James Peak (13,294), Mt Bancroft (13,250), Parry Peak (13,391), Mt Eva (13,130), Mt Flora (13,146), & Colorado Mines Peak (12,493) by Brian Schultz
Friday July 18, 2014

Mileage: 12.75 miles from St Mary's Glacier trailhead to Berthoud Pass

Elevation gain: 5,450'

Start to finish: 9 hours 5 minutes

Participants: Dave Chamberlin, Jason Mayfield, Brian Schultz

I added these peaks to the itinerary less than a week before leaving Minnesota. Jason was able to get time off from work on short notice and Dave joined up at the last minute. I've climbed with Jason and Dave separately since our Aconcagua trip in 2007 but not with the three of us together. I was looking forward to the mini reunion.

We set up a car shuttle because of the long distance involved end to end. After Jason and I dropped off a vehicle at Berthoud Pass, we met Dave at the Fall River Road exit off I-70 and drove the Fall River road to the St Mary's Glacier trailhead. Had we started from Berthoud Pass instead of St Mary's, we would've saved elevation gain but we were willing to accommodate Dave's schedule after his late night hockey game so he could get a little more sleep.

We began hiking up the road at 6:35 AM after paying $5.00/vehicle to park. We were in the heart of monsoon season and these peaks would keep us high for a long time but we had bail out options if rains/storms came in early. Jason and I left our ice axes in the truck, hoping the heavy snowpack from winter and spring had melted enough to avoid snow issues. As it turned out, we wouldn't need the axes.

There was some confusion as to which road to hike up to St Mary's Lake and after a false start, we backtracked to get on the correct one. We wasted fifteen minutes. It would've been better to start at a signed trail for the lake, located just before where we parked at. Anyway, the weather was nice and sunny and we arrived at St Mary's Lake in short order. The trail continues past the lake and Dave put on microspikes when we started up the glacier but the glacier was soft enough to kick in steps with just boots.

Above the glacier, the trail was great to James Peak and we kept a good pace all the way to the top. We reached the summit at 9:35. Dave was feeling a bit out of sorts and didn't like the dark clouds moving in so after taking a few moments to decide whether to take on the long ridge, he called it a day.

After saying our goodbyes, Jason and I headed down to the James/Bancroft saddle, which was fun class 3 scrambling, and followed the curving ridge up to unranked Bancroft's summit. We arrived at 11:10 and stayed on top for fifteen minutes. The scramble from James to Bancroft turned out to be the most fun of all the six summits on the ridge.

When we departed Bancroft, it only took 40 minutes to reach Parry Peak, the highest peak of the day. This was an easy climb and all the remaining peaks would be as well. We summited at 12:05 and stayed 10 minutes before heading to Mt Eva, which also took 40 minutes to reach. We poked around an old weather building on its southwest ridge before departing for Mt Flora at 1:10. Of all the distances between the peaks, Eva to Flora had the longest and we didn't reach its summit until 2:20.

The winds had been gusting all day but were especially strong on top of Flora so we descended immediately. Mt Flora is on the Continental Divide Trail and we followed the excellent trail down to Berthoud Pass. Jason pulled ahead of me and said he'd meet me at the truck when I told him I wanted to climb one more peak, twelver Colorado Mines Peak.

I left the trail at 3:05, made the summit in 15 minutes, and almost got back to Berthoud Pass before it started sprinkling. I stopped to put on my rain jacket and arrived at the parking area at 3:40. I knocked on the truck windows to wake up a napping Jason and we headed back to the St Mary's trailhead to pick up my vehicle. My legs were pretty sore after all the ups and downs of the ridge but I really enjoyed these peaks.