September 19 - 20, 2009, Saturday-Sunday Cat Lake 10591’, north 39° 47’ 54”, west 106°20’ 12” 6.6 Miles, 1995’ , Summit County, Phil was home on leave for nearly all of September so we decided to get a hike in. His long time friend Anthony decided to go with us. We picked a fairly close destination but were open, to some extent, to a longer hiking distance. We chose Cat Lake, in the Eagles Nest Wilderness. The drive is only two hours from home: I70 west to Silverthorne, north on CO-9 to Heeney Road, Heeney Road almost to Heeney, and then a couple miles in on FS-203 to the Surprise Lake Trailhead. Heeney Road is easy to miss and we did not get slowed down quick enough to make the turn so we had to turn around to get back to it. There was a wide shoulder there, probably made so people like us could turn around there when we drove by Heeney Road. We noticed there was a wide shoulder on the other side of Heeney Road too. It must be hard to see coming from the northwest too.

Surprise Lake Trailhead is just past Cataract Campground. On the way home we drove through it and learned that it is not a well-developed campground. The trailhead ‘parking lot’ is nothing more than a wider spot on the gravel road with the typical USFS Trailhead signage ... and a fee tube. There was a $5 fee to park for up to five days. The smooth gravel road goes a bit past the trailhead to the Cataract Lake Trailhead. We didn’t go there but any car could go to the lake trailhead with no problem. Titan went along and was glad to be running loose after we parked. We left the house at 6:30 am and were hiking at 8:30 am. The weather was perfect for hiking – clear skies, almost no breeze and moderately warm

We crossed over Cataract Creek on a nice footbridge as soon as we left the parking lot. For about a half a mile the trail ascended moderately through aspen just starting to take on their fall colors. Then pine trees took over. Pine beetle damage here was minimal and we enjoyed hiking in shade up the alternately very steep and moderate inclined trail. In 2.5 mile we arrived at the Trail, at 9940’, about 1344’ higher than the footbridge. By the time we hit the junction the pine had gave way to spruce and fir. We were about half the distance to Cat Lake and well over half way up the 2144’ elevation we would gain before we descended into our camp. We had taken a break a hundred yards before the junction, so when we hit the junction we turned right and kept going. Surprise Lake was only a few minutes further up the Gore Range Trail, on the left. The trees were still dense, the skies were still clear.

The weather report had predicted a nice day today, but turning cold and wet the next day. So far it was correct. It was perfect for hiking.

The Gore Range Trail traverses the east slope of the Gore Range through the Eagles Nest Wilderness, from Dillon to a bit north of Heeney. It is said that the range is named after Sir St. George Gore, an Irishman who led a hunting expedition across these mountains in the mid-1800s. We hiked up the Gore Range Trail for only about 0.8 miles to the juncture of the Cataract Trail. Cataract Trail heads southwest, up hill about 2.7 miles, to Upper Cataract Lake, and then beyond to Mirror Lake on the Mirror Lake Trail. The trails are marked pretty well at every junction, probably a big help to the many hikers that use these trail in the summer. But we didn’t see a single hiker. We arrived at Cataract Lake about 11:30. We decided to drop our packs and search out the perfect campsite. The first thing we noticed was the “no fires at Cataract or Cat Lakes” sign. A new sign, to boot. So we decided to go up the trail toward Mirror Lake until we could find a decent campsite in the woods. Phil, Anthony and Titan took off in search thereof while I packed some stuff in the backpack. As I did a Forest Service ranger walked up. After our initial greetings, I asked her how far from the lakes we would have to be in order to have a campfire? She replied that “we ask that you be a quarter mile from the lakes”. We talked a minute while we walked toward the lake. Then she walked to the east of the lake and I walked on the trail to the north of the lake. I caught up with my companions at the

1 creek that flows from Upper Cataract to Cat Lake. We would hike about 15 minutes on the Mirror Lake Trail, and then circle into the forest west of Cat Lake. The forest floor had been covered with kinnikinick since well before Surprise Lake. We walked through it for 500 yards and found a good site for our camp, probably 200 yards from the lake and 100 yards from the creek. We would have to be careful when we got water from the creek or visited the lake because there were no real landmarks visible, the forest was dense, and finding our way back could be a challenge.

The creek was without a name on the USGS topo map. But it would probably be the east fork of Cataract Creek. Even though the creek flowed out of Upper Cataract Lake down to Cataract Lake, it was not called Cataract Creek. Cataract creek drains Mirror Lake, to the west. Go figure. No worries though, the water was pretty clear and it was not too far from camp.

After we set up camp we took Titan southeast to Cat Lake for some stickin’. Of course he was excited for that. We had to walk around to the south side of the lake to find some deep water. We saw a couple hikers coming down the trail on the far side of the lake. The same trail that we had come down earlier. We had kept on the upper, main trail, but it also drops a couple hundred feet to Cat Lake. Before long the couple appeared shore-side on the opposite side of the lake. We decided to walk up to Cataract Lake, just a couple hundred yards to the south. These couple hundred yard are a steep set of yards. We scrambled up and stopped at the trail and took some views to the north before walking up to the north shore of Cataract Lake.

To the north was the Cataract Creek valley, packed with thick spruce and fir. In the distance we could see the Williams Fork Mountains on the north side of Green Mountain Reservoir. But the valley dropped down too steep to see the reservoir at the bottom of the valley. Thick forest surrounded Cataract Lake except at the south end, where boulders, rocks and scrabble defined the slope half way up to the rocky peaks. We could see the ragged peaks of the Gore Range. The wilderness’ namesake peak forms the ragged mountain to the south and west of the lake. Eagles Nest rises to 13397’. Mount Powell, named after , rises to 13580’ just south of the lake and south east of Eagles Nest. We could not see either from our vantage point. Three other peaks, all unnamed and all over 13000’, and all just above the south end of the lake, block the line of site to the two more famous peaks. The craggy ridge forms a cirque where Cliff Lake lies at 12146’. We sat at Cataract and talked about hiking up to Dora Lake, which lies in a relatively flat plateau at 12284’ between Cliff Lake and Dora Mountain. We could see two ways to get up there: one by way of the ridge to the north of the lake and the other by way of a very steep rocky slope at the south end of Cataract Lake. The later would be shorter but the climb North Slope of Upper Cataract Lake (10756’) would be a lot tougher. We would decide later.

The weather was nice. There were some clouds and some light wind, but it was definitely nap weather and there was nothing we could do about it. We found some warm grass on the slopes at the north end of the lake and turned to the task that beckoned.

About an hour later we retraced our route from camp to Cat Lake to Cataract Lake, more or less paralleling the creek to Cat Lake, and then walking around the south and west shores of the lake. We took off into the woods just past a marshy area, where a lot of red kinnikinick was preparing for winter. Phil led the way and we came out at camp with no turns. Without a sense of direction or a GPS it would be tough to find camp in these woods. We were camped next to no real landmark. But he walked right to it, without the GPS.

2 It was still pretty early so I heated some water for tea. While the water was heating up I broke out the .44 and targets. Phil and Anthony set a target on a huge dead tree, still standing up right. We couldn’t tell if it was a pine tree killed by beetles, or just a dead fir or spruce. There were not many pines in the area so it was probably a fir or spruce. Either way, it was a good tree for the target. Phil broke out his .45 and the .22 rifle. I fired off a few shots from the .44 and then fixed tea. Phil and Anthony fired the .45 and then the .22. They fired most of the shots from the .22. We shot for about a half an hour or more. Then we cooked dinner.

We had spaghetti with some summer sausage mixed in. Onda had precooked the noodles, and then froze them; all we had to do was heat them up, which I did after I heated the spaghetti sauce packs in boiling water. I mixed the sausage into the noodles and once the noodles were hot, drained the water and dished up some hot spaghetti. Pretty good. There was just enough for the three of us. I had spilled some sausage when I was draining the spaghetti noodles. Once it cooled off I pointed the morsels out to Titan. No liter in our camp!

After we had returned from the exploratory mission to Cat and Cataract Lakes we gathered wood and made a fire pit. Phil worked on the fire pit, and Anthony and I gathered wood. There was plenty of wood around. Although Cat and Cataract Lakes had virtually no wood on the ground, due to over use, the forest where we were camping was littered with it to the point of having to climb over it or detour around it while walking around. That was actually one reason we had such a hard time finding a good clear site to pitch the tents. So it was easy to find wood. We collected enough to last the night and the morning. Phil would be showing us how to start a fire with no more than two matches, something he learned and practiced in SERE training at Fort Bragg. We gathered a few big handfuls of very small kindling, such as pine needles, and then about the same amount of twigs and progressively larger sticks. After it was gathered and stacked in some small piles close to the fire pit, Phil built the fire. He formed the pine needles into a puffy pile and made a hole where he would light it with a match. When it was ready he broke out the lighter. That was probably more difficult than a match because as soon as you let the valve loose on the lighter the flame would go out. He had to move the lighter away in order to get close enough to the pile of needles so that he could blow to ignite the embers. A burning match could be left there as part of the kindling. But in just a few attempts he had the needles flaming. As he kept blowing he added small twigs, blew to get them burning, added some slightly bigger twigs, blew, and progressed through the small stacks of twigs and sticks, then on to the logs we had gathered. The fire was roaring in ten minutes. We would try it again the next night, but with two matches. He had passed that test in SERE training too. It turned out that we had collected plenty of wood. We had a nice hot fire all evening until we went to bed about 11 P.M., keeping us warm while we talked and watched the stars though the partly cloudy sky.

We had hiked six miles from the trailhead to camp that morning, and maybe a mile or two of walking around and exploring. So we were plenty tired. We had two tents. Anthony and Phil occupied one, and Titan and I occupied the other. We wondered how cold it would get, but it was a relatively warm night. Even in the morning when I got up it was warm. My jacket thermometer showed about 40°. Anthony said he woke up once during the night to the sound of rain. But the morning was clear with a slight breeze. I heated some water for coffee, fed Titan, and took off toward Cataract Lake. Anthony and Phil were not stirring. It was 7:30.

3 I walked through the forest back to the trail we had walked in on: Mirror Lake Trail. I came out on the trail about eight-minute walk from the outlet of Cataract Lake. I had hoped the sun would be shining on the Eagles Nest peaks when I arrived there. The sun had, in fact, just topped the ridges to east, but the sun was too far to the south to light up the high peaks. It did shine light on the lower ridge to the west of the lake, making for a decent photo. I decided to walk around the lake with Titan. We would walk the west side first, traverse the rock slides at the south end, and then return to the outlet on the west side of the 36 acre lake. It is about four times as long as it is wide. On the east side of the lake it was a half a mile through a thin strip of dense evergreens to the south side of the lake. Up the slope the trees quickly gave way to the steep rugged rocks on the east slope of Dora Mountain. If I had climbed the slope I would have topped on a relatively flat area near Dora Lake, at 12284’, about 1500’ higher. But the slope was more like a cliff, and I wasn’t going up. Titan and I walked to the south end of Cataract. I wasn’t looking forward to crossing the rocks. We would have to cross about a 100 yards of them. My ankle was still weak from twisting it a month earlier so I was taking my time, being sure of my footing. It took longer than normal, but we made it to the west side of the rocks without mishap. Evergreens took over the landscape as we East side of Cataract Lake rounded the south end to the west side. We saw a few more campsites on the west side. Some were pretty nice, up above the lake with unimpeded views of the lake. But there was no wood on the ground. It had been burned in campfires through the years of heavy use. About an hour and twenty minutes after we started we returned to the outlet creek. I crossed over to see if the sun would offer a better sight of the peaks, but the skies had become mostly cloudy and the view was less spectacular than it had been earlier in the morning.

It was 10:30. I thought I had better get back to camp because we had planned to walk up to Dora Lake or at least up to that elevation. I walked back to Cat Lake, taking the Cat Lake trail this time. Cat Lake is a six- acre, kidney shaped lake. At the west end the shallow water had quite a bit of grass growing in it. Otherwise it is a clear water lake, quite the picturesque scene. The trail follows the lake around the east and north sides of the lake. There were not many campsites at Cat Lake, but the ground had been picked clean of fire size wood. As I neared the outlet stream I encountered the couple we had seen the day before. They

Looking north over Cataract Lake were just beginning their walk out of the wilderness. They had stayed only one night. Titan and I made our

4 way back to camp through the forest. As we got close we heard gun shots. Phil and Anthony were practicing again. I had been basically on track, but the gunshots made finding camp easy.

They had already eaten so I quickly heated water for breakfast, ate and cleaned up. As soon as I was finished we packed a bunch of stuff and began our walk back to Cataract Lake for the walk up to the tundra above tree line. We went through the forest to Mirror Lake Trail, and then to Cataract, as I had earlier in the morning. When we got there we filled the water bottles. We looked over the two routes again and decided that the route up through the trees, south of Dora Lake, would be better. Not as steep and protected by trees most of the way. But the cloud cover had become compete and it was actually getting dark. We figured it would be raining well before we got out of the trees up there. We decided that instead of hiking up above tree line, we would hike over to Mirror Lake.

The Mirror Lake Trail cuts between Cat and Cataract and follows the contour of the north ridge of Eagles Nest Peak around to Mirror Lake. It is about a mile and a half and changes elevation only about 400 feet. It would be an easy walk. The forest between Cataract Lake and about half way to Mirror Lake was dense. With the clouds it was fairly dark. It started to rain off and on, and then turned into a steady rain. We kept going. For the most part, the thick evergreen cover protected us. As we rounded the west side of the ridge we were treated to some nice views of the Cataract Creek valley below. But we were also more in the open and the rain was still steady. The weather did not look like it would be improving very soon. We were well over half way to the lake, but given the degrading weather we decided to head back to camp. It would not be any drier at Mirror Lake. Before we turned around we scrambled up a rock peak next to the trail and had a view of Mirror Lake, maybe a quarter of a mile further. Still, we decided to go back.

When we got back to camp we stoked up the fire again. We still had plenty of wood from the previous day’s gatherings. It was still raining, but the fire was hot. The heat felt good after the hours in the rain. We watched our boots and trousers steam in the heat. I heated water and we had some Ramen Noodles. Tasty treats, to be sure, for a cold rainy afternoon. At times it sleeted and snowed, but snow never accumulated. Mainly it rained. The kitchen tarp made a good shelter for us and for Titan. Of course, he didn’t want any part of a stinking shelter if we weren’t under it too. After awhile I put him in the tent. No use him getting all wet. He liked it though. He wasted no time finding a good place to curl up on the sleeping bag and Therm-a-rest pad. After an hour or so we agreed that the weather would not be improving much, just like the weather reports had predicted. Rather than hang by the fire for hours, go to sleep and get up and hike out, we decided to pack up and hike out that evening. We would hang out until 4:30 at the latest. We took our time cleaning up and getting ready to go. At about 4:30 we hit the trail. My pack was noticeably heavy with the wet tent tied to it.

As Phil had jokingly predicted while we were standing in the rain around the fire, the rain stopped and it cleared up almost as soon as we were hiking. By the time we passed Surprise Lake the skies were blue with only a few clouds. We were making good time going down hill. Phil and Anthony were tooling along at a pretty quick clip. I didn’t have time to choose my steps and my ankle was complaining, especially in the rocky areas on the trail. But we made it down in about two hours.

We drank the traditional celebratory beer at the truck. Titan immediately turned to his traditional unconscio state as soon as I let him in the truck. It is always a treat to sit in the seats that have a back. The heater was not a bad touch either.

The drive home took two hours. I wondered if I-70would be clogged up. I thought not, and Phil and Anthony agreed. It was late on Sunday and the weather had been less than ideal. But it was clear now, although getting dark. Traffic sailed the whole way home. Titan never moved until we backed in to the driveway. And then he didn't want to get out of the truck!

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