August 26, 2012

Trail Report

This second undertaking of the Decalibron came nearly two years after our first, and this time we were able to complete the entire ring in a single day. The tramp was characterized by gentle breezes, a cloudless morning, and somewhat heavy trail traffic. 

Ramius, Claire, and I spent the evening before our hike camped near Kite Lake to ensure an early, low-stress start of the hiking day. We set out around 7am and reached the summit of Democrat about an hour and a half later. Ramius spent this time wearing himself out by running ahead and making countless new human friends. The summit of Democrat was the most crowded of all the summits, and we only spent about ten or so minutes at the top. 

The trek up to Cameron was a bit more arduous, perhaps due to the fatigue from heading up Democrat. In any case, we stopped a few times to catch our breath and drink water on Cameron's West slopes and at one point met a pair of CFI volunteers who reminded us of the restricted access to Bross. 

The summits of Cameron and Lincoln were generally unremarkable in terms of weather, crowd levels, and extraneous events. We did take an extended break on Lincoln's summit to have a snack and relax for a while. Once we'd headed over toward Bross and began descending its South ridge, we began running into an intense amount of foot traffic on a portion of the trail that is quite steep and characterized by sliding scree. I picked up Ramius at this point and tossed him over my shoulder to prevent his pads from becoming scraped or cut - normally I'd have simply put on his Bark'n Boots, but I forgot to take them with us. 

We arrived at Kite Lake at about 2pm, making our total trip time about seven hours.