Quail Mountain (13,461) by Brian Schultz Sunday July 22, 2012
Roundtrip mileage: 6.7 miiles from Sheep Gulch trailhead
Elevaton gain: 3,600'
Start to finish: 7 hours 35 minutes
Participants: Art Boller, Mark Valen, & Brian Schultz
Minnesota friends Art and Mark happened to be in Colorado this week to climb a bunch of thirteeners and invited me to join up with them. I'd climbed everything on their list but Quail Mtn so it was an easy decision to meet for that one. We originally planned on starting from Willis Gulch but switched to the shorter Sheep Gulch route so I could get to the San Juans by late afternoon. By the time I met up with Art and Mark, the San Juan backpacking adventure got delayed by a day, but we still stuck with the Sheep Gulch route because the weather forecast called for 50% chance of thunderstorms and the shorter route would be to our benefit.
Art & Mark stayed in Twin Lakes last night and I in Buena Vista, so we met at 5:00 AM at the junction of Hwy 24 and the Winfield road. The three of us used this same trail for Mt. Hope, which seemed like it was only a few years ago but was actually back in 2003. We began at 5:40, taking a slow but steady pace up the steep trail.
No sheep were seen anywhere in the gulch, only deer as we plodded up to Hope Pass. We arrived at the saddle at 8:30 and with the weather holding nicely took a twenty minute break. A handy trail led up the right side of Quail's slopes from the saddle and other than a loose section just before a notch, the summit ridge was fairly easy hiking. We topped out at 10:00.
We stayed 35 minutes on top checking out a mine and marveling at the two cabins up there, not in any hurry to descend because the skies were still clear and sunny. Nice views abounded in all directions and on the descent, we couldn't help but admire the view of Mt Hope. Once below Hope Pass, we came across many runners training for the Leadville 100, several of whom had stopped to talk to us, and arrived back at the trailhead at 1:15 without a single raindrop falling. Great day and great company on a fun peak.
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