Mount Yale March 7-8 2008

Some friends and I climbed Mount Yale (14,202 feet), my first 14er of the year. Five of us (Dan, Brandy, Austin, Pete and myself) met at the Avalanche Gulch trailhead and we began hiking at 1:30 pm. One person (Pete) turned back earlier, but the rest of us continued to 11,860 feet before camping (we also met Clint there who left earlier than the rest of us).

After a mild (9 degrees F) and rather windy night, we got a late start at 8:30 am. Five of us climbed to the summit of Yale via the East Ridge and were met by two others whom had started earlier that day. The ridge was rather long and tedious in winter and we didn’t get any views from the top because it was snowing, but after the morning it was eerily calm without hardly any wind.

It was a pretty good climb, but Yale is definitely a rather tedious choss pile. On the way down Austin and I decided to push a more direct route down part of the lower section of trail, but that was a mistake.