So on Saturday the 21st of February, our group met up at the Morrison exit on I-70 at 7:00am. For those of you not from around the greater Denver area, this exit just to the west of Denver is a common meeting place for skiers headed to the mountains for a day of sliding & riding. There are multiple parking lots to help facilitate carpooling here. The cast of characters for the day would be (in no particular order); myself, Jonathan, Don, Jim, Erica, Kelly, Shaun, Chris and Tom (last named omitted to protect the innocent!). About 7:15 we packed up 3 4x4s (in case of snowy conditions on Guanella Pass) and headed west....along with 20 billion other people, keen on getting to the mountains! The traffic screamed up I-70 at about 8 miles an hour -- a common sight on winter weekends, unfortunately. Luckily, we were only going as far as Georgetown, well short of the ski area bustle. After a quick bathroom break at the Diamond Shamrock station in town, we scooted up Guanella Pass (plowed and sanded, even!) to the summit...which was surprisingly crowded! It was 9:30 in the morning, and there were probably 40 other vehicles there.

The first section of the hike is actually a gradual downhill through the Guanella Pass Willows -- a huge willow-heavy bog that has seen more than its share of abuse from hikers over the years. About 2 years ago, the Colorado 14er Initiative came in and actually constructed wooden bridges over a large part of this area. Of course, the ample snow cover this low pretty much obscured everything. Luckily, the trail was well-travelled, so it was easy to be sure we were on the right path. After a small stream crossing, the trail begins to climb gentle slopes towards Bierstadt, and gradually steepens as you approach a saddle point just south of the summit, at 13,800'. From the saddle, the summit is a mild rock-scramble to the north for a couple hundred yards.

That's the textbook description of the route, at least. On this particular day, it was lightly overcast and the winds were calm at the trailhead. The morning was surprisingly warm...about 20 degrees (hey, that's pretty good for mid-February!). After a quick assessment of the route, most of us donned snowshoes for the trek, and we tromped out over the well-travelled trail.

The group moved strongly through the Willows area. As we started to climb above the Willows on the west face of the mountain, the group spread out a bit. Shaun rocketed ahead (and would spend about 30 minutes on the summit waiting for the group), while a couple folks lagged behind a bit, the altitude and exertion starting to take a toll. As we moved further up the mountain, the winds started to kick in...lightly at first, but blowing quite heavily at 13,200'. Small pockets of snow moved in and out of the area, but nothing too serious.

About 1:30 the majority of the group reached the saddle at 13,800' and plopped down for a well-deserved lunch break. Shaun was no where to be seen (he was still hanging out on the summit), and Chris was lagging behind a bit, but making progress.  After a few minutes of carb-loading, it was time to press on for the last 280 feet or so. Two of the team, Jonathan and Erica, decided that they'd had enough for the day, and opted to go ahead and start back down. We could all respect that decision, so the remaining 5 of us headed up while the two of them headed down.

From the saddle, it doesn't take long to get to the summit -- just a quick scramble up the easy ridge. By 1:55 we were all on the top (where Shaun had been waiting for us), snapping pictures, trading high-fives and admiring as much of the view as we could with the inclement weather moving in and out. Views of Mount Evans, just to the northeast, were partially obscured, as was the panorama of the Sawatch and Elk ranges to the west. No matter, though -- the sense of accomplishment was high. None of these folks had ever summited a 14er in the winter, and for a couple this was their first 14er, period!

Since it was now 2:00, we didn't spend much time atop Bierstadt -- the trip up took 4.5 hours, and although the trip down wouldn't take that long, the amount of daylight left was still a worry. We scrambled on down to the saddle, where Chris was waiting for us! We had figured that Jonathan and Erica would intercept him and they'd all head down together, but Chris wanted to keep going as far as he could, even at a slow pace. We were all impressed to have seen him make it so far!

So, the six of us started making our way down. The weather moved in again, and it started snowing from dark, low clouds. Unlike earlier bouts of snow during the day, this one was here to stay, and the snowfall got steadily heavier and thicker as we descended. By the time we reached the Willows again, about 3:45 or so, visibility was down to about 100 feet, and the light had gotten very dim. Luckily, there was still no problem discerning the trail, although it was pretty easy to get disoriented in the snow. Once nifty feature about this route is that the trailhead/parking area is always visible on the route, so losing that point of reference was a little odd. As I said though, the trail was not hard to follow, even in the heavy snow and fading, flat daylight.

By 4:30 we had all reached the trailhead, and the snow was falling heavily enough to reduce visibility to just about 50 feet. We wasted no time in packing up the vehicles and making our way down the pass to Georgetown. The post-climb meal was a celebratory affair at Beau-Jo's in Idaho Springs, which is some of the best pizza on the planet. It was after 7:00 when we finally made it back to Denver. Everyone had a great time, and I may just have started a new company tradition!