Saturday and that anyone from Colorado Springs was welcome to join him. I jumped all over the opportunity and we made plans to meet at 4:15 AM on the west-side of town to car pool. Rob had his friend Brad with him and we departed for Mt. Massive at around 4:30 AM.

Our route took us directly up the snowy south face of Massive.

On the way over we had good conversation, shared stories about our climbs and got to know each other. We arrived at the turn-off for Mt. Massive at 6:45 and met up with two other climbers from Denver. We reached the trail-head and began hiking at 7:40 AM. Right at the trail-head lies a memorial to the soldiers that died in a helicopter crash earlier this year on Mt. Massive. Here are some photos of the Memorial, notice a section of the helicopter is seen as well:

A memorial cross for the victims of the Blackhawk Helicopter crash on Mount Massive, 2009.

The forecast for the day was clear skies and a high of 60, and wow the weatherman did not disappoint! We swiftly hiked up the valley and reached the turn-off for Mt. Massive. Our view back down the valley was stunning:

The trail was covered in snow, making for a quite interesting hike. As we gained elevation, the trail became less and less apparent and eventually we just started hiking straight up towards Massive.

Looking back towards Elbert, you can see our footprints through the snow...

None of really expected to see so much snow, but it made for a very challenging hike. The snow was up to 3 ft. in depth in some spots, and it was quite slippery due to the 30-40 degree slopes were climbing on. We stopped several times to rest on the way up, and about halfway up I was able to take some shots, combined here into a smaller panoramic photo:

After approximately three hours, we were able to reach the saddle, which joined us with the standard route. By now I was pretty tired, partially due to the extra effort required by the snow, and partly due to the fact that I had not had much to eat. I made sure at this point to eat some snacks, and we headed back up. We found ourselves climbing up some pretty deep snow, as evidenced by this shot, looking up the ridge towards the summit, taken on our way back down:

After trudging through the snow, we were able to reach the summit at 12:40 PM, a full 5 hours after we started. The snow really took a lot out of us! I was just really glad I brought my gators and had tons of warm clothing... Here is my obligatory summit pose, with the Elk range behind me:

And of course my traditional 360 degree pano:

Before we left from the summit, I took some zoomed in shots of the Elk range, including the Maroon Bells. This stitched pano is one of my favorites from this 2009's shots:

We headed back down and had a good time rumbling down the snowy slopes. I took one last set of the valley, combined into a pano here:

All in all, I would highly recommend this route for Mount Massive. Even in October, the route is solid, and I could see this being feasible even through November or later.