Rio Grande Pyramid (13,821 feet) by Brian Schultz Thursday July 15, 2004
Tim and I met in Creede and ate dinner at the Bears Den before driving to the Rio Grande Reservoir trailhead. The servings at this popular restaurant were so large that we couldn't finish our meals, a rarity for me after a full day of hiking. We parked in the no-fee area of the Thirty Mile campground, set up Tim's truck for carcamping, and prepared our packs for a very early morning start.
Our plan was to dayhike the long East Slopes Route because neither of us wanted to do a backpack, and we figured our early start would have us on the summit before any storms rolled in. Tim scouted the Weminuche Trail to forestall any routefinding problems in the morning darkness and we turned in shortly after he got back. I had no problem falling asleep after five straight days of climbing.
I looked forward to hiking a genuine trail after yesterday's misadventure on Phoenix Peak. We hit the trail at 3:30 AM, hoping to reach the Opal Lake Trail junction at first light, and built up a sweat so quickly that we had to stop and shed our jackets. Short sleeves made for cool hiking in the dark as we hustled up five miles on great trail to the junction. Or what we thought was the junction. Daylight was upon us when we arrived at 5:45 and the good timing called for a break.
Fifteen minutes later we continued on but Tim alertly noticed we weren't gaining elevation as the route description indicated. We backtracked to find that we'd overshot the correct junction. The Roaches' description says to continue 100 yards past the third creek crossing but that's wrong. It's 100 feet, if even that. At the correct junction there is an old wood signpost from which the route heads up the slope (on the right) a short distance to the Opal Lake trail but that signpost is easy to overlook, especially in the dark, and there's no connecting trail from it to the Opal Lake trail. We strongly urge paying attention in this area because the slightly farther junction we stopped at also matches the route description with a sign and turn-off. The mix up cost us a half hour's time and an extra mile.
We slowed our pace on the steep but excellent Opal Lake trail and stopped for pictures when Rio Grande Pyramid and the Window finally appeared into view. The impressive Window looks like someone took a giant chainsaw and cut a square block right out of the ridge. We pressed on to the flat area at 12,000 feet and took another break with a commanding view of the peak. While gazing about, Tim spotted a group of backpackers hiking a different trail in the basin below and, interestingly, they turned out to be the only hikers we saw the entire day.
The trail took a slight descent through some willows before gaining again to our exit point. After a steep grunt to the broad saddle, we headed up the scree gully, not nearly as bad as it looked from below, and stopped for another short break at the top. We'd hiked over nine miles thus far and wanted one last rest before the final push to the summit. As we sat, a marmot crept annoyingly close, and even though we didn't feed it, I unwittingly left my pen and paper on a rock when we left. Much to the delight of the marmot, I'm sure, but providing lunch for the critter was not my intention.
My legs felt surprisingly strong as we began climbing the rough talus to the summit but the finish to the top wasn't exactly a cakewalk. We zigzagged up and around lots of loose steep rocks before finally plopping onto the summit at 10:20.
Over forty climbers had signed the register so far this summer and it was fun to pick out the surrounding San Juan peaks during our 25 minute stay but when storm clouds threatened, we quickly departed. A brief search at the gully for the paper and pen came up empty, of course, and we hurriedly pushed to treeline before stopping again. The expected storms never did materialize and the weather turned out to be rather pleasant for the remainder of the hike. Unfortunately, the long hike out was grueling and I, for one, was totally exhausted when we pulled in to the parking lot at 3:35.
Our round trip distance for this peak, including the extra mileage past the junction, was over 20 miles. It's a good thing we started and finished when we did because I had 210 miles of regular highway driving to get to Telluride. Tim drove the four wheel drive mountain passes to shortcut the miles but barely beat me there. After checking in at our hotel and cleaning up, we ate a fine Mexican meal at Sofio's and set the alarm for another early morning wake-up. Gladstone Peak was next up and I was looking forward to its class 3 route, wobbly ridge and all.
Trailhead to summit- 6 hours 50 minutes
Summit back to trailhead- 4 hours 50 minutes
Start to finish- 12 hours 5 minutes