Where: Independence Pass, Colorado
Caitlin and I took off after work on a Friday to head-up to Independence Pass between Aspen and Leadville. The idea was to check out the bouldering that is all over the area, enjoy the sights, and escape the heat of Denver. We rolled in after dark and after taking Caitlin’s volvo for a little 4-wheelin’ action 
, somehow found free camping up Lincoln Creek road.
After sleeping like logs in the crisp night air (the denver heat was not making sleep easy), we awoke to a beautiful day. Amazingly our friend Terra happened to drive by our campsite as we were getting ready to leave for the day…small world.
Saturday we hit up the James Brown Boulders which we had a little difficulty locating as we were one pull-off too soon. Once we found these great boulders in the shade it was a nice day of trying a number of problems and enjoying the crisp air.
Caitlin working one of the tricky easier problems near the James Brown Boulder (notice the grassy top-out):
Me on the James Brown Boulder (awesome block):
We headed-up to the pass for some sunset viewage. Here is Caitlin showing-off:
Beautiful last chunks of light:
Small pond right next to the road right as the sun disappeared:
The craziest thing happened when we were back at camp and done cooking dinner. We were just sitting there pondering the night sky when a huge tree came crashing down in the forest behind us…scared the living crap out of us and it was pitch black and impossible to investigate. No idea why or how it fell but it was a crazy event that was a little unnerving.
Sunday morning cooking some breakfast:
Playing in the Grottoes:
Cool waterfall formation:
It was 100 degrees when we rolled back in Denver…nice to enjoy some cool weather and experience an awesome place!
Link to blog posting: http://andylibrande.com/news/2011/09/independence-pass-bouldering-and-camping/
]]>Where: Eagle’s Nest Wilderness, Peak C, Upper Piney River Trail (TOPO MAP LINK)
Caitlin and I decided to add a little fun overnight backpacking trip onto a busy weekend. After going to a quick wedding reception in Frisco we headed over to Vail to embark on a short overnight backpacking trip. After driving down a very long dirt road (which uses the Red and White trailhead that we snowmobile in the winter) we finally reached the Upper Piney Lake Trailhead. Immediately we were greeted by a pretty nasty evening rainstorm which we decided to wait out in the car (and only took about 30 mins).
It quickly turned into a beautiful evening and as we started putting our packs on we were startled when two hudge BULL MOOSE popped-out of the brush 50 yards from us at the parking lot. Of course I had to get some photos of this incredibly rare occurrence (I have only seen moose in Colorado from a very far distance). Moose enjoying the tasty-treats:
Of course I wanted to get as close as possible and luckily we were down-wind from them. I sneaked over to an area with some thicker trees and tried to get as close as possible knowing that these animals are incredibly dangerous. I got this shot through the dense brush:
Right after I took that photo a jeep coming down the road saw them, slammed on their brakes and started taking photos as well. A group of car-campers nearby that were behind a small hill heard the commotion and joined in on the moose watching. I suddenly found myself in close proximity to two potentially dangerous creatures as the tensions quickly increased. The big guy looked around and gave me the stink-eye so I high tailed it out of there before he could test those hooves on me. Unfortunately the two never posed together but you can see both of them in this photo:
Moose distraction aside we started our hike in on an relatively easy trail with incredible views of the valley in front of us.
Caitlin measuring up against the local flauna:
Andy checking out the beautiful Peak C (Rough-rider Couilor is just visible on the notch to the right of the peak) We ran into a group that skied it on Sunday:
We backpacked in a few miles since the sun was setting quickly. Set-up camp and had a great cooking area overlooking two different valley’s. The next morning we got up and hiked around the area up the side of the mountain next to peak C. There are not really any trails in the area (and the ones there are poorly marked as we found ourselves somewhat misplaced).
We were camped at the bottom of this valley. To the Right is where the Trailhead for the Upper Piney is and a very large valley. In front of us in the valley is where the trail continues to Upper Piney Lake (which we missed this trail the night before). On the otherside of the peaks on the left is East Vail. The clouds made it hard to get a solid photo.
After watching the clouds build for a couple of hours a quick moving rainstorm scared us back down to the campsite where we got back just as the weather unleashed for 20-30 mins. Then it was back to clear skies and an awesome hike back to the car.
Beautiful valley views on the way back to the car:
Caitlin and I almost back to the car:
A view of the “Rip Saw” ridge from the road on the drive out:
Nice to get away!
Link to the full post: http://andylibrande.com/news/2011/08/backpacking-in-the-eagles-nest-wilderness-peak-c/
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When: June 11th-12th
What: A quick overnight camping trip
Randomly both my parents and Caitlin’s parents did the Ride the Rockies tour this year (~400 miles over 6 days on a road bike!) which made for a convenient excuse to drive them to Crested Butte to drop them off.
Caitlin and I thought it would be fun to drop off each of the parental units and then spend a night camping with our sister’s and enjoy the awesomeness that is Crested Butte.
Arriving in the early afternoon on Saturday we stopped for a delicious lunch at the Brick Oven in downtown Crested Butte which has a surprising great selection of beer. After gorging ourselves on a meatball, pepperoni, and pesto pizza my sister and I parted ways with our parents and headed out to Gothic to check out Stupid Falls.
Stupid Falls is a massive waterfall that is really easy to get to (essentially you turn right after the first bridge on the approach to Gothic and drive down the dirt road until you see a large point in the shape of the river). It was running at 2,300 CFS and was just massive.
Here is video of the falls along with a few photos:
Sister in awe at the power of the waterfall:
We finally met-up with Caitlin and her Sister and found a campsite along County RD 734 where the snowline was not much above the campsite.
Long exposure of the valley that night (~5mins long):
The valley was a contradiction of seasons with spring time at it’s fullest in the valley with mid-winter snowpack on the mountains:
We tried to hike near the Ol Be Joyful waterfall however the trail was closed due to a massive river crossing. Instead we went to a trail near Gothic on the Judd Falls trailhead into the Maroon Bell wilderness. Caitlin and I have done this hike before and we knew that it would be good for the sisters.
The girls with Mount Crested Butte (the ski area) in the background:
Lizard hugging a massive Aspen tree:
Black Bear Track right in front of the wilderness sign:
Sister with Spider Peak in the background:
Super green:
Link to full post here: http://andylibrande.com/news/2011/07/crested-butte-spring-in-june/
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If you are following from a feed please follow this link for the full post: http://andylibrande.com/news/2011/01/some-favorites-from-2010/
]]>Start: Goose Creek Trailhead, Lost Creek Wilderness
Destination: Shaft House Area
Caitlin and I decided to finally get in a backpacking trip just as the Fall colors were starting. We decided to check-out a place that my roommate was just a few days before us as the scenery looked just amazing.
We took off late on Friday and drove to the trail head as quick as possible (lets just say the Honda Civic tore-up the last 14 miles of dirt-road to the trail head) and arrived to the parking lot with the sun just about to set and darkness setting in really quickly.
We took off down the trail moving as quickly as possible to try to take advantage of the last glowing hints of evening sun, but we quickly found ourselves hiking in the dark. The trail is relatively easy with the first chunk of it on a smooth hillside just above the creek. At one point it does climb far above the valley and with the looming trees (and moonless night) we encountered some seriously dark hiking. Out comes the headlamps and what seems like an eternity of rolling trail we eventually got to the turn-off to the “Shaft House”.
Relieved that we finally hit the turn-off we hiked-up this new trail with no idea of where we would camp. In the pitch dark we occasionally smelled some campfire smoke, hear some bumps in the night, and eventually set-up behind a massive boulder. The sheer darkness and absolute stillness of the night made it challenging to get our bearings.
Morning was an unbelievable site. Huge granite rock-formations everywhere with thick forest and the beautiful fall colors just starting to show.
We hiked out to a overlook over a massive valley with an incredible array of large domes, massive boulders, and a creek wandering through the middle. With the help of some guys that were camped nearby we learned that it was possible to get all the way to the creek bottom. We scrambled all the way to the far stream in the picture below:
Attempting the get to the creek bottom was a major event in itself. With a significant amount of rock hopping and scrambling (sometimes over great exposure), we had to drop through chimney’s, climb over knife-edges, do some sketchy jumping over crevasses, all while trying to pick out which route would be possible. Awesome stuff!
Once we were at the stream we were rewarded with a Wild Raspberry Bush!!!:
Hanging out down at the stream-bed (ie Andy falling into the stream):
On the hike out we found a little more direct route but had to take this insanely sketchy, rusted-out ladder that was precariously perched between a couple boulders (not bolted into the rock), above a pretty gnarly ravine. Here Caitlin shows her discontentment with me taking photos instead of holding the ladder steady:
Once back to the top we had to relocate our campsite to this one with a phenomenal view of the valley around us. Then off for more exploring.
Caitlin at the old Shaft House (they actually tried to pump concrete into the ground to seal-up all of the rocks to form a reservoir where we hiked earlier in the day; luckily they failed):
We snagged a sweet spot from the guys we ran into previously. Our campsite had to be one of the most scenic locations I have ever slept:
We built a fire on top of the massive rock formation and hung out looking at the stars in a perfect moonless night:
Hiking out of our camping spot was fun. We were completely protected on all sides by rock cliffs, boulders, and tight squeezes. Here is what we had to do to get out of there:
We hiked out with minimal water (the filter was not working well) and towards the end the heat of the day caught-up to us and made the last climb out of the valley very hard. Once back to the car (which was in direct hot sunshine) we raced out of there and headed down the dirt-road to where the road went over the river; we desperately needed to cool off and clean off the grime!
The drive home was a little different as we stopped at Zoka’s for lunch (amazing as usual) and then headed towards Breckenridge over Kenosha and Hoosier Passes as Caitlin needed to go buy some skis on pro-form (she picked up some new Armada JJ’s!!!). The colors were starting to look real nice on both passes and the drive was well worth it.
If you are following from a feed please check out this post on http://andylibrande.com/news/
]]>Where: Near the Camp Dick campground close to Lyons
Who: Ben, Andrew, Scott, Yours Truly, and Stranahan’s
Why: Well Ben decided to randomly get married on extreme short-notice so we had to throw a bachelor party on extreme short-notice.
Let’s get the elephant in the room a little explanation. Yes, we did have a bachelor party in a place called Camp Dick. Yes, it was just a bunch of dudes camping out together, drinking together, and reminiscing about the good ol’ days. And yes, it was a lot of, uhhh… fun….
We left Denver Friday night all jammed into Andrew’s SUV with several crash pads, gear, food, adult beverages, and four of us with the mission to give Ben a damn good evening/weekend. Luckily for us the drive to Camp Dick is just enough time to enjoy some beverages in the backseat and ramble on about how cool we all once were.
We get to Camp Dick and Andrew has to navigate the 4×4 road in his Ford SUV which was a little tight but we managed. We quickly found a awesome camping spot near the river and had a awesome boulder that we could sit on in the middle of the St Vrian river were we could cook and chill. Luckily I have been there a couple of times (documented here), so everything was pretty easy to figure out.
Morning was a little rough but here Scott and Ben discuss the merits of sleeping in a tent directly under a fallen tree:
We hit up the Bolt Boulder to try out our climbing skills the next day. Awesome high-ball boulder with easy access and a few really fun problems. Andrew getting high into the crux of the main easier problem there (crux is at the top):
Ben showing off his good looks:
There is a easier slab climb to the top which is much more sketchy when your hands are wet from the condensation on your beer and you have to use your teeth to hold the can:
We tried to convince Ben to eat this colorful friend:
Anyways congrats to Ben and Beth!!!
]]>When: June 11-13, 2010
Who: Myself, Caitlin, meeting up with Trent, Bethany, Duncan, Cara, Dan, plus the dogs.
So this recap is a little late considering it is now September and this happened back in June. But I couldn’t leave out this trip from the records because it was ridiculous. Let’s start at the beginning and all the photos will be in chronological order just for sake of ease.
We all convened in the Pinyon Flats Campground Friday night on a relatively quick drive from Denver. It is Bethany’s B-day weekend but we were able to reserve only one campground that can’t have more then two tents and two cars; we were not about to let “the man” hold us down so we set-up camp under a beautiful clear night sky with 4 tents and 4 cars (as we were traveling from all over the state). Spirits were high that night we were excited for a awesome weekend on the dunes filled with glorious adventures and abundant amounts of fun. Let’s just say everything changed quickly…
About 2-3am was when we encountered our first challenge: insane winds!!!! We are in the sand dunes so that means where there is wind there is also flying sand; this is not just a little sand, but epic amounts of fine grain sand getting into every little crevice that it could find. Sleep quickly became a luxury as the wind and sand combo was blowing up tiny particles of sand underneath the rain fly and dropping down on us in the tent; it was literally raining sand.
Morning dawns…kinda. It’s cloudy, it’s windy, it’s kinda raining, we are sleep-deprived and it is really early so we do what any logical human being would do in that situation: drink. Out comes the Jack Daniels which we enjoyed alongside numerous fresh cherries and other breakfast goodies; let’s just say each one of us was focused on this activity with Olympic-like intensity.
Several hours later we decide it is time to go do something (not before we had a run-in with vigilante park ranger about the tent situation even though our tents combined took up less space then the tent cities some of the other campers had). We head over the the incredibly busy visitors center (cold, wind and tourons do not mix), which was fun because well, we were intoxicated. Then it was off to suffer on the dunes:
Hiking in wasn’t too bad, a little chilly and a lot windy:
Trent Catching some Air:
The others turned around because they have the dogs and the sand was really messing with their eyes, however Duncan, Caitlin and I keep venturing further. Bad idea as the wind was to out backs but hiking out the wind was in our faces . Right before we decide to turn around:
Luckily the group found an awesome out of wind bank along the river. Some of us caught up on the sleep we were missing:
The low-hanging cloud on the right is part of a small fire that was happening just miles from the campground:
After catching up on sleep (and starting our afternoon hang-over from all the morning drinking) we thought we would get out of the wind and sand and headed to Zapata Falls. Nice little short walk to some freezing cold water (in the deep canyon part ice was still lining the walls). Duncan trying not to fall:
The evening gave us some nice light and you can see how crazy the wind was:
Next morning we awoke to beautiful skies, no wind, and perfect temps. It was such a radical change it was hard to realize that it was the same place. Trent, Bethany, Caitlin and I all found a quite area away from other people and played in the creek, tried some sand-boarding, and just enjoyed the sun:
On the way out Caitlin and I took the scenic route up the San Luis valley eventually hitting up 285 for the ride home. While we were dealing with wind and a little rain in the sand dunes, the I-70 corridor was hit with a very late season snow-storm (most of the snow had already melted off of the peaks and we were sure glad we weren’t camping in that):
Now I can finally say I have been to the sand-dunes (even if I am still scraping sand out of my eyes 3 mos later)!
]]>When: Friday May 28th – Monday May 31st, 2010; aka Memorial Day Weekend
Who: Caitlin, Andy, thousands of Buffalo, some elk, grizzly bears, black bears, wolves, moose, antelope, and the most dangerous animal of them all: tourists.
Have you every heard of this place called Yellowstone? Because I never have and rightfully so as there is not much to do there. We happened to stumble upon it when we decided that we should drive North through that mostly empty piece of land above Colorado that some historic maps have listed as “Wyoming”.
While driving through this land we eventually landed in this weird place called Yellowstone, which apparently is somewhat famous as it is designated as a National Park (what-ever that means). So we decided to hang-out for a few days (mainly because we were sick of driving through that barren land north of Colorado).
So there is not much to see there which should be expected as it is in the middle of nowhere. Not sure if anyone should ever go to this place…
Not really that many bison roaming all over the park, hanging out on the road or on the trails where you would least expect them.
Or are is there any other wildlife like the herds of elk or Pronghorn Antelope.
Or are there any Grizzly bears taking down elk calves in plain site and proceeding to eat them.
And there are most certainly no Wolves hunting elk herds for their newly born calves.
Lastly the landscape is extremely boring as things such as geysers, springs, bubbling mud-pits, sulphur pits, or stunning mountains and valleys exist anywhere in this park.
Anyways if you want to see some horrible photos of probably the most boring place on earth, please read-on and don’t come crying to me when you are bored to death as I warned you fairly.
The Trip: Yellowstone over Memorial Day Weekend:
Our first Wildlife encounter was on the first evening where we went on our first short hike in Yellowstone (2/3rds mile). We went out around a small geyser basin (Mud Volcano basin) through some insanely wet rain/slush:
Out on this short hike in the wet rain/slush we rounded a corner on the trail right before our eyes was the first (and certainly not last) buffalo; Caitlin exclaimed “Is that a real one!?!”…why yes I believe that is a real one:
One advantage of really wet/slushy rain of the first evening was that the pesky Tourist animal was no-where to be seen. The Grand Canyon of Yellowstone Lower Falls which we enjoyed in complete solidarity for at least 20 mins:
Caitlin demonstrating the proper way to deploy Bear Pepper Spray when a bear, bison, chipmunk, moose, bighorn sheep, or RV decide that they will charge you and attempt to maul/gore/eat/cuddle/love/stomp you:
Saturday morning looked pretty much the Beach Vacation we were expecting (2 inches of Fresh!) the next morning near the Hayden Valley:
Damn tourists can’t walk down the road right:
Porcelain Basin near Norris Junction was insanely awesome:
Some really colorful Extremophiles found in the Porcelain Basin:
The Northern Lamar Valley after a fast moving rain storm (which is about 1,500 ft lower than were we camped and was significantly warmer), also known as the Serengeti of Yellowstone:
Momma and Baby Black Bear were hanging out giving the crowds a show (Near Tower):
Sunday Morning we were treated to some excellent GORE!!! Yogi the Grizzly Bear had chased down an delicious Elk Calf for breakfast and I was jealous as I hadn’t yet had my morning baby animal breakfast. Anyways we finally got a decent photo once he got-up and re-hydrated (but people with high-powered scopes helped us see closeups of the grizzly enjoying the various parts of an elk calf):
Then out of no-where some Wolves attacked a small herd of elk on the same hillside!!! Unfortunately they were hidden by a small hill and they would only pop-out occasionally and were running so quick it that I could not get a photo that was worth anything at all 
Once our killing appetite was taken care of we went and checked out some more Geyser basins near Old-Faithful (Old-faithful was probably the least exciting part of the trip):
The very large Grand Prismatic Geyser from a good vantage point (there is a boardwalk to this geyser but since it is so large and hot all you can see is steam):
So we randomly went to this one small side road and got out of the car to wander around. There was a small group near this one geyser and out of no-where the thing started to erupt and was really sweet to watch it shoot about 25 ft into the air. The White Dome Geyser:
Sunday evening the skies cleared and we were treated to some excellent visual pleasure over the Hayden valley and Pelican Creek (just before sunset the temperature peaked at a whopping 54 degrees):
Monday morning we packed-up and headed out. There was some excellent viewage at Yellowstone Lake (which like most things we saw in the park was still frozen):
Then back in the car again and across that vast land of Wyoming…
Yee Haw!
If you are following from some sort of feed all of my posts can be found here: http://andylibrande.com/news/
]]>When: November 6th-8th
Who: Caitlin, Andrew Giamberardino, Whitney Hoover, Ben Strauss, Scott Miller, Paige Powers and Myself
Weather: Low 70′s during the day with a steady light breeze and mid 40′s overnight; in other words, Perfect
On extreme short-notice a group gathered to go down to Moab to do a little camping, biking, and climbing. We all left Denver around 7:00pm on the Friday night and ended-up hitting the campground just after midnight. Luckily we found a couple of sites just down from the Big Bend campground and set-up for the night.
We woke up early the next morning, made a quick breakfast and after getting a few rental bikes headed to the infamous Slickrock trail. On a side-note I have been to Moab on at least 6 trips but I have never gone mountain biking, so I was really stoked to finally get out and do something really cool.
Pulling into the Slickrock parking lot I realized why coming to Moab in November was so utterly awesome; this massive parking lot is usually overflowing down the road and this time only about a quarter of all the spots were taken.
We spent the rest of the day out on the Slick-rock trail enjoying the slight breeze and moderate weather; the views were also amazing with a light layer of snow on the La Sal mountains to the East and views of fall foliage all along the river-banks below us. The trail was more enjoyable and a lot more difficult then I anticipated and glad to finally tick it off of the list. Also the 7 person crew was a lot of fun and were able to enjoy large stretches of the trail just by ourselves.
Biking Shots on the Slickrock trail:
Scott hitting up one of the wild switch-backs on the first part of the trail:
Andrew, Ben, and Whitney doing one of the really fun downhill sections with some of the better views of the trail:
Scott and Paige:
Caitlin and Me in front of the snow covered La Sal Mtns (almost done with the loop section): 
The only small issue with Moab in November is that the sun is set by 5:30pm so it takes a few hours off of the day. Not too big of a deal as we ate some delicious Chili Whitney cooked up, sat around the fire, ate some s’mores and made fun of each other.
Here is a 12 minute exposure of the Milky Way from our campsite taken at 7:20pm. The stars were unbelievable and then sometime after midnight the moon rose with some really intense light.
The next morning some group shots at the camp-site:
And one of Caitlin:
Then myself, Paige and Caitlin walked over to the Big Bend boulders and had a fun day. Caitlin sending a nice tall problem:
Working on another right next to the road. This one had really cool crimpy pockets and an awesome finishing lip:
Awesome random weekend. It will be hard to ever go to Moab any other time of the year.
]]>When: 9/29/09- 10/1/09
Who: The old man and me
It had been a few years since me and my old man had gone backpacking together which has always been a favorite pastime for both of us since I was old enough to carry a pack. With short-notice and very quick planning we targeted a few days at the end of September that appeared would hold for weather and provide us with some good fall viewing potential.
Having backpacked pretty extensively in the Collegiate Peaks I picked a trail that we had not done and appeared to be unique as it started at the top of Cottonwood pass, wound all the way down to Texas Creek, and then looped around back to the top of cottonwood pass. With everything set we planned on doing three days with two over-nights on the trail.
After parking at the top of Cottonwood we started on the trail. Here is the official starting point of the trail with some glorious peaks in front of us. Our trail wound along the left side and eventually dropped into the valley where we would head down it and eventually come around back to the car.
Old battered wilderness sign:
The old man hiking on the first day:
View of the main peak that was above our campsite on a very beautiful first day. The valley was lined with beautiful peaks all around 13,000 ft in height:
The next day offered up some unique weather. Waking up to a light drizzle with the peaks completely covered by clouds:
The clouds lifted and revealed the snow they had left behind:
Me with one of the many beautiful peaks in the background:
The Old Man crossing the decent sized Texas Creek. We tried fly-fishing but the wind was so strong in the valley that we had to abandoned that activity:
Right after we crossed the river we realized that the trail we used to cross this massive valley dead-ended at an old cabin. At this point we decided to go off-trail with the intention to try to meet up with the existing trail by traversing up the side of the mountain. Well we never did traverse far enough to get to that trail and ended up heading up the side of the mountain following game trails.
Here is the old man on one of the many established game trails we followed up the side of the hill. The hike turned out to be steeper, longer, and harder then we initially expected. However the solidarity that we experienced was excellent:
For the vast majority of the hike up the hillside we could not see the valley below us or the mountain in front of us due to the dense forest. It was pretty wild hiking up on random game trails without being able to easily tell which direction or how far we needed to go. Additionally we saw numerous signs of wildlife for both predator and prey but unfortnautely did not see any actual wildlife. At one point we the trees parted enough to offer a beautiful view of Ice Mountain across the valley which is just shy of 14,000ft:
Finally after hours of steep climbing (approx 2,000 ft elevation gain and 3 hrs later), we reached the top of the ridgeline. Right before we crossed over I snapped this better view of Ice Mountain:
Once over the ridgeline we fought strong winds, exposed hillside, and the looming sunset to get back to the vehicle as quickly as possible. At this time our plans had changed to hike back to the car, drive down to lower elevation, set-up camp and then leave the next morning. This photo was taken at ~6:30pm as the evening glow started to take over as we hiked to the car:
The last of the sunlight with Taylor Reservoir on the left and the Maroon Bells in the distance on the right (7:00pm approx 1.5 miles to car at this point):
After the sun went down we finally hit the road and were able to ditch our packs and make the final mile slog to the car. Without the sun the temps dropped dramatically with only made it tougher since we were exhausted. After reaching the car we drove down the road and found an area to set-up camp where we finally got some food into our bellies.
The next morning we woke up to about 2-3 inches of snow and were glad that we hiked out the night before as there was probably upwards of 4-6 inches at the top of the pass.
The beautiful Mt. Princton (14,197 ft) the next morning as we were driving home:
The storm did not hit our area as hard as it hit the I-70 corridor. We drove home on beautiful dry roads while Summit County got a few inches. At this point we were heading into the South Park valley and the clouds are all north of us:
Overall a awesome few days spent with my Dad in the beautiful backcountry of Colorado.
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