Brainard Lake Traverse (attempt/partial) (Indian Peaks Wilderness, Colorado)

Trip Date: Sept 23, 2018

Caltopo map here: caltopo.com/m/V7LV

The view from Brainard Lake is a true Colorado icon and one of the highlights of Boulder County. It competes with Bear Lake and Trail Ridge Road in RMNP as the most accessible area of natural beauty in the Front Range. While jaw-dropping scenery is available from the comfort of your car, off-trail adventures in this area are even better.

My basic goal was a one day affair that hit all the major peaks visible from Brainard Lake. The peaks I actually visited on this trip are in bold below.

• Mt. Audobon (via SE Ridge, Class 3)
• Paiute Peak (via East Ridge, Class 3)
• Mt Toll (West Sneak, Class 4)
• Pawnee Peak (S. Slopes, Class 2)
• Shoshoni Peak (N. Slopes, Class 2)
• Apache Peak (NE Ridge, Class 4--same as Kasparov Traverse but without the towers)
• Navajo Peak (via Apache S. Ridge, Class 3 then Navajo West Chimney, Class 4)
• Niwot Ridge (Class 2 if staying south of the ridge crest, at least Class 3 on the ridge itself)

With the exception of Mt. Audobon, all of these peaks see fairly low traffic. I chose a scrambling route up Mt. Audobon over the standard hiking route to keep it interesting. Since I was doing a ridge traverse, I couldn't use a standard route for Mt. Toll and this was a great adventure.

After this adventures, the only part of the route I haven't done is the NE Ridge of Apache. Hopefully I'll finish this one next season.

Looking west from Brainard Lake. The east-west ridge extending from Pawnee Peak (center) effectively splits the Brainard Lake drainage in two. (Winter 2017).

The southern half containing (from left to right) Niwot Ridge, Navajo Peak, Apache Peak and Shoshoni Peak (Early Oct 2017)

The northern half containing (from left to right) Pawnee Peak, Mt. Toll, Paiute Peak (hidden) and Mt. Audobon. (Sept 23, 2018)

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For only being 13 miles, this one was surprisingly hard.  I wasn't feeling too great from the beginning and didn't have much of an appetite.  I'd brought nearly 3000 calories but probably only ate 500.  This and some route finding at the notch on the SE Ridge of Mt. Audubon and on the western face of Mt. Toll meant I that travel was slower than expected.  I got to Shoshoni Peak with a couple hours of daylight left but it wouldn't be enough time to do the remaining scrambling sections.

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Mt. Audobon (SE Ridge, Class 3)

This route is documented in Gerry Roach's book.  There are strong streams just before the start of the ridge to resupply on water.  There are also some pools at the start of route on Mt. Toll.  For my route as well the full traverse these are the only two water resupply points.

This is the basin just north of the ridge in the previous photo. A strong stream flows out of this basin (look for vegetation).

Looking south towards Pawnee Ridge at the start of scramble on SE Ridge (Class 3) of Mt. Audobon.

SE Ridge (left) and the surprisingly scenic and hidden walls of Mt. Audobon (right).

Looking back at the crux notch (Class 3). After getting off the ridge and down into the notch, you have to climb a headwall (also Class 3) on the other side.

After the notch it's straightforward talus (class 2) to the summit of Mt. Audobon.

Looking south towards the rest of the traverse.

Pawnee Peak (left), Mt. Toll (center)

Paiute Peak (East Ridge, Class 3)

Looking towards Paiute Peak from the summit area of Mt. Audobon.

Looking north from the ridge between Mt. Audobon and Paiute Peak.

Basic route to Paiute Peak from Mt. Audobon. It's easy class 2 talus until the saddle where there's some brief class 3 scrambling on easy slabs. At first I thought the first peak was the summit but I think the summmit in the back is actually ~10 feet higher. Whoever built the summit cairn seemed to agree.

One of the later slabs. There were three of these before the first summit. There was another very brief slab in the notch between the false summit and true summit.

Traversing over to the true summit of Paiute. Avoid the slabs on the north (right).

Looking north from Paiute Peak towards Upper Coney Lake and Coney Lake.

Mt. Toll (West Sneak, Class 4/5??)

The original idea for a plausible route for the Brainard Lake Traverse was based on these two reports:

1. Derek's 14ers.com Trip Report
2. Andrew Rose's Trip Report

Andrew's report was actually inspired by Derek's.  I looked for more official info on the route in both Gerry Roach's Indian Peaks book and Derek Wolfe's book "Colorado's Front Range Thirteeners" but couldn't find any mention of route up the west face.  (FYI, as far as I am aware, Derek Wolfe has no relation to the author of the 14ers.com trip report).  There's also some information on this route on Summitpost.  

Mountain Project has a page on a similar route, Barbershop Traverse (West Face Spiral Route), but it seems distinct from what I did.  I don't think I encountered anything at the 5.3 difficulty so either that route is misrated or there are indeed multiple mystery routes up the west face.  

Looking back towards Mt. Audobon on the descent from Paiute Peak.

Looking towards Mt. Toll (center) on the descent from Paiute Peak.

West face of Paiute Peak

There were good views of Paiute Pass which I'd crossed on Day 5 of the Pffifner Traverse.  I didn't think I'd be seeing it again so soon.  

Looking east towards Blue Lake in front of Mt. Toll.

Looking back to Paiute Peak (left) and Mt. Audobon (right).

Pawnee Peak (S. Slopes, Class 2) 

The route up to Pawnee Peak was straightforward class 2 talus hopping.  

Looking back at Pawnee Peak from Pawnee Pass

Shoshoni Peak (N. Slopes, Class 2)

Shoshoni Peak was also pretty straightforward.  I thought the talus on the descent from Shoshoni was pretty bad but it could have been primarily just because I was tired and my patience was wearing thin.  

It's too bad this gnome got turned to stone.

Maybe it was just because it was the end of the day but I thought the talus field on the descent from Shoshoni was the worst part of the entire day. Huge, loose talus was fairly nerve wracking.