Tom Grundy's Capitol Peak Page

I took a break from 14ers for a while after Sam and Raquel left and cruelly forced Nalumon on a you need to be acclimated acclimitization overnight up Mount Sopris and did some climbing and other rest day activities. Then I wanted to finish off the Elk Range before the next round with Sam and Raquel in the San Juans. Capitol is a fairly long trip with 17 miles and 5300 feet of elevation gain round trip. We decided to both hike in to camp near Capitol Lake and I would climb the peak the next day and we would both hike out. First we had to get to the trailhead. The last mile was getting a little unpleasant and then the last big hill was worse than I wanted for sure. I made it up but was definitely white knuckling it a bit. Then Nalumon stalled out and was a little intimidated by this kind of driving. I ended up driving her Subaru shell up but I probably took a month off the clutch (the gearing was too high and it would stall out). We cooked dinner and camped near the trailhead that night. The road seemed pretty bad, but lest you think it was all that impressive to get a little 2wd truck or Subaru up the road I also saw a Honda Fit and a Subaru pulling a Scamp trailer up there.

We started in at a reasonable hour (for me) but still maybe a bit too early for really reasonable people like Nalumon. At least it wasn't too hot. At first the ditch trail we took parallels an irrigation ditch so it only goes uphill very slowly. This was nice. Soon enough it decided to leave the ditch and head up the slope through the woods. When we got to the wilderness we also got to the cattle. There was a lot of cattle on the hike in and a few fences. Not exactly my idea of wilderness, but it beats condos and ATVs. My pack was pretty heavy (around 50 lbs including the camera, required bear canister, and trekking poles) for this jaunt and pretty much as soon as I put it on I wanted to take it off. I wanted to hike fast and get it over with while Nalumon wanted to stop to catch her breath on a regular basis (like every few steps on the steeper uphills). At the worst I would power ahead and then stop where there was a rock or log to put the weight of the pack. One nice thing was that we could see Capitol off in the distance for a lot of the hike - except it wasn't so nice when it seemed so far away or didn't seem to get any closer. We had a wading stream crossing that also featured a sneaky cow patty - dry and hard on top but with a soft gooey green interior that Nalumon discovered with her shoe.

cattle in the wilderness - Capitol behind them

This hike seemed to go on forever, especially for Nalumon who was still recovering from the Mt Sopris sufferthon and being relatively sedentary and near and below sea level since Hawaii. Finally we got to the turnoff for the camping. We has recently passed some people heading down who had just left their camp and we took it over. Once the tent and hammock were set up things got better. I walked over to Capitol Lake to fill our water containers and contemplated jumping in for a quick rinse-dip, but the chilly wind convinced me otherwise. I stuck my feet in and they ached from the cold so I think avoiding the dip was wise.

sunrise from the saddle

Snowmass to the left and Capitol to the middle right

I got up too early (4:45) and started hiking up Capitol before sunrise. Shortly after I started up the slope I was passed by someone with a lot more pep in their step than I had. At the saddle there was a nice sunrise and soon I rejoined the guy who passed me but then dropped down farther than I did on the far side. This was Nate and we ended up doing the rest of the peak together. We traversed across the talus and some snowfields before heading uphill to the summit of K2. There we had our first good view of the remaining ridge and the infamous "knife edge". It looked pretty awesome. The downclimb from K2 to the ridge might have been the hardest technical climbing but it could have been avoided with some backtracking and traversing. Then it was on up the ridge. I stashed the poles and tip-toed up most of it. The rock was mostly solid and grippy and there wasn't much wind - it was really fun. Like walking along the ridgeline of a roof. Nate had a gopro and made a video of his trip - you can see the trail, cattle, and the peak. Since I was in front of him I am in a lot of the video starting around 1:40. The super wide angle lens makes the ridge look even steeper than it was.

Rather than traverse across the loose face and up we decided to stay on the ridge to the summit - this might have been a little more technical but had better views, more solid rock, and was just more fun. All day I was sort of hoping I would see some way to traverse over to Snowmass and climb that too, but it looked like there would be more than one big descent and ascent and a lot of traversing across snow and talus if I wanted to do this. I think it would have made for a truly epic day - but we wanted to hike out before dark.

posing on the summit (Nate took the pic)

Nate climbing back along the ridge - note the fisheye distortion

Nalumon bravely held down the hammock while I was climbing

Back at camp I had some soup and then we hid in the tent during a brief rain. Then the sun cooked us back out and we packed up and started hiking back down. As usual the hike down required less resting but seemed to go on a lot longer than it should have. I had to do some off trail traversing to avoid some bulls. Finally we made it back to the ditch trail and levelish hiking back to the vehicles. We camped there that night before braving the road back out - my main worry was meeting another vehicle coming up in a skinny steep section.

looking down the Capitol ridge - camp was past the lake in the left

Summary of July 14 and 15th, one 14er, about 17 miles, 5,300 + feet of elevation gain, one cow patty stepped in and some tired slackers.

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