Kit Carson Peak
- Kit Carson Peak
- 4317 m.
- Primary factor 312 m.
- 23rd in Colorado
- Location North 37:58.78, West 105:36.15
- Climbed July 3, 2001
Kit Carson Peak
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This trail leaves the trailhead, crosses the creek and enters some
open grassland. There is a trail going straight here, do not take this,
but hike the trail that heads up the hill. There is a trail register
partway up this initial slope. The trail then makes 12 switchbacks to
the top of the hillside. As the trail crosses this crest it enters the
Willow Lake drainage, but stays well above the valley floor on the
north side. The trail continues its climb and crosses the Willow Creek
before climbing a distinct step in the valley on the south (right)
side of the creek. After reaching more level terrain, the trail again
crosses the creek and climbs more gently about a 100 m (vertical)
to Willow Lake.
Second, from Willow Lake to the summit:
The natural way to climb Kit Carson Peak from Willow Lake is via
the summit of Challenger Point. An alternative that looked quite OK,
is a snow climb to the saddle between Challenger Point and Kit Carson,
this route would require crampons and ice axe, but might be nicer
overall. From this saddle one could then proceed to climb both peaks
if desired.
See the description under Challenger Point for the first part of our
route, this description will cover the route from the summit of
Challenger Point and back.
From the summit of Challenger point, an easy descent to the saddle between
the two peaks starts the route. As one approaches the saddle, the first
part of Kit Carson Avenue is clearly visible. This is a large ledge that
starts in the saddle and proceeds to the Kit Carson south ridge (called
The Prow), while climbing gently. This ledge is very wide and completely
straightforward to walk on. From the south ridge, the avenue (ledge)
proceeds, this time gently descending all the way to the saddle between
Kat Carson and Kit Carson on the east side of the mountain. One should
follow this ledge quite far down until an easy traverse to the left
brings you into a large gully that heads up the mountain. This gully
is not class 3 (as described in some guide books), rather class 2, one can
walk all the way up without the use of hands. This climb is easy and
brings you to Kit Carson's ridge, shortly thereafter (going left) to the
true summit. The return hike should just reverse the approach, that is
down the gully, across to Kit Carson Avenue, up to the Prow, then down
to the Challenger Carson saddle. Finally, back up to the summit
of Challenger and then the Willow Lake to Challenger trail, back to
Willow Lake.
Comments:
I did this climb with Pål Jørgen, age 12. Several observations
may be in order.
When returning from Kit Carson Peak, we traversed onto the north-east slope
of Challenger Point and then angled downwards. This route cannot be recommended,
we ran into cliffs and had to use a rope for safety a couple of times.
One should definitely climb back over Challenger Point and follow the route
of ascent back down. The climb of Kit Carson Peak from Challenger Point
is, in my opinion, clearly of class 2 difficulty, no more. However, the
climb of Challenger Point involves a traverse (on the south-west side
of the ridge) that I would rate class 3, so the overall route from
Willow Lake to Kit Carson Peak would still justify a class 3 rating.
See the description of the Challenger Point climb for additional
details. We started at 0600, hit Challenger Point at 1000, Kit Carson
Peak at 1100, spent 30 minutes there and returned to Willow Lake at
1430, 8.5 hours, but at least one hour should be allocated to
our poor choice of route from Challenger Point.
We met two guys, a girl and a dog! climbing up the south-east face of
the Prow, directly to the top of Kit Carson Avenue. They free climbed
and admitted to being scared a couple of times. I would not have
done this, the climbing talent shown by the dog being perhaps the
most impressive.