Ten Mile Ridge

Ten Mile



Back in mid-September as we hiked into Breckenridge, the Colorado Trail led us through an alpine cirque in the 10 Mile Range that sat in the shadows of a narrow ridge that connected Peaks 1-4. Since I first saw that ridge I have wanted to come back and make the traverse across. And now from the front of my apartment the ridge dominates the landscape.

The base of "Alpineglow Wall" on a warm Nov 1st.

I met Brandon at 2:00 at a coffee shop on the main drag in Frisco, Co to hike the ridge. 2 o'clock in the afternoon is a late start for what I guessed would be a 7 hour round trip, but we left anyway to see how far we could get.

Somewhere on Peak 1

Given the recent fall time change we made it to the top of Peak 1 and the start of the ridge as the sun was setting. The weather was moving. Just the day before we had climbed routes over in Motazuma in t-shirts in 65 degree sun while now, a day later, I gnawed on a snickers that had frozen in my pack. We got out our headlamps and assesed our route to the neighboring Ten Mile Peak in the setting darkness. We shouldered our packs, exchanged glances and both turned back down the way we came up.