Iris Climbs Mountains

A friend wanted to do some hiking, and knowing that he likes to scramble, I chose UN 10,252 and UN 10,050. The latter was rated class 3 on Lists of John and I was curious what it would be like.

I am usually restricted to trailheads reachable by a sedan, but my friend has a truck, so we were able to drive pretty far up a forest service road. There were some icy ruts at the very beginning and some large erosion prevention bumps but it was mostly nice and smooth.

Starting to walk uphill through open forest, some peaks become visible behind us to the west. We will be summiting 10,252 first.

A bit higher up, bigger peaks become visible. I believe that is Rosalie Peak. Fun story - one time I found $500 on Rosalie as part of a youtuber's (kinda poorly planned) riddle/scavenger hunt.

Near the top of the first little ridge (9691 spot elevation on caltopo scanned topo layer) we walked past this pretty cool "ship's prow" boulder.

Just past this was a large open area that provided great views to the south, including Pikes and the other usual suspects. The pointy peak on the left is 10,050.

Looking towards 10,252. Up we go!

We reached the summit, going through a little snow. Not much of a view due to trees. We descended a broad gully on the east side of the peak, and then contoured over to the saddle between the two Peaks.

Some cool cliffs with 10,050 looming in the background. It looks pretty steep!

Eventually we reach the saddle and head up, aiming for the west side of the peak.

The forest transitions to talus, and then we were at the start of the scramble. I don't have great pictures, but we went up on the left side of this picture (or possibly just out of frame to the left?) and then followed a catwalk-like feature to the summit.

Another picture from the base of the scramble. I believe we went up just to the right of this picture. The scramble wasn't too bad. I downclimbed facing out the whole time, basically crab walking lmao. There was one move that was a bit awkward to downclimb with a bit of a fall possible if you were to like slip forward somehow. And another part where you had to walk along a flat ledge with some nice hand holds to your left but quite a large drop to your right. Overall, the scramble was more fun than scary, mostly just easy class 3 while you're safely wedged between large boulders. I am always a little stressed doing this kind of thing and I was very glad to reach the summit.

View from the summit towards Staunton State Park

View to the south

View towards the kenosha pass peaks

Meridian Hill

view towards Rosalie

We reversed the scramble and descended a bit west of our ascent line where it was less steep. About 2 miles of walking through nice open forest later, we reached the starting point.

a few minutes before we reached the car, I found a huge piece of very clear quartz, which made a fine addition to my collection.

This was a pretty nice hike. Almost no deadfall to deal with which is very rare for 10ers.

Total Stats:

5.6 miles

2280 ft of vert

3 hours and 34 minutes

On this day I hiked some peaks in the Tenmile Range above Breckinridge. I started on a piece of the Colorado Trail from the Wheeler Trailhead (which is in one of Copper Mountain's parking lots). Once the trail delivered me to the ridge, I went over Peak 9 and Peak 10 to get to Crystal Peak. Then I side hilled around Peaks 9 and 10 to get back to the Peak 8/9 saddle. Then I followed the ridge to Peak 4 and finally went back to the trailhead. In total I summited 5 ranked peaks (Peak 4, Peak 8, Peak 9, Peak 10, and Crystal Peak) and 3 unranked (Peaks 5,6,7). One of my biggest days last summer and a very enjoyable outing.

The trail has brought me to a saddle! this is the view of Peak 9 from the saddle.

View from the saddle back towards where I came from, with the Gore Range in the background.

Heading up Peak 9, starting to get a bit rocky!

Another view back towards the saddle, with the grassy ridge I'll follow later in the day now in view.

Almost to the top of Peak 9, with Peak 10 looming behind. There is a slightly tricky section in the little dip before Peak 9. Nothing too scary, maybe one move of class 2+

Ontop of Peak 9, looking back at the tricky bit

The next two peaks on the agenda, Peak 10 (left) and Crystal Peak. Check out the steep talus I'm about to go up on Peak 10! not the funnest terrain ever. It was large-ish and not that loose. Definitely could have been worse.

Time to go up Peak 10!

View to the west featuring the talus slope

Getting pretty high up! Looking back at Peak 9

From the summit of Peak 10 (or possibly just below?) looking at Crystal and more peaks to the south including Quandary, Pacific, Atlantic. Time to go to Crystal!

Some rock glaciers to the west

Ontop of Crystal, looking south. Crystal's north ridge was pretty pleasant with some interesting rocks. I walked back to the Crystal/10 Saddle, then side hilled on talus to a road on the east side of Peak 10. I followed this road north past some mining ruins until I was past Peak 9's east ridge, where I side hilled back to the peak 8/9 saddle. I took a relatively long break and then started up towards Peak 8.

Reaching the top of Peak 8, I took this picture back towards 9, 10, and Crystal. The road is visible left of Peak 10.

Looking at the rolling grassy ridge to Peak 4. Unfortunately Peaks 5, 6, and 7 do not have enough prominence to be ranked, but there is still a bit of up and down to get over them.

There's lots of stuff up on the ridge from Breckinridge Ski Resort

Who knows which peak this is, they all sort of blurred together for me at this point. Probably Peak 4?

Looking back where I came from. Crystal is so far away

Finally at the top of Peak 4, my last peak of the day. Looking at the spiciness of Peak 3 and Tenmile Peak. Most people do the tenmile traverse instead of the route I did, but I am not a huge fan of exposed scrambling and I didn't want to deal with this part of the ridge. Also there was no need for a car shuttle with my route. Gore range looking cool in the background.

Looking back at at all the peaks from today and a lot more to the south.

Finally back on a trail below Peak 6

Some nice views on the trail down to wrap up the day.

Total Stats:

20.3 Miles

7040 ft. of vert

10 hours and 27 minutes