Kineo Mountain Again


28 April, 2007: I took advantage of a warm, sunny day to climb Kineo Mtn. via the long route: from home. It's about a 12-mile round trip, with roughly 3,500 feet of vertical gain. I'd tried this in the early spring of last year, but turned back not far from the summit for inability to see my way in gathering snow showers.
This time, snow was no problem. The one new wrinkle was that I decided not to retrace my steps on the west ridge from the summit. Instead, I dropped down the east side of the mountain, shortening the return trip a little. I intersected the trail which comes up to the ridge from the Bear Creek drainage on the north, and took the gully back down to the Gold Camp Road parking lot. There were plenty of people on the Columbine Trail and the Seven Bridges Trail down in the cañon, but I saw no one up on the mountain.
It was a nice spring run. I'm still waiting for the snow to recede from the high country; hopefully the year's first fourteener will be bagged late in May.
Long life and many peaks.