Bald Mountain (13,684) by Brian Schultz Saturday July 28, 2007
Unsure I'd even be climbing today, I drove up to Boreas Pass in my street clothes. The weather forecast called for morning rain but marginally clearing skies convinced me to change into hiking clothes and give it a go. I parked on the west side of the road, north of the pass, and at 7:55 AM started up the grassy slopes. I crossed paths with a fellow and his dog on the ridge who'd gone as far as a false summit and turned around because of the weather but I kept going believing any storm activity would hold off.
At 9:45 and in a totally socked in cloud cover I pulled up to what I thought was the summit. There was a large cairn and my GPS showed a high enough elevation reading but it turned out to be another false summit. A check of the GPS summit waypoint showed I was still a half mile away. I arrived at the true summit at 10:20, greeted by two registers and a wood sign showing the elevation.
Skeptical about the cloud activity, I left quickly and didn't stop until reaching the grassy slopes. Three young women at the first false summit had turned around and after short-cutting around them on the slopes, I waded through knee-high grasses at the low end of the slopes and finally stopped for a break. Photo opportunities were abundant with all the colorful flowers but I lost a brand new pair of sunglasses while taking pictures and couldn't find them even though I retraced my steps for a half hour. I arrived back to the car at 1:00 under surprisingly fast clearing skies.
The two false summits were discouraging but didn't detract from an otherwise easy climb and the short day allowed for a nice relaxing afternoon in Dillon.
Parking area to summit- 2 hours 25 minutes
Summit back to parking area- 2 hours 30 minutes
Start to finish- 5 hours 5 minutes