Last Updated on July 31, 2023 by James Dziezynski
Though I didn’t know it at the time, my trip down to Lake City to climb Handies Peak and Whitecross Mountain was the start of a very strange three days. The 6-hour drive from Boulder to Lake City seems like a long voyage to take for a single day of hiking, but that’s how it ended up. The plan was to stick around for the weekend and get good half-dozen peaks with Fremont. While things changed, the plan to grab Handies and Whitecross stayed true. Along with Jenny, who was staying in the area for a Telluride based vacation, Fremont and I set off to grab his third 14er (Handies Peak 14,014 ft.) and a bonus summit (Whitecross Mountain 13,491 ft.) along the way!
Jenny and Fremont on the approach to Handies Peak on a picture perfect late summer Colorado day.
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Fremont checks in en route to the summit of Handies Peak.
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Fremont on the final ridge to the summit of Handies Peak.
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Fremont gets his third 14er on Handies Peak summit!!
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Jenny's Handies Peak summit shot shows the beautiful topography of the San Juan Range.
Our ascent to the peak was peaceful and surprisingly uncrowded for the holiday weekend. As it turns out, Handies did have quite a few visitors but the bulk of them came up from the American Basin side, which is a shorter hike. We lingered at the top for a while, admiring the stunning San Juan scenery. Whitecross Mountain was a short jaunt from 14,014 ft. Handies Peak and the ridge connecting the two looked dog friendly, so we were off!
Jenny and Fremont descend from the summit of Handies Peak en route to Whitecross Mountain.
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A border collie's eye view of the rocky red ridge up to Whitecross Mountain.
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Cloudwalker.
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Jenny on the ridge of Whitecross Mountain with Handies Peak looming in the background.
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Wild formations just before the summit of Whitecross.
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Fremont advances the self-timer early, making for a fun summit photo on Whitecross Mountain.
Whitecross Mountain’s 13,491 ft. summit was a great traverse but it’s off-trail nature revealed something I hadn’t expected: a lot of the rock on the ridge was embedded with hard, sharp cuts of rose quartz. The few places I used my hands revealed the sharp rock’s presence — I could imagine had the ridge been longer, it would have started to chew up Fremont’s pads on his paws. Since our planned hike for tomorrow was 9 miles of almost all off-trail peaks on this same rose quartz, I made the call to save the planned adventure for either a non-dog hike or for a point in the future when Fremont’s pads have grown tough enough to handle it.
Splish-splash victory swim!!!
With that, Jenny headed off to Telluride and Fremont and I decided to return to Boulder that night — which was Saturday Sept. 4th. The 6 hour drive was quick and traffic free. As Fremont dozed off, I listened to a wonderful series of college lectures on the middle ages (I’m a big nerd, if you have forgotten). We drove into Boulder just before 9PM, determined to take Sunday as a rest day and head out again on Monday, Sept. 6th…
