Mineral Butte 5232 ft

February 17, 2001

Michael had told me about this seldom visited area past the town of Index and I was looking forward to exploring it. We took advantage of the low snow year and drove the Index-Galena road to the Troublesome Creek campground. We were hoping to get closer to Troublesome Mountain but the road beyond this point had deeper snow so we turned around. On the drive in we were treated with views of Troublesome Mountain, and we agreed that it was aptly named. From our vantage it looked quite steep and rugged. We were drawn to this mountain but we knew very little about the approach or the climbing involved. The Beckey guide nearly overlooked this mountain completely. We were able to find this brief description in the Approaches section of Vol 2:

"Troublesome Mtn (5430 ft/1655 m) is a good viewpoint SW of the lake [Blanca] but involves a fairly arduous cross-country trek of over 2 mi. Leave the trail at the divide, then follow bumpy subalpine terrain."

This of course didn't help us much since we were SW of the mountain. So we decided to set our sights a bit lower in hopes of reaching a winter summit, and drove back down the road to Mineral Butte. We took the turnoff from FR 6330 as far as we could. There were tire tracks in the fresh snow from where someone had driven earlier, so we followed these until they stopped. I was glad that Michael was driving on this trip because his RAV 4 got us much higher than my Accord would have!

We hiked up the road for almost a mile until the snow was too deep, so we put on our snowshoes and continued trudging along. After another mile or so we came to a wide area where a gully led up to the switchbacked road above. With all the new snow, we cautiously ascended staying as close as possible to ridges and shrubs. Michael led up in a more direct approach while I stayed high on the left side of the gully. My route quickly ended in a loaded slope, so I climbed up the side to a dense forest of small trees on the ridge. While this was safer, it was also quite tiring. I wove my way through the forest, glad for my umbrella that shed the snow that sloughed off tree limbs as I brushed against them.

We reconvened at the top of the gully, and took a break to catch our breaths. Ah, another example of where a short cut turned out to be a long cut! We agreed to stick to the road from here on out. We picked up the road again and saw on the map that it was taking us on another long switch back. We must either hate hiking on roads or have extremely short term memories because we decided to head through the forest to cut the switch back and gain the open field that led to the summit ridge! It worked out better this time as we reached the clearing and made our way towards the old growth forest that led to the summit. This forest was my favorite part of the trip as there was virtually no underbrush and the branches were high above us. As we entered the forest I heard the low hoot of what I believe was an owl. Neat! We traded off trail breaking duties and wound our way up through trees. We stopped for some lunch at the edge of the forest and took in the views. It was a great day to be in the mountains.

Looking forward to the summit, we put our packs back on and continued up through the forest. We knew that we were getting close because the terrain narrowed to a ridge. There was an interesting clumb of trees that grew in a semi-circle that gave the appearance of a "tree jail". We were thankful for the ridge and the trees that provided a safe route for us to ascend. Up to this point I wasn't sure if we would reach the summit, but as we reached an open field and saw the summit I felt a surge with the anticipation. Michael led up near some trees on the right side of the open area. As we got higher we saw that the trees we were following ended and that we would be forced to traverse the open field. In normal conditions this would not have posed a problem but today with the new snow and the considerable to high avalanche conditions we weighed our options carefully. To get a better idea of the snowpack I suggested we dig a snow pit and perform a shovel test and a Rutschblock test. The shovel test revealed several unconsolidated layers, about 10 and 24 inches down. Even further down was another layer that resembled hoar frost. When I weighted the slope above the pit, it didn't move but when I hopped, the first and second layers released. We both agreed that it was too much of a risk to make the traverse, so we looked for alternatives. There was a row of trees at the bottom of the open slope that looked like it would provide us with a safe route over to the left side of the slope to a ridge with more trees which appeared to lead up to the summit. So we hiked back down and with a large space between us, we traversed across the bottom to the other side. Now safely across we ascended near the trees only to find that there was a 30 feet gap in the row of trees with a loaded slope between. Ah! So close but yet so far. Michael led out a little further but returned when he sank 3 feet in the wind swept snow. Without a way to cross this slope safely, our only choice was to turn around. We could see the summit a mere 250 feet above us.