Quick Tips for a Few Elusive Peaks

I went out with a huge loop planned and the intention to get as much done as I felt like. I learned a little, saw a lot, and had a great time over Labor Day Weekend. I started at the Cataract Creek Trailhead, a 2wd/sedan accessible trailhead with plenty of parking and a pit toilet.

Day 1 - Cataract Creek - Cataract and Tundra Top - Lost Trail Creek Pair - Pole Group

Cataract and Tundra Top

• Just after crossing the bridge from the trailhead, there has been a busy beaver (literally). The trail goes left/east. It's pretty easy to lose in the dark. The beaver's drag trails confuse the area.
• The route I took up the split between Cataract and Tundra Top is great. It's either easy grass or game trails to the saddle.
• Choose your own adventure up Cataract. There are no completely right or wrong answers.
• The traverse to Tundra Top is obvious - go up the hill. There are multiple game trails through the one steep section between the two.

Lost Trail Creek Pair

• The ascent of UN 13,573 is also obvious from Tundra Top.
• Dropping down and following the supranihilest route between UN 13,573 and UN 13,587 is straightforward. The descent starts slightly east of the low point on the saddle and follows a game trail. The hoodoo garden between the two is worth visiting. I calculated the extra vert compared the "normal" traverse as being ~100ft of gain. I found it to be a worthwhile trade for easier ground.
• Ascending to the summit ridge of UN 13,578 is relatively tedious. Someone built a trail there at some point but it's barely legible as such. Cutting through the low cliff bands is on the built trail and game trails. The break in the bands is pretty easy to find by sight. It is the first possible break past the hoodoo garden.
• I took a photo of the "normal" traverse. I couldn't see the game trail that appears on satellite view which made me feel pretty good about the route I took.
• I should have descended the way I came up. My route shows some useless contouring trying to get past some crumbly slopes, which wasn't fruitful. Take whatever straight shot makes the most sense to you given the topography. The grass above ~12k is sparse everywhere and the slopes are all a little slippery.
• Following the middle of the drainage down is fine, at least in fall. It would be better to be on the nose of one of the ridges that forms the wedge of the drainage. The trees are mostly loose and easy to get through. Despite it being a historically dry year, the creek was flowing well.

Pole Creek Group

• The ascent up the unnamed drainage north of Pole Creek Mountain has my highest recommendation. It all goes easily and is truly a 5 star approach.
• Crossing under Pole Creek Mountain to get to and from East Pole Creek Mountain is simple on both sides.
• There is a block of short cliffs guarding the summit of Pole Creek from the east. Anything that looks like it goes does.
• Descending off of Pole Creek Mountain to get to NW Pole cannot be done ridge-direct. There is a large amount of low-quality tread between the two. There are short sections of some goat trails, but they peter out. Most obstacles were circumvented to the east.
• Ascending NW Pole from the flat between it and Pole Creek Mountain is done directly. You just need to slog up that hill. It starts to get shifty near the top, but nothing unmanageable.
• There is a Class 3 summit block with some exposure. There are a few gaps that need hopped, but they're not very long. Start on the right/north side and work back south.
• Getting off of NW Pole down to Pole Creek proper takes longer than one would expect. None of the terrain is fast, unfortunately.
• The high angle terrain from Pole Creek Mountain all the way down to Pole Creek is slow. Almost everything moves, if only a little bit.
• West Fork Pole Creek does not have drinkable water in it's main stream. The water is some sort of neon blue from mine drainage. I didn't drink it, nor would I recommend others do so. There are tributary steams in the basin that are drinkable, but they're concentrated at the low end of the basin. Once you pass ~11.6k there is no water.

Day 1 came out to 24mi and 10.4k of gain. I slept in West Fork Pole Creek drainage with a tarp, bivy, and quilt setup.

Day 2 - UN 13,076, Cuba Benchmark, and UN 13,003

• The CT provides all the access you could ever want to these peaks. Their ascent will be left as an exercise to the reader. By the time you're looking at 2 of the lowest 13ers in Colorado and it's unranked neighbor, I bet you can handle some class 1 and 2.
• Cuba Benchmark's location is incorrectly marked in some mapping services. It is not the higher of the two lumps near there.
• Not surprisingly, the CT is great up in this area.

Day 2 came out to 17.6mi and 3.8k of gain.

The scenery around Lake City is spectacular and I think these peaks don't get the attention they deserve in the 13er community. They seem to get treated as an exercise in efficient box-ticking because they're low and a few hundred feet of gain can be knocked off with a measly dozens hours of driving. Consider trying these peaks as a wilderness experience instead of hauling some truck up to Timber Pass/Beartown/Cataract Pass/Maggie Gulch/Stony Pass. This loop can easily be broken into an arbitrarily large number of days, with each section is between 2.5k and 4k of gain. DM me here if you have questions about the loop and I'd be happy to help with trip planning.