I haven't gotten rained off a 14er climb in two years, so I guess I was due. I wanted to climb Mount Wilson and El Diente, but I had heard enough about the horrible North Slopes route on El Diente that I wanted to climb it from the south side, from a high camp in Kilpacker Basin. The standard route on Mount Wilson is from the north, and Gerry Roach does not recommend the south slopes route without a cover of snow, but with a little research I thought the Kilpacker Basin approach would also work for Wilson.

I left home around 09:00 on Monday, driving through Gunnison, Montrose, and over Lizard Head Pass to reach the Kilpacker Basin trailhead. The trailhead is nothing but a small parking lot in a clump of trees not far from the dirt road, so it would be easy to miss. The weather report for Tuesday showed afternoon thunderstorms, so I was a little doubtful about bagging these peaks, but it was the only chance I'd have for several weeks and I thought I could at least scout out Kilpacker Basin and familiarize myself with the route. The drive out was loaded with road construction once I passed Gunnison, and I had to stop at least 8 times on various roads. It took around 6:30 hours to go from Conifer to the trailhead.

I started hiking up the Kilpacker trail - the trail crosses grassy fields, then works its way into aspen forest and turns north. The trail is very nice for backpacking, rolling moderately through beautiful aspen and spruce groves. I felt I was making good time; in less than an hour I found the trail junction and took the right fork, then crossed Kilpacker Creek and continued across grassy hillsides. About 30 minutes past the trail junction I found an excellent campsite a little below the lower of two waterfalls. El Diente roared up to the northeast; I couldn't see Mount Wilson, it was too far up the basin.

I set up camp, having the entire basin to myself, cooked dinner and relaxed with a bottle of Laughing Lab I packed in. I had a second beer cooling in the creek for after the climb; cans would have been easier and lighter to pack out but it's hard to find good beer in cans. I took some pictures of the waterfall with El Diente as a backdrop, took a short recon hike up the trail to treeline, then retired to my little tent. I actually slept pretty well, even though much of the night I heard it raining outside.

The rain was light but steady, and when my alarm went off at 04:00 I could still hear it coming down. I went back to sleep for a little while, then got out of the tent at 04:30. The rain had stopped, so I thought I'd make some oatmeal and start hiking with a headlamp. If the weather was going to clear that morning, I wanted to be up the trail a ways when it became light enough to tell. I started up the trail at 05:00, and found the scree trail once I rose above the trees. It was about here that the rain started up again, steadily becoming heavier. The rock on the scree trail was slick and it was hard to see the trail because my headlamp was reflecting off the wet rock, so I thought it would be best to retreat under the trees and wait until daylight before continuing.

Below treeline I kept losing the trail; it was really hard to see it under the direct light of the headlamp, when all the vegetation was wet and shiny. While thrashing around in the woods trying to find the trail again, I decided the weather probably wasn't going to improve and that I might as well head back to camp and pack out. If only I could find the trail that led from the bluff above the creek down to the campsite... I decided to hunker down under a tree and wait for some daylight, and 15 minutes later it was light enough to see where I was going without the headlamp. I backtracked, figuring I had missed the trail down, and sure enough, I had been sitting maybe 50' from the trail. I went down to the campsite and started packing up, after having my victory beer, of course. I didn't want to pack out the weight of 12oz of beer if I didn't have to.

Another nice hike out, and I reached the Jeep at the trailhead. I thought I'd take the long way out through Durango, rather than deal with all the construction delays on the route I used the previous day. I drove down 145 to Dolores, then took a cutoff road through Mancos then onto 160 and Durango. It took a long time to get home, but at least I didn't have those construction frustrations. Wolf Creek Pass was all torn up - it seems they're blasting out a section of tunnel to route one or more lanes through, so they can widen the road on the pass. Even with all this going on I didn't have to stop...

Well, it's frustrating to drive so far to get rained out before even getting to climb, but I understand it takes many people many tries to climb El Diente. The Kilpacker Basin route is the way to go, though, and I hope to get back out there mid-September for another try.