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Thought I’d drop over to Dav’s website. Good news, with a descent of Mount Lincoln this past Sunday he’s officially started his project to make complete descents of all 54 Colorado fourteeners in one season (winter/spring ’06).
I have to admit to getting a chuckle out of Dav’s trip report. It looked like a beautiful day, but mention of cold toes and groaner snow conditions had me reading between the lines and knowing that it probably wasn’t the perfect fourteeener day — though the worst day on a fourteener is better than the best day of heli skiing, or so I’ve been told (grin).
Davenport’s choice of mountain and route was interesting. While many Colorado peaks now have plentiful snowcover, he chose an area that is somewhat dry. That’s wise, as this time of year most heavily covered fourteeners have significant avalanche danger. By backcountry skiing a wind hammered and thin snowpack, he avoided slide hazard and still got to ski and climb a ‘teener. But be advised, Chris Davenport mentions the skiing on Lincoln as being ” mildly horrible.” That equals kick turns and traverses for us mere mortals — but a kick turn on a fourteener is still better than a lift line at Vail.
And this just in from Chris Webster, another guy who’s well on his way to backcountry skiing all the fourteeners and happened to be on the Lincoln/Bross massif the same day as Davenport:
“We skied Mt. Bross Sunday. All the snow that summit county is getting has not been making it south of Hoosier pass. Bross was a lunar landscape, the gut of moose creek was not fully connected, so some
detouring was required.”
Webster also shared some guidebook beta (a new edition of my 14er guide is due out during the next year, because of stuff like this):
“Errata: directions to Bross need update, I think you can’t cross the creek right after turning onto 4 (barricades, washed out), you need to go up a mile or more and then back down that same mile or more to
Quartzite. Alternative is to go up Peterson (further North) which then connects with Quartzite at the top.”
As always, best wishes to Webster, Dav and all other winter fourteener skiers out there.
WildSnow.com publisher emeritus and founder Lou (Louis Dawson) has a 50+ years career in climbing, backcountry skiing and ski mountaineering. He was the first person in history to ski down all 54 Colorado 14,000-foot peaks, has authored numerous books about about backcountry skiing, and has skied from the summit of Denali in Alaska, North America’s highest mountain.
