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| Hiking | 5.34 Miles |
1,866 AEG |
| | Hiking | 5.34 Miles | 2 Hrs 21 Mns | | 2.37 mph |
| 1,866 ft AEG | 6 Mns Break | | | |
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| no partners | | Last little outing for the trip, originally intended to go check out Endlich Mesa, but the thing that turned out to be Endlich was the road to the TH. Was about 3 miles up it and turned around because I didn't want to spend three hours driving at 5mph. So I headed over to the La Platas for some fun.
Found a trail on my map heading up from near the junction of Kennebec Pass and Columbine Basin roads, and saw on my map that there is a loop around Taylor Lake. Unfortunately, I was out of service range at that point, so couldn't load the contours... But can't be that bad, right?
The climb up to the lake was mostly on an old road bed, then overgrown singletrack the last little bit before it disappeared into a field of willows only a few hundred feet from Sharkstooth trail. Fortunately they give a little more easily than manzanitas.
The lake itself was nice enough, and saw a handful of hikers and bikers there. Headed up the CO trail to the top of the ridge behind the lake, and departed along the ridge. A couple hundred feet of bouldery talus across a cool causeway thing (ridge was a lot more narrow than it looks from down below), then it's grass the rest of the way up to the summit. Nice view up there, good look at the East and West La Platas, San Juans, and the La Sals off in the distance. Probably the Abajos as well but I was distracted.
The descent down the south side was quite steep, but the rock was stable enough until the lower, flatter portion. On the way back along Sharkstooth a young couple asked me about that route and whether it would be suitable to bring their 3 year old up it... I said I probably wouldn't, but they could certainly take a look at it.
Finding the trail back down took a bit of help from the GPS. Once I did, I actually saw two different couples on the way down who were as surprised as I was that anybody else used this trail. |
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