Quandary Peak (14,265) West Ridge route by  Brian Schultz   Saturday  July 15, 2006

The west ridge route has been on my wish list for a long time. My climbing pal, Tim Briese, was unable to join me at the last minute because of a family commitment so I ended up doing the climb alone. I was uneasy at the thought of climbing the class 3 ridge by myself but took heart in knowing John Maki did it alone two years ago and in much less favorable conditions. I had his trip report tucked in my pocket.

I began at 5:40 AM under clear skies from the Blue Lake trailhead, not anticipating any route-finding problems to the Fletcher-Quandary saddle since I was here last year on Fletcher Mountain. The hike went smoothly through the willows and up the valley but a significant amount of snow remained at the end of the main trail and also in the gully I ascended last year. I climbed left of the gully on a hit and miss trail and was discouraged to see even more snow still covering the slopes to the Fletcher-Quandary saddle. I tried to work my way up on rock but was stopped by icy snow just 20 feet below the top. It was too steep, too slippery, and I didn't have crampons with. Not wanting to wait for the sun to warm up the snow, I climbed back down into the basin hoping to find a way up the cliffs to Quandary's west ridge. This daunting prospect wasn't as bad as I expected for I found a reasonable route up scree and talus and arrived on the ridge at 7:20. I took a short break before continuing.

An excellent trail makes easy work out of most of the ridge and goes just as Gerry Roach describes in his fourteener book. At 8:20, when I reached the point where the trail fades and Gerry says the fun part begins, I concentrated on trying to maintain the ridge without dropping more than 100 feet below it, as suggested. My biggest worry was where and how often I would have to climb down 100 feet but that was a misunderstanding on my part and I never had to do that. Gerry simply says the route never drops more than 100 feet below the ridge. There is a difference.

Here are my recollections of  the class 3 section of the ridge: Other than an initial bypass on the right side (south), all the climbing was on the left or on top. Some of the scree gullies looked intimidating but once in them the ascents went well. One particular top section on the ridge was extremely exposed on both sides as I walked the tightrope and two downclimbs were quite sketchy. One was mostly vertical and didn't look possible to descend at first so I looked for a route on the south (right) side by dropping down about 20 feet. It didn't work and was the only time I had to backtrack. The correct descent was straight ahead and straight down. John Maki wrote about a chockstone blocking upward progress in a chimney near the end of the ridge and how dicey it was to get past it. I was able to completely avoid the chockstone by stepping left out of the chimney and then climbing up and around it.

It was a great feeling to stroll the last stretch to the summit and arrive on top at 9:25. I won't say the class 3 part of the ridge was easy because it wasn't, and I was certainly nervous doing it alone, but gratifying for me was making right decisions when choosing which side to take or whether to scramble on top. I'm not the best routefinder.

There were only a few people milling around at first but during the hour and a half I spent on top at least 75 hikers had come and gone. The day was absolutely gorgeous. My descent down the Cristo Couloir was on miserable scree and loose rock and it was steep. I wouldn't use it as an ascent route in the summer for those very reasons but four guys on the summit did just that because they thought the regular trailhead was closed. Near the bottom, I heard a yelp from a fellow who jumped into the reservoir for a swim. Maybe he was expecting a warm pool? I returned to my car at 12:35.

Trailhead to summit via the west ridge- 3 hours 45 minutes

Summit to trailhead via Cristo Couloir- 1 hours 40 minutes

Start to finish- 6 hours 55 minutes (including 90 minutes on summit and other breaks)

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