The Kissing Couple

 What is so incredible about desert towers? Layton Kor said “one tower is worth five big walls.” Maybe he is right? What ever the case desert towers have some sort of magical draw to me. I love desert towers isolation from everything around them. Vertical elevators of adventure straight up. There is nothing like sand in the corner of your eyes, caking in your ears, irritating your nostrils, and rubbing the skin off your body in squeeze chimneys. Desert towers are always a complete experience.

Not to long ago Terray Sylvester and I climbed the Long Dong Wall on the Kissing Couple located in Colorado National Monument just outside of Grand Junction Colorado. The climb is nothing but fun from start to finish. 

The tower can be approached in a couple ways. We chose to park at the Upper Monument Canyon trailhead near the Coke Ovens Overlook and walk down from the Rim Road into the canyon. One could also rappel directly into the canyon if so desired.

The first pitch of the climb is the crux and offers steep sandy crack climbing with a sporty finish protected by a bolt. I thought the first pitch was incredible and worthy by itself.  The pitch is long and sustained.

A couple pitches of chimneying and scrambling bring you to a 5.8 crack in styrofoam like rock followed by another chimney of sorts. 

 

The top of this pitch is called the “belfry,” a window like area through the towers visible from the road. The architecture of rock here is truly fascinating and creates astonishing exposure.

 

 

The next and final pitch is hard to imagine but it tunnels through the tower on guano covered cracks to a climatic overhanging move that involves transferring from the face you are on to a face behind you in a wild display over the void. 

The summit is a special place of isolation, solitude, wind and sensational views.  

Descending requires a few rappels. The first being free hanging for most of the way. Manage the rope well. Rope eating cracks abound littered with the remnants of old stuck cut ropes. 

The Lond Dong wall is a great adventure with some excellent climbing along the way.

Colorado's Highlands Ridge Ski Traverse

A couple days before the trip I asked Jamie, “What gear should we bring?”

Jamie replied, “I don’t think we need any gear.”

I then asked “What about my little glacier rope, it’s pretty light?”

Jamie countered “If we don’t bring any gear no reason to bring a rope.”

I muttered “I guess there’s no reason to bring a harness, what should we bring?”

Days later I found myself on an exposed, crumbling and jagged fin of 5^th class rock just south of Keefe Peak, one of Highland Ridge’s several 13,000 foot peaks. For the last 45 minutes I had only made 50 feet of forward progress. Ski boots, gloves, dehydration, exposure and fatigue were making the going especially slow. The giant fin of rock I was climbing was about three feet wide and a couple hundred feet long. To the West was nothing but air, the fin was slightly overhanging. To the East was an 80 degree chossy cliff face, “impossible,” I thought . I needed to move South but I was looking down a 25 foot spire to a small patch of flat snow below that would offer a breath of horizontal ground to rest on before I had to climb the next fin of step crumbling rock. 

Down climbing the steep vertical cliff to the South would have been preferable but I could only pick out a few possible foot holds for my clunky ski boots. Who knew if they would even hold when I weighted them? For the last several hour the foot and hand hold failure rate had been well over 50 percent. A hold would look promising but when tested would explode out of the rock. There was another way, the horn of rock I was holding onto looked like it would hold me on rappel. “I don’t have a rope,” I thought to myself.  I decided to down climb the 80 degree rock to the East. After 30 feet of terrifying down climbing I plunged me ski boot into a sliver of snow that connected to the start of the next fin of rock. The snow was shallow, heavy and wet in the afternoon sun and my boots slipped on the rock beneath. Below me were several steep rock bands that dropped into a huge snow bowl. Slipping was not an option. I tuned out the exposure, took some deep breaths and focused like never before.  I followed a simple mental safety checklist:

Right hand on bomber hold, check,

Left foot on secure foot hold, check,

Left hand on satisfactory hand hold, check,

Ok to move right foot, GO.

I inched forward. Life had become very basic and simple almost robotic in nature.

When I first moved to the Roaring Fork Valley of Colorado in 2005 I eagerly hiked up Highland Bowl on a casual day of powder skiing. I remember standing at the top of the bowl on a bluebird day with prayer flags fluttering above my head looking to the South. What I saw amazed me. A ridge rolled on and on into the distance. It was the most inviting path I had ever seen. A walkway made by the divine. It was love at first site.  Back in Aspen I asked every body I knew about traversing Highlands Ridge. My inquiries were met by blank faces or accounts of backcountry skiing around Highlands Peak. I wasn’t interested in skiing power I just wanted to follow the ridge to where ever it might take me.  That night I bought a topographical map of the Aspen area at the Ute. Opening up the map fired me up even more.  Highland Ridge formed an almost perfect straight line North to South for over 10 miles.

For years I tried to find someone to traverse the ridge with me without success.  Someone tipped me off that Jeff Hollenbaugh had completed the traverse solo. A few years ago I went skiing with Jeff in Marble, Colorado.

I nervously said “Hey Jeff I am thinking of trying the Highland Ridge Traverse, do you have any suggestions?”

Jeff the alpine master replied “Don’t bring much.”

Then silence………….. “Thanks Jeff,” I said.

A couple winters ago I was reading Louis Dawson’s Colorado Backcountry Skiing  (Page 114-115) and found mention of the Highlands Ridge Traverse. This was the first concrete evidence I found pertaining to the traverse. Basically the Highland Ridge Traverse involves going up Highlands Ski Area and following the ridge South until one reaches Traingle Pass. From Triangle Pass one descends the pass East to Conundrum Creek and follows the Creek North back to Aspen. Based on Hollenbaugh’s experiences Dawson described it as gnarley, scary, done by few and one intense mountaineering objective. I had to see this traverse with my own eyes I thought to myself.

For some reason it wasn’t difficult to convince Jamie Hozack (aka Jaime Caliente) that we should try the Highland Ridge Traverse. Jamie and I did some climbing together including a trip to Denali and I knew he was the man.  2011 was our first stab at the traverse. We were packed and ready to go when a late spring storm dumped over 20 inches of snow on us and we were shut down. 2012 was not looking promising with our rapidly disappearing snow pack but we rallied on Thursday April 12^th after work. We new with soaring temperatures it was our last chance of the year that ridge might be skiable. All week I checked NOAA every 15 minutes for weather updates. The weather looked horrible cloudy, cold, windy and predicted snow every day from Thursday to a building storm Sunday that was going to dump.

More concerning then the threat of bad weather was my wife’s 90 year old grandparents where flying into Colorado Springs, Colorado, a 4 hour drive away. I vowed to my wife be there on Saturday knowing the traverse would take us at least 20 hours.  The timeline turned into a problem when my wife  Katy asked her typical question of “when should I call Mountain Rescue?”

I replied “ummm ahhhhh ummmmm.. I  don’t know…. like Saturday night after 10pm.” 

She gave me the look and a few words emphasizing the fact that I had better be back by 8 am Saturday morning and it didn’t matter if it required a helicopter ride and leaving the ICU against medical advice to make it happen. 

Thursday late afternoon I raced up to Aspen to meet Jamie after work. We decided we would skin up to the Highland Patrol Hut rest a couple hours and see what the weather was like when we got up at midnight. Our departure was uneventful besides having to buy a 30 dollar pair of forgotten ski socks in Aspen as the clerk was turning the store sign from open to closed and I dropped down on my knees in front of the store begging.  We shuttled cars and hem and hawed about the likely prospect that we would get towed considering the “No Parking sign” 20 feet from Jamie’s truck and the “No overnight parking sign,” posted in the parking lot where we left my truck. We decided to split the costs of misfortune and suited up.

Skinning up to the Highlands Patrol Hut the weather did not look promising. We were blanketed in a think cloud of pea soup. The snow cats groomed the little patches of slushy snow around us. The snow cat’s beams illuminated the thick fog like when the City of Gotham signals Batman. Little did we know we would need super powers in the hours to come. We arrived at the patrol hut laughing nervously about what was to take place the next day.  When we went to bed for a two hour nap the weather was miserable, cold, wet snowing, windy and there was zero visibility.  We hunkered down on the patrol hut floor for a back aching nap  I lay listening to the howling winds outside the hut thinking there is no way this thing is going to happen. Two hours latter the buzz of my watch alarmed and I picked myself up off the floor and tried to stretch the knots out of my back. I looked outside and there were several inches of new snow on the deck. “Darn,” I thought this is not looking good. We pretended everything was a go and we were ready in 20 minutes flat. For a midnight buzz we sipped stale left over coffee made by the ski patrollers the day before. Stepping outside I looked up to my surprise and saw stars, stars everywhere bright bright stars. “This could happen,” I thought.

In the dark of night Jamie and I first did the familiar hike to the top of Highlands Peak (12,381 ft). The next 4 miles the ridge is very inviting and gentle with a steep rocky step here and there. Just before ascending Hunter Peak (13,497 ft) a raging wind storm swept us off our feet.  Our eyes were pelted and scoured by evil granular blowing snow.  We stumbled possessed by the howling wind that was so strong it was deciding where we stepped. From here on out we would not drop below 12,000 feet for over 10 hours until we descended Triangle Pass into the Conundrum Valley. The wind made me nervous and doubtful we would get much farther.  I thought any moment Jamie or I would crack and call it quits. Climbing anything knife edge in the gusting winds would be impossible.  Magically as we reached the summit of Hunter Peak the winds ceased and all was quiet as flickers of morning light streaked the sky.  Hunter Peak was the first of seven 13,000 foot peaks we had to climb in the next 3 miles.

After climbing Hunter Peak the ridge wonders to Keefe Peak, 13,516 feet, and the tempo of the trip starts to change from relaxed to desperate. From here on out the ridgeline is plagued with technical rock bands.  At the start of each band there are three choices.

1. Climb the fins of rock directly.
2. Down climb East around the band of rock.
3. Down climb West around the band of rock.

Climbing the 5^th class bands directly is not desirable given ski boots, gloves and lack of protective gear. But this year happen to be a low snow year. In several spots going to the East side or West side of the rock bands would have been insane. The slopes to each side of the bands were loose and at the angle of repose. Furthermore the West side of the bands were cut by steep ribs of rock and deep gullies between.  The choice was made for us we had to climb the apex of many of the rock bands directly. Jamie out front yelled back to me words of caution “Pull on the kind of loose rocks not the really loose ones,” as he threw a chunk of rock over his shoulder. For hours we negotiated the fins of rock between Keefe and the next unnamed Peak (13,537 ft) to the South. Exposure, fatigue and the constant threat of slipping and tumbling down bone shattering slopes kept us in a constant state of panic and intense focus on moving forward.

As we inched closer to Peak 13,537 the sky became gray and flakes of snow fell around us. We were far past the point of no return and making it to Triangle Pass was the safest option. I silently picked my way over slippery snow dusted scree blocks until descending to a grassy saddle. “This must be it,” I thought to myself. 

I took out the map and took a compass bearing to Conundrum Peak across the valley. My heart sank, I had only reached Conundrum Pass (12,780 ft). According to the map we still had Peak 13,216 and Peak 13,057 to climb before Triangle Pass, the true completion of the Highlands Ridge Traverse. Jamie was no where in site. I sat down on my pack and hung my head between my knees. I fought the urge to say the heck with it, lets just descend Conundrum Pass and be done with this. Neither Jamie or I had drank any water for hours. I new Conundrum Creek and a full nalgene was only a half hour ski away.  As I waited I calmed my thoughts of throwing in the towel. I thought to myself “finish this thing and you will never have to question coming back out here again.” I looked up and Jamie emerged as a dot in the snow above and stumbled his way to the saddle. He crashed down in the dry grass and laid out totally exhausted.  Before I had the heart to tell him we had two more thirteeners  to climb I got the stove out and melted 2 cups of water.

Peak 13,216 passed without difficulty. Peak 13,057 was a headache. We scrambled up a rock spire until we reached a gap between the spire we were on and the peak proper. The gap was about 6 feet wide and 30 feet deep. Connecting the two rock outcrops was a column of rock that had fallen into the gap and was chock stoned forming a “balance beam.” The balance beam was a foot wide and looked of suspicious character but offered the path of least resistance. I strattled the “balance beam: of rock with my legs hanging from each side, held my breath and scooted across just waiting for it to give away. 

It held! Jamie followed in the same fashion. Another section of 4^th class climbing with a 5^th class move here and there brought us to the top of Peak 13,057. Before reaching the top I watched Jamie in horror as his foot hold gave away and he slipped catching himself on hand holds. He had dodged a catastrophic fall down a nearly vertical slope. He let out a gut wrenching scream as he clung on for dare life. 

I was over it. I had to be done. Enough of this. I descended feeling lifeless to Triangle Pass (12,900 ft) completely ready to go home. We had left the Highland’s patrol hut at 12:40 am it was now 3:38 pm. We had been on the move for 15 hours. After a quick picture we clicked into skis and turned our way down to Conundrum Creek. Little did I know we had 5 more hours to go before getting back to the truck.

Cold, wind, snow, rock, Jamie and I had faced them all. The next threat to our safety was cows, dead cows. My biggest regret of the Highlands Ridge Traverse is missing the opportunity to soak in the Conundrum hot springs.   A soak in the hot spring is such a momentous way to celebrate being just 8.5 miles away from being done. In our haze of exhaustion we skied right past the hot springs realizing we had missed the springs minutes later. We stopped and debated about putting our skins back on and skinning back up for a celebratory soak. By now it was getting late. I though I would be lucky to be home by 12:00am Saturday morning. The threat of an angry wife refocused my attention to getting home so we could be in Colorado Springs by early Saturday afternoon. We decided to forgo the soak. It turns out several cows had died in the Conundrum Hut and were rotting potentially spewing toxic organisms into the inviting hot pools of water. Great we finish an epic ski tour, jump in the hot springs, contract some flesh eating bacteria and then get mauled by a bear feeding on dead cows, what a story. Ok ok a little far fetched.

A couple miles past the hot springs the snow petered out to patches here and there.

Jamie refused to accept the long walk ahead. He skinned across rock, grass and dirt

patches refusing to take his skis off his feet. I succumbed to the long walk putting my skis on my pack. For the next few hours I trudged along in my ski boots following the melted out trail. Without the cushion of snow to walk on my toes bashed the front of my ski boots sending burning pain up both legs. I begged for a miracle that would magically put me back at the truck. Each time I thought we were close to the trail head another half an hour would go by of aching steps. Without excitement we finally reached Jamie’s truck. We congratulated each other like zombies. Twenty five hours had gone by since we started our skin up Highlands Ski Area.

The Highlands Ridge Traverse is by no means the gnarliest thing you can do with 25

hours of your time. One thing it is though is hard. One of the most difficult things I have

ever done. The HRT is an objective that burned in my mind for completion for years. I am grateful to have experienced the terrain that lies between Highland Peak and

Triangle pass. The Highland Ridge Traverse is one of the great ski mountaineering

objectives we have locally in the Elk Mountains. It’s one of those things that should be done once. The traverse requires commitment, non stop movement and high stakes climbing in a low snow year, so be prepared if you find yourself out there on the Ridge.