Pikes Peak via Devils Playground and Crags Trail report with pics

We went to Boulder last week for the Boulder 70.3 triathlon on Saturday, went down to the Arkansas River Gorge on Monday to do some rafting and on tuesday decided to hike Pikes Peak.

There are more than one route to the top but the Barr trail seemed a bit longer and we were hoping to make it back to Denver to watch The Goonies at the Red Rocks that night which started at 7 pm so we opted for the Crags trail which is shorter, but steeper. This was my first 14'er but my buddy is a very experienced climber with over a dozen 14'er's, Mt Rainier, and a few other pretty tough ones I can't remember.

3:30 am wakeup, an hours drive to the Crags trailhead and we were off.

The Crags Trail and the trail to Pikes Summit through Devils Playground both start out the same trailhead and veer off shortly after the hike. We started at 5:30 am and it was still dark so I stole a few pics of the start for a frame of reference

Crags Trailhead - not my photo



Once you get to the veer point where Crags goes one way and the trail to Pikes Peak goes another there was a sign on a tree. We took a right to head to Pikes but missed the actual trail (it was still kind of dark) and inadvertently rejoined the Crags trail thinking we were heading to Pikes.




It was in the 50's and it was a damp morning but the Crags Trail was gorgeous.

(these are my photos - sorry about the quality as they were all with an iphone)















After walking and talking for about an hour and realizing we hadn't hit the "rocky" portion of Devils Playground we started to wonder if we missed a trail or something but we could tell we were walking to something nice as the sun was rising so we just kind of rolled with it.






We hit an opening just before the end of the trail and caught a gorgeous glimpse of the sunrise.













You're going to have to forgive my attire. I had just done a 70.3 two days ago and felt I needed some compression on my shins, I left my convertible pants back in my apt in Boulder and these were the only synthetic shorts I had with me that wasn't a bathing suit.

#SorryNotSorry







We get to the end of the Crags Trail and finally realize we had walked over 2 miles and over an hour in the wrong direction...time to turn around and head back and now the entire reason we decided to hike Crags over Barr (to save time) was now null and void.

So, back to the sign on the tree and we see the turn we missed and start out to Pikes.




The first 3 miles are pretty brutal. Almost 2400 feet in the first three miles but the next two are pretty flat with only about 200 feet of ascent.









Brutal stretch right here about mile 2.5




You can see the trail here after mile 3 when it flattens out along the side of that ridge and Pikes Peak off in the distance





The last mile and a half is a son of a bitch! I could only make it about 25' before needing to stop for air. Over 1000' of ascent in that last mile and a half and the last .5 mile is mostly climbing over boulders between a 10%-20% grade.

This isn't my picture but this is pretty much what it looks like the last 30 minutes or so of the climb





We made it to the top right about 5 hours from the point that we got lost (6.7 miles).






We had some donuts and coffee at the top, then took a van down about 3 miles (to get past the boulders at the top) and hiked the remaining 4 miles back to the truck.

It was harder than I thought it would be, especially 3 days after a half ironman, drinking beer for days and only on about 4 hours of sleep but it was definitely rewarding.

I think I'll look for a longer trail next time with a more gradual ascent but all in all it was a blast.

We didnt mean to get lost but we also didnt know we could take a shuttle down and had you given me the option to hikes both (crags and pikes) I would have said yes so we ended up doing exactly what I think we would have chosen anyway.

No, I didnt make it to the goonies but my buddy did and he said it was awesome. I went back to the apt with the wife, drank two bombers and a 6 pack of Colorado craft beer, watched two movies and fell asleep like a baby.