Dizzy D at the 30 Mile Campground TH at 7:40am just before we headed out. A super bright moon made for a great night's sleep.
The Rio Grande Reservoir just after we got started hiking. As you can see, the day was awesome!
Crossing the Weminuche Creek on the good bridge.
Lots of low angle cruiser terrain for roughly 8 miles before jamming up the summit of RGP.
Dan contemplates hopping the river at the second river crossing. He made it.
Waiting for Dan to cover up his foot hot-spot
Dizzy D at the faintly marked “Skyline trail” (now Opal Lake trail) intersection.
Our first view of the Window (left) and our goal Rio Grande Pyramid.
Apparently there was a very recent blow down of trees at about 11,900' which made the going very slow. Based on information we got today in Lake City, it's likely this just happened last weekend. (100 mph winds)
Into the willows about 12,100'
The north slopes of things looked very “winter-ish”
Dan heading up the summit pyramid of RGP with Unnamed 13,278' in the background. We did not climb that this time.
The summit is only 700' vertical up there!
Hot talus action!
Self portrait, Rio Grande Pyramid, 13,841', 10/17/2008, 12:10pm (Note the awesome Grenadiers in the background!)
Grenadiers! Man, those are some awesome mountains. The Guardian, Storm King, Silex, The Trinities, Vestal and Arrow. I've had the good fortune to climb them all on previous outings.
Windom, Sunlight, North Eolus, Eolus, Pigeon, Turret and Monitor should all be over there somewhere.
Dos amigos on the summit. We reached the summit in 4 hours, 30 minutes from the car. Not super fast but on such a beautiful day, no hurry!
Dizzy D on the summit.
Wetterhorn, Matterhorn and Uncompahgre over there. Also, Half Peak near center. We hope to climb that the next day.
Extreme descending!
Dan points out his “cutting edge” style of shorts over long johns. Kickin' it old skool.
Close up of the Window. Next time.
We enjoy running. So for the descent we ran a good portion of it.
So fast things are a blur!
Mud!
Potential for sure.
Back at the car eating recovery Doritos. Round trip was 7 hours, 55 minutes. A super stellar day!
