Mt. Sherman – West Slopes

Date: July 29, 2003
Elevation: 14,036′
Rank: 45th
Route: West Slopes, Grade I, Class 2, 4.2 miles, 2140ft vert.
GPS: N 39° 13.5′ W 106° 10.15′
Team: Matt Esser (Toid), Mark Jaeger (Gugals)

Pre-climb: Gugals (college buddy) was in town, and we wanted to start off our trip right by climbing one of Colorado’s Giants! (haha) Sherman is deemed by many as the easiest and most boring of all the 14ers, so I had no particular reason to do it — until now. This would be perfect training ground for a flatlander to get acclimated with, before we tackle the harder ones.

Climb: Waking up at 3:30am is hard to do. However, if you live in Boulder, and you want to climb a 14er on the same day, it’s pretty much required that you get up earlier than you want to. We somehow managed to do it, and in the entire process packed our bags for a two day trip that included Mt. Massive. An hour later we were out the door and on the way to Mt. Sherman.

About 7am we pulled into the Iowa Gulch trailhead as Gugals got out and looked at Sherman. We were originally going to do the Fourmile Creek route, but since we were doing Massive the next day, the Iowa Gulch trailhead on the Leadville side would work out much better logistically.

By 7:30am, we were off! We set a blazing speed across the field towards the trail that was obvious from our car. In fact, we were going so fast that my sunglasses fell off the top of my head! Where they fell off I didn’t know, but I figured I would just summit, then come back and look for them later. The weather was somewhat worrying me as there were a lot of clouds around. A lot more than normal at 8am.

The hike up to the saddle was uneventful. The trail is fairly steep but not as steep as Massive’s southwest slopes. As I was climbing to the saddle, since Gugals and I both had radios, we decided it would be a good idea for me to go on ahead and scout out the weather from the saddle, as I could see more of what the clouds were doing from up there. Once I got to the saddle, the clouds just started building and building! I radioed Gugals and told him to keep on coming up, and I would climb to the summit to see what I could see from there.

I ran up the ridge and made it to the first windblock, but luckily before I started, I entered the coordinates into my GPS and knew the real summit was a little farther north. After a very short hike to the summit, which only 1 hour and 30 minutes had passed since I left my Blazer, I realized that I couldn’t see ANYTHING! It was starting to snow and the winds were terrible! I radioed Gugals again to find out his location. He had just made the saddle and was hunkered down in some cave wind shelter. Meanwhile, I put on some gloves, snapped a few pictures and then took off down the mountain.

Shortly after leaving the summit, I ran into a couple people who told me that everybody below (including a person who had climbed over 50 different 14ers) was turning around. I asked if they saw Gugals and they said they did and he was in a cave. Did I miss something here? Where on earth is there a cave on Sherman!?!? I made contact with Gugals and told him that I think the weather was clearing up and for him to try for the summit if he wanted to. He was happy and started hiking. I soon met up with him and gave him my camera so he could take pics from the top.

Then I proceeded to run down the entire mountain! I made it around the saddle and then back down to the flats where I found my sunglasses! I had just arrived back to my car in time for Gugals to radio from the summit that he was there! His first fourteener! He said the wind was so bad that he had to crawl on all fours for parts of it but that he was ok, and going to start heading down. I told him to radio me when he made it back to the saddle. He made the summit (and I finished) in three hours.

While he was descending, all the clouds must have passed because then the heaven’s opened up and sunshine was abundant everywhere! It was a completely different day. Now I could see the entire mountain and after Gugals made the saddle and descended a good part, I could see him moving along the trail.

All in all, it was a great trip. Gugals being the meteorology major he was at the University of Oklahoma, enjoyed the interesting weather. I enjoyed the fact that we both made it, had fun, and made it back down again safely the most. It’s now on to Mt. Massive!

Drive: 2.5h
Ascent: 1.5h
Summit: 15 min
Descent: 1.25h
Drive: 1h
Total: 3h