Colorado Western Slope and FJ Summit Vacation (20100716-25)

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Wednesday, July 21st, 2010 - Yankee Boy Basin with WILSON and Others on Day 1 of the 2010 FJ Summit in Ouray, Colorado









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Other FJCers had been trickling into town little-by-little all week so far,
but today was 'the grand convergence'.

As we met you with some good friends from Texas (WILSON), we decided to do a quickie trail run together.
So, we took them up to Yankee Boy Basin.

If you want ALL of my photos from this day, click ---> here <---  (VERY LARGE ZIP FILE)

Here are the shots I chose to upload for this page...


These first few shots were actually from the morning, when we got up to go register for the 2010 FJ Summit.




Here's the morning fog view of the Amphitheater from 'headquarters'




Of course, Sandi had to get in this view too  :P




Talking with WILSON earlier in the day, we decided to get together and go up to Yankee Boy Basin.
Finally, off we go.
On this run, we had four FJ Cruisers and a Tacoma.


 

I saw this 2008 Iceberg (not in our immediate group) and had to take the shot.

 

yep, it was so foggy, we were doing well to identify the rig behind us at times




 

Here's an animated gif showing WILSON and the Tacoma coming up through the fog

 

If you go up to Yankee Boy Basin and keep going as far as the road will allow,
this hiking trailhead is where you end up. It's the most popular place to start the hike to summit Mt. Sneffels (a 'Fourteener').
It's only .9 mile from this trailhead to the Summit (though some put the round trip at 2.5 miles),
but it's an elevation gain of 1700 feet (trailhead is at 12,460 and the peak summit is 14,150).

In years past, JamerGirl and I attempted it a couple times, but had to turn back, either due to bad weather, hurrying to return a rented vehicle,
or bad route choice. We finally succeeded in the fall of 2007 (I have yet to upload anything from that trek).

 

While standing around chatting, I noticed the fog clearing a little bit so we could see some crags on the mountain behind us.
So, I had to snap a few shots.
























There are at least two alpine lakes up in Yankee Boy Basin.
On the other side of the mountains, there's an area referred to as the 'Blue Lakes'.
They can be seen from 'Blue Lakes Pass' which is on the way to one of the summit ascent routes to get up Mt. Sneffels.
This one's beautiful enough for today though.









looking back down valley



 

It was so dingy out that I had to 'liven up' this one a little to bring out the colors, etc.




That's it fro me for this day of fun.
Thanks again to WILSON and everyone else for a nice drive in the mountains.
Fog - schmog. It was still beautify up there even like that.   :)



Click ---> here <--- to see the next day of this trip.

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