West Slopes

Trailhead: Lead King Basin
Summits: Snowmass Mountain, North Snowmass
Distance: 11.3 Miles
Elevation Gain: 4725ft
Time: 8 Hours
Partners: Robby Grace
GPX

Our plan was to climb the S-Ridge on Snowmass' south west shoulder... a route accessed from Lead King Basin.

Our first obstacle was to get to the trailhead.

After a year of massive avalances north side access to Lead King was closed. So we ended up driving my Tacoma from Marble to Crystal then Crystal to Lead King.

The section from Marble to Crystal was relatively easy going. The road from Crystal to Lead King was a step up but reasonable for a Tacoma. The only stessful part of the drive was the traverse on the narrow road with the river hundreds of feet below. If there is traffic in the opposite direction I could see backing up to a pullout being difficult.

When making a decsion to drive this section be sure both you and your vehicle are up for it. I wouldn't drive this road solo.

After arriving at the TH we prepped for our hike, re-checked weather (10% all day) and hit the hay.

The alarm went off at 5AM and I was surprised to see it was drizzling. We ate a quick breakfast and started our hike in light rain. I was concerned about wet rock on a class 3/4 route with slab.

By the time we reached Geneva Lake our feet were soaked. I had already rung out my socks twice.

When we reached the S-Ridge cutoff we discussed our options and decided to climb the West Slope route. It was still raining and we didn't want any part of wet class 4 slab. I was concerned that if the rain picked up we might not summit at all.

Climbing the west slope route was on nice blocky or slaby rock and wasn't too steep. I would rate it as 2+. As we climbed the weather slowly cleared up.

Once we reached the summit ridge there was some easy (but exposed) class 3 moves to the summit.

After some quality summit time we scrambled over to North Snowmass (completely worth while) before heading back down the west slopes route and back to the truck.

The drive out didn't seem as rough as the drive in. Although we did have to back up and pull over for traffic coming up.