Prize Benchmark (13,384) & "Booby Prize" (13,312) by Brian Schultz Saturday July 21, 2018

Roundtrip mileage: 9.0 miles from the South Fork Lake Creek trailhead (elev 11,300')
Elevation gain: 3,600'
Start to finish: 10 hours 5 minutes

This is the same trailhead that I used two years ago to climb Middle Mountain and UN 13460. I drove Road 391 from Hwy 82 to its gated end, passing by the La Plata trailhead and some camp areas further along the road that now have "no camping allowed" signs posted. The road is somewhat slow but easy 4x4 driveable. I truck camped at the junction of Road 391 and Road 382 (which goes to Sayres Benchmark) before heading out in the morning to the trailhead.

I started at 6:40 AM on the trail, and in no time was saturated from the wet willows, including my boots. "Booby Prize" loomed ahead as I squished along the trail and aimed toward the "Booby Prize"/Point 13,090 saddle. I shortcutted to the trail leading up to it, wanting to climb Prize Benchmark first in case the weather turned later, and once at the saddle, headed over to unranked 13,090. This bump stands in the way of Prize but can be contoured around without going to the top. The weather was supposed to hold until early afternoon but it didn't and I'm glad I went to Prize first.

Trip reports indicate the ridge to Prize is steep and difficult and it certainly looked that way. From the 13090/Prize BM saddle I headed up the ridge, where several class 3 areas went pretty well, but I still took it very slowly. I stopped often to pick my route and after several false summits, finally made the summit at 11:00.

Views are terrific from the summit (photo 1, photo 2, photo 3) but I only stayed twenty minutes with dicey looking clouds approaching. I no sooner got down near the cliffs of the ridge when thunder started booming loudly. I knew I couldn't get to Point 13090 and down the other side in time so I dropped well below Prize's ridge to duck out the incoming storm. I felt relatively safe as it started raining and hailing, and stayed there for an hour until the storm passed through.

While waiting, I looked across the basin toward "Booby Prize" and noticed a trail. It would require losing more elevation to get over to it but the trail wended toward the 13092/Booby saddle and I decided that's the way I was going to go. If I had time to climb Booby Prize when I got there, I would. If more storms materialized, I'd just head back to the trailhead.

The trail was very faint in places but it worked and when I got to the saddle, I was confident I could get to Booby's summit. I started up at 2:00 and reached the summit at 2:30. Threatening weather once again was moving in so I departed and got back to the saddle at 3:05. I barely made it to the trees on the main trail below when round 2 of the storms hit. More rain and a furious hailstorm unleashed its fury as I took shelter in the trees, soon followed by yet another hailstorm.

I got back to the truck at 4:45 and cranked up the heat while I peeled off my rain-soaked clothes. Despite the stormy weather, I was thankful to pull off these peaks. I'd wanted to add the 12er near Booby Prize to the climbs but that would've been risky with the weather. A good day for me but I was tired and switched my itinerary to do a different peak in the morning.