Thread: TR: Englemann Peak

I have been looking at this peak for a long time and finally got to ski it. Didn't find much about skiing it on the interwebs but there are lots of summer TRs out there. Initially there were four that were going to attempt it but when it came down to it there was Craig and I. I checked the two Berthoud weather stations and there was a freeze overnight so I called Craig and told him it was a go. We got on the trail head around 7:30, which is up by the URAD mine to drainages south of Butler Gulch. It looks like there is a lot of skiing in this drainage that never gets touched.
It was much warmer in the morning than was forecasted so I was a little agro in getting on the trail. There is an old road that parallels west face of Englemann then we took a left into a gulley and followed that until it got to steep. I turned up much earlier than Craig. I had to switch to boot pack because of the steepness which sucked because I was breaking through. Craig who had chosen to skin made it to the windblown aspect much faster than I did and was lounging waiting for me. While I was on the boot pack we heard a big wumph and I panicked for a second and then got my head together and then made my way up to Craig’s lounge room. We again split up and I climbed the bare ground while he climbed the snow field because he was having traction problems with his downhill boots. We finally gained the ridge and worked our way through bare ground and Talus with snow covering the majority of it. We got the Chute Dropped our stuff and made our way to the summit and back. We had a quick lunch and got our stuff together for the ski. The snow was pretty soft and cold for a few inches for the top 1500 feet and then corned up till about tree line. We then put on our skins and attempted to traverse over to a north facing avi path/chute. We started to work around to the north in the trees but the snow was sliding out from under our skis. There were a couple sketchy moves ahead that neither of us felt comfortable with so we looked at the map for the escape route. We found a bench not far below us and then worked our way out creek drainage. We ended up coming crossing the West Fork of Clear Creek and coming out at the Mizpa campground on highway 40. It took us seven and a half hours and in the end it was worth it but I don't feel like I need to go back again. I may go ski something else in that drainage though.

Parnassus from the road

The gulley and Woods Mountain

Craig's lounge

Crawling for it

Almost there

Me with Bard and Parnassus

Craig on the summit and Berthoud looking small

Craig in the chute

Me skiing with Englemann behind

The Creek Drainage

West Fork of Clear Creek


Bonus Picks from the Fraser Valley while drinking on the deck later that day

One of the local Drunks telling the cows to get out of here (thier feild)

Moving on up.....

Nice work. I don't think I know anyone who has been up there.

Also, thanks for the bindings.

Good stuff, looks like you guys had a bit more snow than when we skied it in June a few years ago: http://www.backcountryclub.org/1/ind...85&catid=5#685

On an entirely unrelated note, anybody here want to take credit for this line off Sawtooth?

Underoos thanks and your welcome..

Dave Yeah there was alot of snow up there, we skied all the way to the creek. It looks like you guy skinned and skied the north facing tree chutes? We triedto traverse over there but the now was to rotten.....

Interesting to see Berthoud Pass from that perspective.