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| Peak 10,340 (Peak #1) in the background |
Dan Robbins, Tom Lopez and I had been talking about climbing the four 10K peaks that surround Little Falls Creek basin east of
Ketchum, and with temperatures expected to
be 108 in Boise, it sounded like a good time to be high.
After a nice, cool night spent in Phi Kappa campground, we drove
up the rough Little Falls Creek road as far as we felt was necessary (7800
feet), and were moving a little after 6AM.
We hiked up the road, which alternated between rough rocks and smooth
gravel, for a couple of miles until we reached an old mining cabin at 9200
feet. With our first peak directly above
us, Dan and Tom took a short break while I wandered around and admired the cabin.
We then dropped down and crossed the creek before starting up
the open mountainside of Peak 10,340, eventually gaining the eastern
ridge. Though it was in the low 60’s
when we started the hike, it was now considerably warmer in the sunshine.
Once on the ridge, it was a nice walk up to the summit of
peak 10,340 which we reached at 8:45AM.
Even though there was a haze in the air, the views were outstanding.
After a short break spent eating, chatting and admiring the
views, we started out for peak #2 directly to the north of us. Before we started down the ridge, Dan spotted
a herd of elk spread out below us. They eventually detected us as we moved down the ridge, and moved into the thick trees, talking
amongst themselves. I have always loved
listening to cow elk talking!
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| Elk heard |
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| Close up of elk herd |
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| Peak 10,356 (Peak #2) |
Peak #2 (Peak 10,356) was another straightforward walk up,
which we reached at 9:30AM. From this peak,
we had an excellent view of our third and most exciting looking objective – Peak 10,350. We didn’t spend too much time on top of peak
#2 for two reasons: it was starting to warm up and peak #3 looked like it was going to
be a bit of fun.
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| Looking back at Peak #1 |
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| Peak 10,350 (Peak #3) |
We dropped down the 500 feet to the saddle between peaks
10,356 and 10,350, and stared up at the somewhat rotten looking cliffs above
us. Unfortunately, the lighting wasn’t
so good and the photos below do not do it justice. We'd gotten a good look at the cliff band from the
first peak, and noticed that you could either drop down 100 or so feet to skirt
them or just head straight up through them.
Dan and Tom chose the first option, while I chose the second, and in my
opinion, better option.
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| Cliff band with Dan as a perspective |
After telling Tom I’d be careful, I picked the first obvious
seam and started up. My second handhold
crumbled on me, but my feet were firmly planted, so I shrugged it off and
continued carefully climbing. Twenty
feet higher and the seam ended. After a
bit of looking around, I made an airy move over to my right and found another narrow
seam. This took me up another 30 feet
where I topped out on a ledge with a goat trail! I just followed this goat trail up along the
edge of the cliffs to the summit at 10:45AM.
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| Taking a break with the goat trail behind me (above my head) |
After a few photos, I dropped my pack and moved over to the edge
to see how Tom and Dan were progressing.
It didn’t take long for me to validate that I had chosen the correct
route. They were slowly making their way
up in loose talus on the hot, exposed, steep southern slope. From the sounds coming from the two of them
(Damn, it’s fricking hot!), there wasn’t a puff of breeze to cool them off. After a few more minutes they both joined me
on the summit.
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| Sorry Tom! |
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| Looks hot! |
I was still feeling pretty good at this point, but the heat had
taken its toll on Tom and Dan. After a
short rest, they informed me that the fourth peak wasn’t in the cards for
them.
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| Peak #4 to the left |
Peak 10,300 looked to be at least a mile away, with a fair bit of ridge scrambling involved.
So off I went, trying to keep up a brisk pace while also trying to stay
cool. Luckily, the clouds blocked the
sun for the majority of the uphill portion, and after 45 minutes I was on
summit #4 for the day at 11:45AM.
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| A look back at Peak #3 - Tom is on the open ridge in the sunshine |
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| The final ridge |
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| Summit shot! |
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| Great view of Mystery Peak from Peak #4 |
Now it was just a matter of getting down. The original plan was to backtrack to the saddle
between peaks #3 and #4 and drop down a less steep ridge. The only problem was this saddle was a mile
back in the wrong direction. It was
continuing to get hotter and the inevitable rain clouds were building, so I
just decided to drop straight down. Other
than skirting a couple of short drop offs, I boot skied down ¾ of the 1800 foot
slope. The last ¼ proved tedious because
the rocks were too big to slide and it was now damn hot. When I was several hundred feet above the
road, Dan and Tom went strolling by. As
it was, I ended up being about 5 minutes behind them.
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| The straight shot descent route |
A cold creek on the feet and a cold beer in the hand never
felt so good!
