Clark Peak (12,955), Lewis Peak (12,667), & Bull Mountain (9,708) by Brian Schultz Friday July 19, 2024

Lewis Peak & Clark Peak:
Roundtrip mileage: 7 miles from parking spot at ~10,075'
Elevation gain: 3,400'
Start to finish: 7 hours
Participants: Tim Briese, Brian Schultz

When we checked the weather forecast yesterday for our climbs today, it was horrible- rain before 9:00 AM, showers at 12:00 noon, and 90% chance of showers/storms in the afternoon. Yesterday evening the forecast improved to 70% chance of shower/storms after 1:00 PM. That sounded much better and we felt with an early start we could be off the summits before 1:00.

We left Walden early in the morning wondering how far we could drive up the 4x4 road from the 2x2 parking. This whole area is in the State Forest State Park with a daily fee of $10.00, which we paid at a kiosk at the beginning of the two wheel drive road. The 2x2 road is excellent but it quickly became obvious the 4x4 road has deteriorated since bdloftin's trip report described it in 2019. We parked and called it quits around 10,000' elevation. Had we continued past the nasty section we parked at, we probably could've driven to the Jewel Lake trailhead. But we were only 0.6 miles away and the extra hiking didn't bother us.

Skies were gray as we began at 6:40 AM and reached the 4x4 trailhead in short order. The trail to Jewel Lake was excellent and we arrived there at 8:00. The trail ended at the lake and then it was a steep grunt up mostly tundra to Clark's summit, which we reached at 9:50. So far so good with the weather. It was raining in the distance to the west but we were dry and stayed dry as the sun tried poking through the clouds. We departed Clark at 10:05 and headed over to Lewis Peak.

The terrain to Lewis Peak (photo 1, photo 2) was still mostly tundra with small talus and we arrived on the summit at 10:55. Amazingly, the skies began clearing whle on Lewis Peak. We got back to Jewel Lake at 12:05 and suddenly we were in bright sunshine. What a dramatic turn from the forecast 24 hours earlier! We took a long break at the lake and talked with a number of people whose destination was just the lake. Some were fishing.

We arrived back to Tim's truck at 1:40 PM. Clark Peak was one of two remaining peaks we needed to finish on the list of Colorado National Forest Highpoints and now we were down to just one. We'd be attempting Crater Peak in three days.

Bull Mountain:
This peak is an easy add-on after Lewis and Clark. We drove the Bull Mountain road and parked off the road for the short hike to the top. It only took 8 minutes to walk up to the top and cover the potential highpoints and return. Rain was imminent so we called it a day and drove back to Walden.