Coxcomb Peak - 13,663'

Coxcomb Peak, at 13,663 feet, is the highest peak in the Cimarron Range, a sub range of Colorado's San Juan Mountains.  It is very prominent when viewed from most places in Montrose and is one of only a handful of technical 13,000 foot peaks in Colorado.  It's been on my mental peak list since I first saw it.

The day's weather forecast was for 90% chance of showers around 9AM with thundershowers starting at noon.  Finally, the start of the 2023 monsoon season! With this in mind Dylan, Nicole and I were walking up the West Fork of the Cimarron River trail at 7AM.  OK, we should have been there much earlier, but who believes the weatherman anyway?

On the drive in, just before the trail head, we saw a couple of bull moose.  It was going to be a good day!

The West Fork trail is pretty buff and we made great time for the first mile or so, until we took a left and started ascending the ravine between Redcliff and Coxcomb Peaks.

Coxcomb is the flat peak second from left

A forest of flowers, or as Nicole says "a flower forest."

The wildflowers were abundant and it was impossible to not step on them as we traversed cross country up towards the saddle between Coxcomb and Redcliff.

Coxcomb to the right of Dylan and Nicole

The normal route for Coxcomb stays on the West Fork trail, goes over Wetterhorn Pass (12,500') and traverses the southern side of Coxcomb Peak.  Eventually you reach a gully, rope up and climb the gully, and then traverse the summit ridge until you reach a notch.  Here you rappel down the notch, before scrambling back up to the summit.  Seemed like a lot extra of time and effort, especially if it was supposed to be raining by 9AM.

We had found some online references to climbing the north side that looked promising; less mileage, no traverse, and no notch equated to less time.  A little more of an unknown adventure, but it fit our style.

Nicole topping out on the saddle at roughly 13,100'

Dylan and I heading toward the north side of Coxcomb. (N. Kreiser photo)

After the saddle, we had a relatively short, but extremely shitty, climb through loose rock to the base of the cliff.  Here, we donned helmets and harnesses and Dylan racked up to lead.  It was now 9:30 and the skies we're still pretty clear.  Looking good!

Dylan preparing to go

And away he goes! (N. Kreiser photo)

Like the shitty rock below the cliff, the rock on this wall was also loose.  Dylan tested every hand hold to make sure it wasn't going to pull off the wall before committing.  It was a good thing we'd set up our belay off to the side, as several rocks came careening down while Dylan was out of sight.  After (what seemed like) 15 minutes or so, and with 10 feet of rope left, Dylan set up an anchor at the summit and called off belay.

Now it was Nicole's turn.

Nicole starting up

It didn't take long before Nicole finished up and Dylan signaled it was my turn to climb up.  The initial 10-15 feet of rock was pretty good compared to the following 10 feet.  In this section, every rock I touched seemed to be loose, but somehow I made it through without pulling anything off.  Once above this section, the angle eased and it became more of a class 4 scramble to the summit.

Looking up as the angle eased.  Cool notch we climbed through.

Me finishing the scramble with Dylan belaying (N. Kreiser photo)

Once on top, we unclipped and soaked in the views.  And they did not disappoint!

N. Kreiser photo

Summit Splattski

It was now time to head down.  Just below us, previous climbers had slung a huge (stable) boulder to set up a rappel station.  We descended to this boulder and took turns rappelling the 200 feet down to our packs.  The rappel was awesome, pretty much vertical and no loose rock!

Nicole starting her rappel.

And Nicole almost down (D. Fadgen photo).

We finished our rappels about 11:00 as the clouds were just starting to move in.  We even heard a little bit of rumbling.  Hmmm, maybe time to get down?

One last look at Coxcomb Peak.

Heading on down the West Fork trail.

And that's what we did.  We were back to the trail head in about an hour and though it threatened, we did not get rained on.

Another beautiful day in the San Juans!