Solo Flight solo

Solo Flight Solo

An unlikely route in a spectacular setting, Solo Flight strolls along the flank of Lone Eagle Peak as if it had no intention of getting to the top, then sidles around and sneaks up on the summit from behind.

I was looking to train for attempts on the Palisades in the Sierra in August, and didn’t have a partner handy, so what could be better for the single climber than Solo Flight on Lone Eagle Peak?

I used as sources Roach’s Indian Peaks Wilderness, Cooper’s Colorado Scrambles, and the SummitPost resources on the peak.

The route involves a number of ways that have many names, so here’s what I found in July 2010. The road to the Monarch Lake trailhead is Grand County road 6, and it ends at the trailhead. A mileage sign at the turnoff from US Rt. 34 stated that the trailhead was 10 miles away. None of the route guides have information that match this description: the road does not appear to be called FDR 125, Arapaho Bay Road or Monarch Lake Road. Anyway, it wasn’t hard to find.

The trail from the trailhead is now called the Cascade Trail, and it used to be called the Buchanan Creek Trail for the first stretch until that trail diverges from what used to be called the Cascade Creek Trail. Anyway, you just follow the luxurious Cascade Trail all the way to the signed turnoff for the Crater Lake Trail, about a mile from the campsites.

Having gotten my permit in Boulder the day before, I left the car at a little after one in the afternoon on Friday, July 23, packed up to the junction with the Crater Lake trail by four, and then took it easy on the way to Crater Lake, arriving a little before five. I managed to snag the primo campsite for Solo Flight, #7, partly by sensing a pirate trail that led straight to the site. Another hopeful camper arrived minutes after I claimed the first-come site. Sorry, bud!

The next morning the weather looked beautiful, and there seemed no need to hurry. I got on the trail about 7:30, and headed up the talus slope below the peak’s north face. On the way down I found the climber’s trail to the north of the talus field, but the talus was nice and stable and just as good to ascend. At the top of the field I found the trail, and then just followed the cairned trail all the way around to where Triangle Lake appeared below. Oddly, the only place the cairns give out is on the “Class 2 ramps” that zigzag up to the once-again heavily-cairned trail. It wasn’t tricky to figure out, though. I followed obvious lines of weakness through the cliff bands, two zigs right and two zags left, and found the trail again. The trail was well-cairned all the way to the summit.

There’s only one tricky bit of routefinding, and all three of my sources inexplicably failed to help. Where does the “4th Class downclimb” begin? Thankfully, there was “mandolinpunk” on SummitPost, who posted his tremendously useful photo of the downclimb in his trip report. I carried a copy of the photo with me, and used the thumb of rock in his picture as my landmark. Thanks, man!

The downclimb is the way off the second-to-last bulge on the ridge as you
head north. There’s a cairn right where the downclimb starts, above and southeast of the thumb of rock that marks the easy way to the big ledge below. I’ve attached a pic that shows where these items are in the view down toward the summit.

Spoiler alert! I found the downclimb and the final climb up to the summit anticlimactic. There were no moves that felt at all committing, so it felt more like 3rd Class than 4th. Maybe it’s just my nose for the easy way, but I found nothing that approached “low 5th Class” and would have felt acutely embarrassed if I had carried a rope, harness, etc. all the way up there. As it was, I carried a completely-useless helmet in my pack from car to summit and back. There is no falling rock from above anywhere on the route, and no objective cause to bang your head.

I wish I’d brought binoculars instead of the helmet – there were birds everywhere.

The summit was as spectacular as promised. It took me about two and a half hours to get there without hurrying, and I dawdled on the way down, arriving back at camp just before noon, and back at the car before five. There was no pen in the summit register, so my visit was unrecorded.

A delightful solo Solo Flight, through beautiful country. My hat’s off to the pioneer of this sneaky route, and I look forward to coming back with a partner for the Stettner route.