| As a follow-up to my Missouri Mountain ascent 08/30/02 (I was planning on bagging Ice Mountain and North Apostle 8/31),
I drove back out on Chaffee County 390 to take some more peaks on. From the beginning, things started to go awry. I went
up the wrong 4WD road on Huron's West side, and back-tracked to the appropriate road leading to 10,600'. I got a late start
at 7:30am. It didn't take too long to reach the first trail junction, whereupon the Roach guide gives instructions to cross
to the west side of the creek. Little did I realize that the correct turnoff is one junction South. I went up the Lake Ann trail
about a mile before turning around and taking the "Apostle Basin" trail (not mentioned in the book). I followed this up to treeline,
where I ran into some people hiking Huron Peak. The trail junction to cross the creek at the correct point was disguised by a log (700' down from where I was)
which I discovered on the way back down later in the day. The photo on the right shows the Apostles from Huron Peak's southern approach.
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And so began a long bushwhack to the basin below Ice Mountain. The terrain wasn't too bad, as long as I skirted the middle of
the slopes. I arrived at a basin with a lake at 12,100' and figured I had found the place to approach the saddle. I was actually one
basin North of the correct approach. I tried making sense of the topo and the route description, and tried to climb a north-facing rib
to reach the saddle. After about 700' the rib became unclimbable with incredible exposure and loose rock faces. Back down again, I studied
the route some more, and decided to take a gamble at traversing the west side of this basn to see what lied beyond the other side. I found some
Cairns, which was a welcome sight, and followed them up into what might be the correct basin. It was now 11:00, and I had put in enough effort to
climb one peak and descend, but I wasn't going to give in. Following the cairns on the ramped grass/talus, I eventually broke out into the correct
basin (photo on the left). |
| This is a very nasty basin, reminiscent of the loose rock that abounds the Sierra Nevada Range. After traversing a talus morraine, the route
became more dirt-based, with a lot of loose scree unthoughtfully placed by the peaks over time. I was moving slow at this point, and I had to
make small goals for myself to be able to make progress. I spotted a group of climbers up above on the Ice/North Apostle saddle, and there was loose
rock abound making all sorts of erratic noise. I had before seen someone's comment that the sound of falling rock is representative of the mountain
slowly dying. I suppose if climbing creates more rockfall, then perhaps climbing accelerates death. If so, Ice Mountain is dying fast, because I have
never heard rockfall of this longevity anbd intensity. Eventually, I came to a fork where a tower froces a choice of left or right mini-gullies. The photo on the right
shows the route up the left (North) gully. Make no mistake about it, this is a loose section and the basin below the saddle should be rated Class 2+.
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The route becomes more faint after reching the top of the fork, and to this point there had been no trail other than exposed dirt due to the loose nature
of the route's components. I preferred to take some slightly more difficult terrain by scrambling up large talus blocks to avoid the scree madness. The proper
direction to take was indiscernable, and I looked for the lowest point to head towards, which changed with each time of evaluation. After some more scrambling,
the saddle revealed itself. Ice Mountain doesn't look too domineering from this perspective, but I decided to take on North Apostle instead, due to the rockfall
I could still hear, and the late time of day (12:30pm). Somewhat disappointed, I knew that I had put in a hard day's work and needed a summit for compensation.
On the left is a view of North Apostle from the saddle.
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The general direction to take was straightforward, though the route was not overly easy. Changes in course toward the summit had to be re-evaluated every 40' of
elevation gain to avoid the ridge crest and still hike on something solid. Soon enough, the final stretch to the summit appeared, and it was much smaller
than I had expected. It became clear to me why there are no other routes mentioned in guidebooks. The views of Mt. Harvard and Huron Peak were spectacular, and
Ice Mountain definitely looked more intimidating from this perch. On the right is Huron Peak seen from the summit of North Apostle. I obviously decided against a
3,000' vertical attempt of Ice Mountain by descending back to the Lake Ann trail junction and coming back up, as it was now 1:00pm. I had highly underestimated the
difficulty of the approach, and learned a healthy respect for lesser traveled routes.
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