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Sneffels view

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11 replies
Posted by Dave Showalter` on July 6, 2006 at 5:32 PM
Sneffels view
Greetings! My wife and I climbed Mt. Sneffels, 14,150' over the holiday (7/3) and a view is attached. This may be my favorite Colorado summit so far....until the next one.

The image shows Dallas Peak, 13,809' over the blue lakes with the Wilson group obscured by clouds (which brought rain). I'm not sure I've ever seen clouds moving so fast.

Surprisingly, the San Juans are quite green and lush after a dry winter. The flowers in Yankee Boy and American Basin are decent; but not great. There is still a fair amount of snow in places and the rivers are flowing strong. It seems that the melt was slower than some other mountain locations.

Dave Showalter
Posted by Guy Tal on July 6, 2006 at 5:43 PM
What an awesome view! Which route did you take?

Guy
Posted by Momo Vuyisich on July 6, 2006 at 6:50 PM
Wow, this is really making me itch. Great photo.
Posted by Jack Brauer on July 6, 2006 at 7:22 PM
Hi Dave,
I was on the summit of Wetterhorn that same day! What a beautiful day it was.

You might be interested in checking out a panorama I made from Sneffel's summit last June (after a huge snow year). http://www.widerange.org/panorama.php?id=6

~Jack
Posted by Scott Borger on July 6, 2006 at 7:40 PM
Nice shot. How long did it take you to reach the summit? I've been meaning to get to the top of this one for a while now.
Posted by Dan Walters on July 6, 2006 at 8:10 PM
Beautiful shot. I love the clouds and the green down below. Makes me want to climb this one!
Posted by Adam Schallau on July 6, 2006 at 11:04 PM
Congrats Dave and Jack on your summits! :toast: There were a lot of us climbing the San Juans this past weekend. :wavey:
Posted by Brian VanDenzen on July 6, 2006 at 11:47 PM
Very impressive view. We almost headed up Sneffels on Sunday. We did Handies on Saturday. The weather turned far too dicey for our comfort the rest of the weekend for peakbagging.
Posted by Rick Dunn on July 7, 2006 at 9:33 AM
Man, what a view! That's fantastic, Dave. Love the feel lent by the weather/clouds - very powerful.
Posted by Dave Showalter` on July 7, 2006 at 12:32 PM
Thanks everyone - the route was the SE slopes, class 2+. We parked at 11,800' (don't tell Jerry Roach that we didn't do the requisite 3,000 feet of climbing.) and hiked to the "trailhead". The TH is actually a talus field below a hideous straight-up scree gully, which had just enough hail on it to make things laughable. I didn't time us - we weren't moving fast; but I would guess that it took about 2 1/2 - 3 hours to summit.

Jack: Your 360 degree view is otherworldly! Thanks for sending the link.

Dave Showalter
Posted by Todd Caudle on July 7, 2006 at 10:53 PM
That's the best Sneffels summit view shot I've ever seen! Way to go, Dave!
Posted by CAZ on July 7, 2006 at 11:15 PM
Wow, Dave, the drama in that image is fantastic! Absolutely spectacular!