After the star filled and moon-lit hike out of the Animas River, Pete and I slept in a bit (till 6:30a anyway). We stopped in Silverton for a quick breakfast then continued north to the Ophir Pass Road. Just before the pass we pulled over and geared up for a short hike up Lookout Peak.
The weather initially didn’t look very good, plenty of clouds and a little bit of rain. However, it rapidly moved east and the clearing sky convinced us to continue upwards. Once up in a little basin the route up a somewhat grassy slope to the left was obvious.
Once on top of the ridge we just turned north and worked our way around the loose cliffs.
At first I was a little surprised this hike made it into Cooper’s Scrambles book, since it was so loose with almost no solid rock to be found. However, as the name implies, the peak has some amazing views. US Grant Peak was prominent to the south.
The scrambling looked to get more interesting as we neared the summit, with some cliffs forcing us to choose the best option.
We did find one 12 foot section of solid rock that provided some short, but enjoyable class 4 moves.
The really spectacular views came as we nearly reached the summit when Columbine Lake to the east came into sight.
We spent a little while on the summit, enjoying the 360 degree views of the San Juans. Then we slowly picked our way down the loose rubble back to the car.
