Tom Grundy's Grays and Torreys Peaks Page

August 10, 2016 We spent the night at the Holy Cross trailhead and then took our time getting up and driving down to civilization. We stopped in a park to cook up some food and dry things off (once it got sunny). Then got groceries and went to the Grays and Torreys trailhead. This involved heading up a pretty lousy road. I stopped to scout a few bits and momentum was our friend (but a fickle one because there were some big rocks and potholes you didn't want to start bouncing on). I was white knuckling some of it but we got both turtles up there. The parking area was pretty empty in the afternoon so we were able to take over a corner to cook up dinner and relax. That evening a lot more vehicles showed up. It was cloudy so I didn't bother trying to see any Perseid meteors.

my private chef making pb&j sandwiches for us

8-11 I delivered coffee at the traditional 5:30. Many more people showed up and headed up the trail before we started. These are relatively easy popular peaks close to Denver so they get a lot of traffic - even on a Thursday, it must be crazy on weekends. I wanted to do the Kelso ridge on Torreys and then traverse over to Grays but Nalumon was not convinced she was up for a class 3 adventure, especially one with a "Knife edge". I am sure she would have been fine, but it might have gone a lot slower and there was the usual threat of afternoon thunderstorms. We took the regular route up Grays. it was wide and easy to follow and there were a lot of people. By the time we were heading up the last slope many were already heading back down. We got to the 14,270 ft summit around 10:30 and did the usual food and photo break plus some summit acro.

Nalumon getting closer to the top

looking back where we started (in the trees at the bottom of the valley)
Kelso Ridge is on the left

high bird on the summit of Grays Peak

Grays Peak summit panorama looking North to Torreys - the Kelso Ridge goes down and to the right from the summit

The trail down to the saddle between the Grays and Torreys was uneventful but we had some mountain goats on the hike up to Torreys. This too wasn't very hard, but we still had to go uphill at high altitude, so it wasn't very fast. We got to the 14,267 ft summit just before 12:30 where we ate more and took more photos, including some jumping ones. Nalumon thought I was trying to kill her poor little legs. Then we went down to the saddle and a bit up before traversing across the slope to meet the main Grays trail and down that back to the trailhead. There were some threatening clouds and a sprinkling of graupel on the hike back but not enough to merit rain gear. The temperature swings from sunny and still to cloudy and windy were drastic though. Driving back down the dirt road was a lot easier than the trip up. I was still glad we didn't meet anyone heading up.

a mountain goat we passed

jumping in tired celebration on the summit of Torreys

Torreys Peak summit panorama looking Northish

looking back up to Torreys from the descent

Summary of August 11, 2 14ers, about 8.5 miles, 3,600 feet of elevation gain, crowds, mountain goats, and a bit of graupel.

Return to the Colorado 14ers Page

Return to the Index Page