Redcloud Peak – 14,034 ft
Sunshine Peak – 14,001 ft
Handies Peak – 14,048 ft

Date:  10-8-2005

Climbers: George Barnes and Joey Luther

Route: via Silver Creek and American Basin Trailheads

Total distance: 14.3 miles

Total elevation gain: ~7,000 feet

Total time: 11 hours 50 minutes

USGS Quadrangles:  Redcloud Peak, Handies Peak

Redcloud and Sunshine Peaks

RT time:  7 hours 30 minutes

RT distance:  9.3 miles

Total elevation gain: 4,500 feet

Time to Redcloud: 3 hours 30 minutes

Time on Redcloud:  30 minutes

Time to Sunshine:  1 hour

Time on Sunshine:  30 minutes

Time to TH:  2 hours

Handies Peak

RT time:  3 hours 5 minutes

RT distance:  5.0 miles

Total elevation gain: 2,500 feet

Time to summit: 2 hours 5 minutes

Time to TH:  1 hour

Trip Report:

Joey and I hit the Silver Creek trail at 7:15 AM after a clear, chilly night at the trailhead (20 degrees when I woke up). We had driven up in the dark the night before, so we got our first views of the peaks as the sun came up. North facing aspects were holding a little snow, but it looked like our route would be largely dry.

The trail following Silver Creek is pleasant class 1 and passes quickly. We made our way into the upper basin under blue skies and got our first look at the route up Redcloud. The ridge had a little snow on it, but someone had been up the route recently and we could see their tracks all the way up. At no point did we regret not bringing an axe or snow shoes.
 

At 10:45 we topped out on Redcloud and had the summit to ourselves for half an hour. After summit handstands and panoramic pictures we set off for Sunshine.

"Joey's Panorama" - 500 KB

Redcloud 360º - 430 KB

Wetterhorn, Matterhorn, Uncompahgre  -200 KB

The traverse is about 1.35 miles long with ~550 feet of gain. Joey’s training for the PPA/PPM is apparent as he pulls ahead on the final climb. I arrive ~10 minutes behind with a traverse time of about an hour.

We spend another half hour on the summit, and watch as the summit of Redcloud becomes quite busy with 8+ people. We discuss hitting “Sundog”, UN13432, on the way down but ultimately nix the plan to give us more time on Handies. Our descent route more or less follows Roach’s route 28.4V. The small amount of snow on the route allows us to plunge step and save our knees. We had to make a couple interesting down climb maneuvers in a short couloir, but the descent is largely uneventful.
 

By 2:45 PM we were back at the Jeep and refueling for Handies.

We drove up the road to American Basin and made it to the 4WD TH just before 4 PM. The weather still looked great, so other than being a little tired we didn’t have an excuse to not attempt Handies.

We talked about doing the short route up Handies’ west face, but we couldn’t get excited about 2,400 feet of scree. The standard route is a little longer, but much more gentle. At around 12,700 the trail makes a pretty significant deviation from Roach’s map. To reduce erosion the trail has been routed up near Sloan Lake to avoid a steep scree slope. This adds some mileage and a little elevation gain, but the section passes quickly.

5:15 PM – Up to this point (~13,000 ft) Joey and I had been hiking under mostly clear skies. While stopped for a breather, we note some darkening clouds behind the ridge above Sloan Lake and observe precipitation in the direction of Cinnamon Pass.

One very distant roll of thunder cues a discussion on the prudence of continuing. While the clouds were dark, they did not look like the billowing cumulous clouds you worry about in summer.

We agree we’re comfortable moving upwards, as we’re both well equipped for dealing with what looks like imminent snow on the hike down. I suspect the temperature was nearing freezing as the sun had long been behind the clouds on the horizon. I was wearing a fleece hat and two thermal layers under my hard shell jacket.

5:34 PM – The clouds that Joey and I had watched approach finally reached us. Snow began to fall heavily and visibility quickly decreased. We were at 13,350, only 700 feet and a third of a mile from the summit. We had not heard any further thunder, and we both felt the risk of an electrical storm was low because of the freezing temperatures.
 

5:50 PM – The wet, heavy snow was accumulating quickly, and Joey disappeared into the mist in front of me. With less than 300 vertical feet to the summit I pushed myself to move as fast as I could. A long day on Redcloud and Sunshine had taken its toll on my legs and the summit seemed to be approaching in slow motion.

6:05 PM - Joey had been on the summit for a few minutes when I arrived.  I was completely winded from pushing hard for the last hundred feet, and the yellow lenses of my sunglasses were fogged over from the snow and high humidity.  As I walked past the wind shelter and made my way to the high point Joey said “I don’t want to stay here very long”.  There was nothing to be seen from the summit, so this was fine with me, and we wasted no time retracing our footsteps.  There was now upwards of 2" of new snow over what had previously been barren tundra.

7:05 PM – We arrived back at my Jeep in the 4WD parking lot just as it became dark enough that headlamps would have been a good idea.  We loaded our wet, snow covered packs and jumped in the car for a 6 hour drive home.

I think doing these three peaks in one day turned out to be a bit more of a challenge than either of us expected, but they certainly are doable with a reasonable level of fitness and good weather.