Climbing in Albert Ellingwood's Footsteps on the Crestone Needle
We first became aware of the Crestone Needle in 1999 when we were just starting to do multi-pitch climbs. A friend of ours, who, in part, taught us to climb, set out to climb the Needle that May but never even got on the mountain due to altitude and an out of shape partner. Ever since then the climb has been stuck in the backs of our minds. We met another guy later in 1999 who had just climbed the Needle but got terribly lost on the descent. This mountain intrigued us. The fact that our friends and mentors had repeated difficulty almost made it more appealing. Sort of a right of passage or graduation if you will--the student out-climbing the master.
After climbing a big wall in Zion we needed to refocus our climbing ambitions. Another big wall didn't appeal to us at the time, so we decided to focus on alpine rock climbing with our ultimate goal being a trip to the Bugaboos in 2005. With that goal in mind, the Needle became a stepping stone (a rather large one) along the way.
So, in September 2003 we found ourselves in our new Subaru Forester trying to drive up what is purported to be the worst four wheel drive road in Colorado. Needless to say, we didn't make it very far. Without a low range we just didn't have enough torque to overcome some of the obstacles. Unfortunately the first mile or so of the road crosses through private land so parking is not allowed. This meant that we had to turn around and drive back down to the trailhead. Had we been thinking we would have dropped our packs off at our turn around point. We weren't thinking. We were too stressed about getting our car back down the road in one piece to think clearly about anything else.
What ensued was one of the most trudging, monotonous approaches ever. Seven miles on that blasted 4x4 road! Nothing to look at but trees and the rutted, boulder filled road. And of course it was almost all uphill. Moving at our usual slow pace under our packs, we made it to the lower Colony Lake in about six hours. We entertained ourselves along the way by pondering over which vehicles had made it the furthest up the road. We saw what looked like a rented Expedition with a very bent running board. Ouch!! A couple of jacked up Wranglers passed us coming down the road. They were totally in their element. We were green with envy!
When we arrived at Lower Colony Lake we were
pooped. There didn't seem to be a lot of good campsites open (at least ones
that were far enough from the water), so we ended up with a less than ideal
site. It was a grass tufted sloping sight. We both rolled around endlessly
trying to find a spot where we
could
be somewhat comfortable before pitching our tarp. The only nice thing about our
sight was a big flat rock which made a fantastic kitchen! Oh, and I can't
complain about the view!
The next morning we were up at 3:30 and on the move by 4:30. With only tikas
to illuminate our way, we had great difficulty reaching the base of the Needle.
All the trails we seemed to find also seemed to disappear, leaving us
bushwacking through thick pussywillows. Eventually we made it out of the
willows and on to a steep grassy hill. This hill led to a dead end under an
unexpected cliff. Much confusion ensued. We debated at length about where the
hell we might be and where we should be. It was so dark we could only see a few
silhouettes here and there. We found an escape route by traversing to the left
into a boulder strewn gully which we couldn't remember observing from camp the
night before. We were pretty sure we were near the start of the route, but we
wanted to be sure we got off on the right foot, so we took a break and waited
for a little help from the sun.
First light found us exactly where we needed to be. We quickly headed uphill to the left leaning weakness that allows access to the Ellingwood Ledges.
This climb is made up of three distinct sections. The first is the long
traverse across the Ellingwood
Ledges. This is mostly on second and third class terrain. There is a great
deal of loose rocks on this part. We found it more secure in places to actually
use the tufts of grass as
footholds.
A slip or fall on this terrain could have bad consequences as the traverse
crosses some steep slopes.
Eventually the traverse leads you to steeper and
rockier terrain. This begins the second part of the climb with is made up of
fourth and easy fifth class climbing. Here we roped up with a hundred feet
between us and began simul-climbing. We climbed this section of the route in
two long pitches. For the most part the climbing was really easy. I felt bad
at one point because I had to climb a fifteen foot 5.4 chimney. I tried to face
climb around it, but just couldn't convince myself to trust those rounded
cobbles. I
worried
about Angela cursing me because she was wearing our pack, so I called down to
her and apologized in advance. Luckily she made it through without too much
trouble, and she didn't give me to much grief about it.
As we climbed higher the third part of the climb came into view--the upper headwall. The headwall consists of about three pitches of even steeper and more difficult climbing. By the time we reached the beginning of the headwall the clouds were really starting to thicken around us. We quickly transitioned to normal belayed climbing and continued onward. The first two pitches only had short technical sections followed by more scrambling. This made for fast climbing as we were able to simul-climb some more.
As I neared the final, crux pitch, I had trouble finding a suitable belay
anchor. I passed up a huge ledge because I saw one up higher, but when I got
there it turned out to be an illusion. I ended up running out of options
twenty-five feet up a steep face with lots of rope drag. (This seems to be a
theme in my climbing adventures.) Both continuing on and down climbing seemed
equally perilous. I managed a mediocre stance on a six inch ledge and wiggled
some gear into the only crack I could find. The anchor was
sufficient for belaying Angela up, but I had real doubts about taking a lead
fall on this anchor. Needless to say, the first twenty feet of the next pitch
were pretty heady. I was relieved when I finally got in some bomber pro.
On this last pitch of the climb we veered off Ellingwood's route and took a
now preferred 5.7 crack. The crux moves were plenty exciting. I stitched it up
real good and thought for sure I was going to fall. The moves pull past a bulge
in a corner
to
a slightly oversized hand crack. With my hip about to pop out of socket, I
found a contorted stem that pushed me through to more secure ground.
After she had watched me struggle through the crux, Angela urged me to make sure I had a bomber anchor at the next belay. But when I got to the end of the pitch I again had difficulty finding a worthy anchor point. There were no cracks to work with and everything I touched seemed to be loose. I couldn't find one descent sized rock to tie off that wasn't begging to be pried of the mountain. I finally settled for tying off what looked like an upside down soup bowl. I sat down, dug my heels into a couple of small cobbles, and prayed that Angela wouldn't fall on the crux.
She didn't. The crux was totally her style of climbing--stemming in a
corner. When she reached me I told her, "Don't even look at my belay anchor".
Of
course she did look, and we laughed it off. The clouds were beginning to look
angry so we had other things to worry about. We quickly stashed our ropes and
gear in the pack and scrambled to the summit.
Bad weather was definitely moving in. Since there was no view to take in, we
immediately began contemplating the descent. We didn't want to screw up here.
We'd heard plenty of stories of people getting lost on the way down. Things
were complicated by the fact that we could only see about a hundred feet, and of
course nothing quite seemed to match the descriptions we'd read. Finally we
broke out our topo map and compass to make sure we had our heads screwed on
right. It's a good thing we did because we ended u
p
changing our mind about which gully we should descend. We took the obligatory
summit shot and headed down as it started raining.
And rain it did! And snow, and sleet, and hail! Under these conditions the
descent was quite trecherous. We left our climbing shoes on
to tackle the wet terrain that is generally supposed to be third class. Believe
me, it's much harder than that when wet. At times we wished we were still roped
up, but we managed to
persevere.
Angela took the lead (her route finding skills are more tuned to going down than
mine) and found our way down the winding and often confusing descent.
In my usual irreverent way, I mocked Mother Nature. "Bring it on!! Is that all you got!" I shouted as lightening flashed and thunder crashed all around us. Angela told me to shut the hell up. I just felt so alive, totally at the mercy of uncontrollable and unknown forces.
When we finally reached easier terrain the wind really picked up. By now we were soaked to the bone. The combination of wind and wet turned our unprotected faces and hands completely numb with cold. As we headed down what finally resembled a trail we ran into another climber who was descending from Crestone Peak. The weather eased off a bit and we spent the remainder of the descent swapping stories with our new companion.
In better conditions the trail that descend back to Lower Colony Lake offers
a spectacular view of the Crestone Needle with the Ellingwood Ledges route in
perfect profile. The three of us stopped occasionally thinking the clouds would
part and offer us a glimpse
of this beauty, but all we got was a good tease. I guess that's what I get for
messing with Mother Nature.
We made it back to our crooked camp about 4:00. Since we were wearing just about all the clothes we'd brought and they were all wet, we decided to pack up, have a hot meal, and head on down the trail. Sometimes it's just hard to resist the lure of civilization!
In payment for our long day on the move and the final three hour grunt down that damn 4x4 road, Angela ended up losing both of her big toenails.
