Planning a Backpacking Trip to Chicago Basin | San Juan Mountains, Colorado

[@meg-jones]

Wow this was SO informative & helpful, SO beautifully shot. I love this! Please keep it up 💖 your experience is SO valuable!

[@wanderingwildflowerfilms]

Thank you so much!! :)

[@zekeshow3769]

Great video. Thanks for the information! 👊🏼

[@wanderingwildflowerfilms]

Thank you so much!! It was such an amazing trip!!!

[@ZZ_90]

Kaylyn! Great video! We are heading out there in a week for a few nights. Heard it might be a little cold and rainy, but worth the risk of the adventure. Had a question. When you guys went out there, was the trail pretty covered in down trees? How long did it take you from the train drop off to get to your desired campsite? Thanks again! Cheers!

[@wanderingwildflowerfilms]

Thank you so much! Hopefully it doesn't rain too much! We had a pretty gnarly rainfall on our last night and the river turned super brown and rose quite a bit. Crazy to see the changes in flow and color in such a short period of time! When we went, the trail was fairly clear. We didn't step over many trees but you might experience a few more from the winter in June. We were there in July when plenty of volunteers and trail workers had already come through to clean things up a bit. It took us about 3 hours to get up to our campsite from the train stop. It is a fair amount of elevation and it was super hot so we were moving at a moderate pace. I would think it averages 2-4 hours depending on your hiking speed and how many stops you take for photos and enjoying the views along the way.

[@kenziketterhagen8582]

How far in advance do you suggest booking the trail tickets

[@wanderingwildflowerfilms]

We purchased our original tickets about 2 months in advance. If you are going over the weekend or around a holiday I would say book it out at least 2-3months in advance. If you are going mid-week or shoulder season you can get away with a bit later. We had to reschedule due to COVID and ended up booking only a few weeks out and there was still space.

[@SonicAndTrippy]

Of the 4 surrounding 14ers, which would you say is the easiest and which is the most difficult?

[@wanderingwildflowerfilms]

I would say all of the 14ers in Chicago Basin would be considered difficult. They all include class 3 or harder climbing and have alot of elevation gain from the trailhead. I wouldn't suggest anyone attempt summiting without a helmet and having comfort climbing 3rd class or harder. With that info though, Windom is by far the least technical of the official 14ers in the basin. It didn't get harder than low 3rd class climbing and was easy to follow the trail the whole way up. Sunlight and Eolus/N. Eolus both included some scrambling and 4th class climbing - some spots even felt like low 5th class, depending on the route you chose. Eolus/N. Eolus were a more pleasant climb but had some exposure on the ridge and tricky route finding. Sunlight was easier to navigate but the scree field was gnarly and there was one quite tricky scrambling spot near the summit.

[@SonicAndTrippy]

@wanderingwildflowerfilms yup, knew they were all pretty tricky. Just didn't know if any of them were particularly more or less difficult than the others. Alltrails actually shows a black dashed trail all the way up to N Eolus which I found interesting because I was under the impression none of them had a dedicated trail to the top 🤷‍♀️

[@wanderingwildflowerfilms]

@@SonicAndTrippy yeah there is a really nice trail up to N Eolus/Eolus until you hit the base of the cliff then you scramble up to the ridge. N Eolus is easier route finding than Eolus as the trail is way more straightforward and basically just up the ridge to the top. That was probably my favorite summit of the 4 because I love scrambling and just climbing along rocks. We found Mt. Eolus trickier to stay on the trail and you can easily get yourself in a tough spot with loose rocks and tricky 4/5 class moves. Definitely something to be careful of if you head up that way.