the Castle - Lost Creek Wilderness, CO

[ScoutColorado]

The Castle - Lost Creek Wilderness, CO 8/15/2010 Evergreen Dean, Rick Rock
The Lost Creek Wilderness is a gem in Colorado, and only about an hour from our houses. I had always wanted to visit "the Castle", a prominent rock formation by Wellington Lake, and eventually I talked my good friend Evergreen Dean into this foolish endeavor.

Our Destination - The Castle from the trail

We met in Aspen Park at LoafNJug at 7am. We drove to Wellington Lake, and as Dean had heard, we found the whole lake closed and fenced off. I was hoping to start the climb from the west side of the lake. It was bushwhacking on a very steep slope, but less than a mile to the rocks. No such luck. So we backtracked to the Colorado Trail, and drove to the Rolling Creek Trailhead. Beautiful, sunny day to be in the 70's.

Evergreen Dean

Now it was said to be about 1.8 miles of good trail, then the death hike to the rocks. But it turned out to be more like 3 miles of good trail, then the death hike.

Ran into lots of "shroomers", groups gathering trashbags full of mushrooms. It was the most mushrooms I had ever seen, due to a favorable spring/summer.

We then struck out off trail to the south and started up the slope, angling slightly to the east as we gained altitude. Slow going. Downed trees, rocks, bushes, a real trek. Hard to avoid the many drainages.

Start of the Death Hike - it got much more twisted - logs, rocks, bushes, steep etc.

But we hit our destination of the western saddle almost perfectly. Now it's gettin cool...

Evergreen Dean scouts for the crack up

First, let me say this rock formation is probably 100 times bigger and more majestic than I had imagined. Huge rappels were possible. Hundreds of spires, hanging gardens, lush as I've seen. You could spend a lifetime exploring, and climbing is unlimited. We decided we needed to backpack to here, then explore for 2 days.

Incredible hanging gardens

RickRock on Spire Top

Evergreen Dean on Top

After chillin' for a while, we started down, and downclimbed a couple of cracks. When we hit the saddle, we realized that we had to bushwhack and hit the trail perfectly, or would end up in a drainage well below our destination, possibly costing us miles.
By perfect luck and probably some skill we hit the trail on the exact corner where it turned away.
Another hike back, and we found a beautiful campsite, river below, and a beautiful view of the Castle.

Lots of Cool Tree Fungi


Lush Trail Out

Last view of the Castle from the trail

Stopped in Aspen Park and had Ribs and Catfish..........

[accadacca]

Sweet!

[ibenick]

Excellent pics! Love those rock formations amongst all of the evergreens, very nice.

[asdf]

awesome palce

[ScoutColorado]

Thanks guyz.
Yeah, it's an amazing place, and I didn't even do it justice with the photos.
What we climbed was just a small spire, and didn't even make it close to the top and the 4 summits, which are supposed to be amazing.