When July 4th hits on a Wednesday it doesn't make for a long weekend, but it does make for a rare, but welcomed, mid week summit. For my sixth 14er I chose Quandary Peak. The nice thing about Quandary is that its just south of Breckenridge. I would be hiking this one solo, and because of that I decided to car camp at the trail head the night before. This would also allow me to get an early start and summit relatively close to sunrise.
Tuesday was a slow day at work and my boss decided to let us go early, so I quickly headed home finished packing the car and headed out of town. I got to Breckenridge well before dark and decided to take Darwin, my 2 year old beagle, for a walk around the town to get some energy out before we got to the trail head. After our walk we drove the rest of the way and found little pull off just past the trail head where I parked for the night. After a little reading (Consilience by E.O. Willson, recommended by a friend) I called it a night.
I woke up around 4:30, and it was still dark. I downed a couple protein drinks and drove back down to the trail head. After getting my pack together and getting Darwin ready for the hike we were ready to go just before 5:00 am, it was still fairly dark out and the trail started below treeline, but it was a full moon so I could see enough to stay on track.
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| Full Moon over North Star Mountain to my south... |
This hike like Sherman, which is only 10 miles or so to the south started out climbing and did so the whole way. I tend to hike at a pretty steady clip when I'm solo hiking, but trying to keep up with Darwin was definitely a challenge.
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| Sunrise Towards Keystone |
Once the sun was out enough to see we started covering ground pretty fast. Soon we could see a group that had left the trail head about 15 min. before us. I could also see several groups on the ridge and just below the summit. Looked like a few people had the idea of doing a sunrise hike. Also looked like they had started around 3:00 am.
Before long the trees started to become smaller and smaller, while grass turned to gravel. We caught up with the group just ahead of us at about the half way point and passed them while they took a break. I don't think Darwin and I took a break longer than a minute the whole way up.
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| Quandary Peak in the distance |
Once we reached the ridge the summit was in sight the rest of the way up. The trial turned into a screed field that makes gaining elevation a bit more difficult. We passed another group going up that said they left the trial head around 3:30 am, they joked that they guessed I left around 5:00 am when they saw me coming up behind them. I stopped to chat for a little while, to help lift there spirits about the rest of the hike, the rest of their party had gone ahead a little ways. I passed a couple groups that were heading down from the summit and I caught up with the rest of the group that had spit up about 400 feet below the summit.
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| Ridge leading up to Quandary Peak |
I reached the summit around 7:00 am, about 2 hours after I started. There were two guys at the top so I asked if they would snap a picture of me.
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| North Star Mountain directly behind me, and the Mosquito Quad (Lincoln, Democrat, Cameron, and Bross) in the distance. |
Shortly after summitting the first group I passed showed up. Four guys decked out in American flags and 70's style jorts... They tried to shotgun a couple Budweiser Ameri"cans" which failed miserably. The two groups didn't stick around long which was nice, because I got a little time alone on the summit. It was a foggy/smokey morning, hard to tell the difference, but the views were incredible.
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| Atlantic Peak, and Pacific Peak to the Left. Peak 8 & 9 at Breckenridge Ski Resort in the Distance. |
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| Another view of North Star Mountain and the Mosquito Quad looking south |
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| One more pick of me looking north. |
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| McCullough Gulch to the north |
Once the group that had split up reached the summit and after a short chat I decided to head back down. It was about 7:40 am and I was looking forward to getting back home before noon. The way down was pretty quick going, jogging some when I could to make up for time spent letting people pass. The sun was coming out and it was getting hotter every minute. I was glad for my early start as I saw people coming up already in shorts and t-shirts.
I made it back to the car around 9:00 am for a total trip time of 4 hours. The trip was 6 3/4 miles up and back with an elevation gain of 3,450 ft. I really enjoyed my mid week hike. I got back to Denver well before noon, and got to take a much needed nap before heading over to a friends for a 4th of July dinner.
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