Peak Names: Mount Hope & Quail Mountain

Peak Heights: 13,933' & 13,461'

Location: Sawatch Mountains, Colorado

Route: East Ridge (Hope) & SW Slopes (Quail)

Trailhead: 1 mile short of Sheep Gulch TH

Difficulty: Class 2

Round Trip Stats: 9 mi, 5180 ft

Date Climbed: 3/12/2016

Dom and I took advantage of May-like winter conditions and a marginal forecast by nabbing Mount Hope and neighboring Quail Mountain via Sheep Gulch, the standard summer approach. In a typical winter this would be a horrible route choice, as evidenced by an impressive amount of avalanche debris in upper Sheep Gulch. On this day we paid for a lack of avy danger with waist-deep slush on the descent.

We were able to drive to within a mile of the Sheep Gulch TH, but spent 45 minutes getting ourselves unstuck near our stopping point. This was our third trip up these peaks which was too much! They are blah and don't warrant this much attention.