We left the car at 8:15 and started our journey. After about a mile the brush had started covering the trail, but have no fear, we made our way through with ease. Another mile later in a meadow we encountered avalanche debris.
We made our way through that and not much further up the trail it opened up and we were rewarded with great views of the area.
About 30 minutes later we were on the summit of Rock Mt, over 6800' up.
(I'm the one on the right, for those who don't know me)
Down the scree slope and off to Rock Lake we went. We re-joined the main trail and flanked a ridge and soon came to Crescent Lake.
We headed to the back of the lake and ascended a steep slope and found another gully to head up and soon we found ourselves below Mt Howard. With a bit more effort and snacks, we were at the high summit for the day, just over 7000'!!
We took a short break then eyeballed our last summit for the day, Mt Mastiff to our east.
We headed down the ridgeline from Howard and headed up the ridge to Mastiff.
There were a few tricky spots along the ridge but in due time we were sitting high atop Mt Mastiff.
We spent about 20 minutes or so on the summit before starting our trek back to the car. We modified our route back in a few spots to make the return a bit easier. As the sun got lower the perspective on things changed and the grass below Rock Mt turned to a nice golden color, even though my photos don't quite do it justice.
We returned to the car by 8:15pm and we were very tired. I retrieved my celebratory Pepsi from the creek and we hit the road.
Our stats for the trip were surprising: 12 hours, 16 miles and over 7700' elevation gain!!
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