WorldCitizen: Chicago Basin Trip Report

Chicago basin has been on my short list for a while and I was finally able to take a backpacking trip there last week. I met Jilly, Scott and Dan from 14ers.com near the trail head on Sunday morning and we began the 15 mile hike in from the Purgatory flats trail head. It seems like most people take the Durango-Silverton train to Needleton and hike in from there but we opted to take the longer approach.

Unfortunately just as we arrived at the basin I began to feel some intense pain in my right knee, which I was quite concerned about. The following morning our group got up at 4:30am to start the climb up Eolus and N.Eolus, I was still experiencing pain in my knee so decided to have a rest day at our camp. It ended up being a very nice day hanging out with the mountain goats, doing yoga and relaxing in the high country.

The next day after feeling rested we got up early again and headed out at around 5:30am to climb Sunlight and Windom. We cruised up to twin lakes and could see some rain clouds lingering in the distance so swiftly continued up to the summit of Sunlight peak. It was cold and misty on the summit and I waited for the others for about 20 minutes, by the time they arrived I was ready to start going down. While descending Sunlight we found the route for Windom Peak and followed the ridge to the final scramble to the summit. As we headed down rain clouds moved in and we were able to arrive back at our campsite before getting too wet.

The following day Jilly and Scott woke up early to climb Jupiter (a 13er) despite more rain and I packed up and hiked out solo. Overall it was a great trip other than my knee problem and the rainy conditions did not effect out trip too much. Chicago basin is a special place, located in a relatively isolated part of the Weminuche wilderness. Hope to make it back here again and spend more time exploring these mountains.