This week in RMNP

[ByteWrangler]

That's Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado.

My brother, a longtime friend and I are going to try for the summit of Longs Peak via the Keyhole Route tomorrow (Sun, Sept 9). It's a (long) hike from the ranger station at 9400' to the summit at 14,259', not a technical climb if the weather's good, but you need to be on the way down by noon to avoid afternoon t'storms above the treeline - we need to be started before 2 AM.

They were there two years ago but stopped short because they were behind schedule. Last year the ledges beyond The keyhole were icy and rated as technical, so we got as far as The Keyhole - about 13,200' and a long hike in its own right. Weather looks good for tomorrow - we had originally planned for a Monday attempt, but Sunday night looks dicey. Third time's a charm!

We've been on conditioning hikes since last Thursday. Spectacle Lakes, Ypsilon Peak (13,514'), and an easier hike above 11,000' today. Spectacular! See this place if you can, even from a car.

Wish us luck. We'll need it!

 

[Tedrick]

I did this same hike in September, 1980. Longs Peak was only 14,256 feet back then . I guess the Rockies are still growing a little.

Anyway, it's a long 16+ miles RT, but the views on top are spectacular :thmbsp:. Good luck and be safe.

 

[ByteWrangler]

Well, 2 of 3 of us mad it to the top - all made it down. The day before, my brother had been suffering from what seems to be a case of food poisoning and turned back after a couple of miles and headed back to the cabin to sleep and be near a toilet.

We started at 1:30 AM and were the third party on the register for the day; we wanted an early start because we're old and slow. Once we were above the clouds there was a wonderful dark and crystal clear sky; the Milky Way was vivid and we saw several meteors while stopped to rest with lights out. Venus and a thin crescent moon rose shortly before dawn. We could see a long string of lights on the trail behind us at times, and some faster parties (that's most of them) passed us along the way. Reached the boulderfield above 12,000' in the early dawn and passed thru The Keyhole (13,200') soon after sunrise to spectacular views of Glacier Gorge to the west. The ledges beyond The Keyhole were not bad, but The Trough - about 800' of elevation gain directly upslope - kicked my butt. Some of the people who passed us on the way up passed us again on their way down. The Homestretch, the last pitch to the summit, another 200' straight upslope, wasn't much better. We reached the top at about 9:30.

The view from the top is, as Tedrick says, spectacular! Lots of people. The weather was still nearly perfect, but some convective clouds were already building in the distance to the west. We wandered around, took pictures, talked with some of the folks we'd met along the way, then started down after 20 minutes. Going down was easier than coming up (we weren't sure this would be the case). It snowed on us briefly as we were descending the boulderfield east of the keyhole, then cleared again.

After the boulderfield, it was a long slog down the mountain in alternating clear weather and scattered light showers (snow at higher elevations, rain below). Signed in right at 4:30 PM - 15 hours. Totally exhausted. There were almost 4 pages of entries on the register after us, not all for the summit, though. My brother said that there were almost 2 pages filled by the time he arrived back there in the early morning; most of those would be bound for the summit. The GPS I carried gave total distance 15.1 mi. My brother was waiting for us at the ranger station with cold beer! After a shower I felt awake enough to eat dinner (barely!), then crashed and slept for 11 hours.

Great trip (now that it's over)! I might have argued about that at some points in The Trough or late in the hike down. But, wow!

I'm not sure where that 14,259' came from. Probably just remembered or typed it wrong - that does happen. The benchmark on top says 14,255 and most of the maps I have say that or 256. Tectonics aren't working that fast (3 feet in 30 years) here!

Photos:
Keyhole
Homestretch
Summit

Yours truly on the right of the summit picture.

 

[Scorpion8]

Awesome! Thanks for posting!

 

[Tedrick]

Congrats on achieving your goal!! That's by far the toughest one-day hike I've ever done. The combination of elevation, distance, high-altitude scrambling, and exposure to weather extremes makes this a very difficult hike. If it tells you anything, the first American expedition to summit Mt. Everest did their training on Longs Peak in the winter.

Regarding the elevation, your post was not a typo. I read somewhere recently that the official summit elevation is now accepted as 14,259'. I can think of two reasons for the change: (1) continued uplift in the Rocky Mountain massif, and (2) improved accuracy of survey instruments. Although 3 cm/yr of uplift is not out of the realm of possibilies, I'm thinking it's probably a combination of the two.

And thanks for sharing, too; you brought back some great memories.