We rendezvoused at a lodge in Breckenridge, twenty or so miles from the trailhead, Dan drove us to the trailhead the next morning. We left around a quarter to six, stopped for breakfast at a gas station in Fairplay, and arrived at the trailhead, after official sunrise time, but before the sun actually rose over the mountains surrounding us. The last five miles of the journey covered a progressively degenerating dirt road.
The trail started over weathered-white rocks at the outlet to Kite Lake, a name whose logic is evident from higher elevations, and proceeded through an unoccupied campground. At 12,000 feet we were well above tree-line, but green grass covered the ground at the start. As they grass gave way to the talus of the mountainside, the gentle ascent quickly evolved to a serious climb that notified my lungs I wasn't at sea-level anymore.
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As we proceeded, a group of college kids at least thirty-strong started on the quiet trail behind us. They would stretch out based on ability so that beginning about an hour into the hike and continuing to the first summit I always seemed to be in their company or that of other hikers as they overtook me. Dan for his part proceeded ahead of me ten to fifty yards before stopping to let me catch up. Registering a whooping average speed of 1 MPH, we reached the saddle between Mt. Democrat and Mt. Cameron, a good place for a short rest, after an hour and half or hiking.
After a ten minute rest on the remnants of some mining operation, we took the left fork of the trail up the last 700 feet of Mt. Democrat. An hour later when I set foot on the USGS marker at this mountain's peak, I had officially summitted my first fourteener. We rested there among the crowd (20-30 people) for about twenty minutes, but it felt like half that to me.
Most people satisfied with reaching this peak, return to the parking lot from here, but we wanted to continue on to Mt. Lincoln, the highest peak in the Mosquito Range. To reach this 14,286 ft. mountain, we backtracked to the saddle where we had rested early and continued on the right fork of the trail up the west slope of Mt. Cameron, an extension of Mt. Lincoln (to be an independent mountain, a peak must rise at least 300 feet above the saddle that connects it to the nearest peak) . Simon Cameron, a senator from Pennsylvania, was Lincoln's first secretary of war, though I don't know if this fact played into the name of the peaks. All told we had lost and regained about 700 feet of the orginally gained 2,000 in elevation, between Mt. Democrat and Mt. Cameron. We unnecessarily wandered around the top for Mt. Cameron trying to devine which point was the highest on the broad peak.
After all the exertion, I enjoyed the short section between Mt. Cameron and Mt. Lincoln for it was comparably flat. Moreover, Mt. Lincoln projects like a prow from the line of the other mountains. Consequently, the forward views here were more open compared to the pile of rocks leading to the previous peaks. Lastly, Mt. Lincoln represented, not only the most distant point on the hike, but also the tallest mountain I would ever climb. Arriving at the summit around 12:30 we had made pretty good time, but not enough for more than another twenty-minute break for the common threat of late afternoon thunderstorms prompts wise hikers to be off the mountains by 3:00 PM.
With 3.5 miles of trail ahead of us, we set off for Mt. Bross, the last fourteener on the route. Mercifully the ridge to this last summit only drops 400 ft before beginning the to rise again. Indescribably exhausted by this point in the hike, I resorted to taking twenty steps forward before resting for 10 deep breaths. I repeated this pattern until I reached the summit (a broad-topped mountain like Mt. Cameron) at around 2:00 PM.
With dark clouds in the vicinity, we spent very little time on this last peak. Considering that it really was all downhill from here, I didn't mind the abbreviated visited. The menacing skies aside I was happy to to expedite completion of the hike, but not the point I didn't enjoy the great views, particularly of Mt. Democrat, the peak I had climb how many thousand steps ago.
Dan seemed more hurried on the descent. Trusting his experience, I traveled as fast as I could bear, but even walking down hill takes energy. I found the worst parts of the entire trail were on the top half of Mt. Bross. At times it seemed the trail slanted laterally 30 to 40 degrees. At others, the rocks felt so loose I'd sink up to my ankle in dirt and fear riding a rockslide the rest of the way down the mountain. Halfway down, we dropped from exposed ridge to semi-protected gulch and Dan seemed to relax. I anxiously sought the return of the green grass at the base of the valley. The clouds continued to gather and dropped a but a few sprinkles. The trail had one last surprise for us, the a 15-ft cascade hidden in a small cleft at the end of he gulch, a half mile or so from the parking lot.
Trip Statistics
Length: 8.0 miles
Time: 8 hours 3 minutes
Elevation Change: 2,286 feet
Total Climbing: 3,700 feet
Max. Elevation: 12,286 feet
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