Sill and Polemonium peak in Palisades

At the beginning of August 2007 I went to the Palisade range to climb both Sill and Polemonium peak. On Saturday me and my climbing party hiked over to the Mt. Galey camp. The start of the North Fork trail starts at a hiker's parking lot which is about 1 mile from the end of the road. The initial part of the hike goes over a well marked trail. At a river with well trimmed grass we rested and also took a detour to use trail. The use trail is shown on the pictures and is not very hard to find. The use trail leads through large field of boulders which is marked only by few stone markers every 30-50 feet. This trail is very hard to follow in the dark - unless you have a GPS it is very likely you will get lost. I did and so did few other people including the leader on our way back. On Sunday we started early in the morning after a very stormy night. Our progress was slow. We also lost over 2h right at the bottom of Polemonium since we all used a rope for safety. When climbing to the saddle between Sill and Polemonium you will have to cross a narrow ledge which some say is scary but is only class three and is rather wide. However, after this rather easy ledge there is a short, 30ft section of 4th class climbing. You can go the usual route or go to the left - which for me seems less exposed.

Click thumbnails to see larger image and more detailed explanation of what is shown on a given picture.

above the glacier	above the lakes	another view of one of the lakes
another view of palisades glacier in the summer time	another view of the spot where use trail starts	another view of three lakes
at around 13000ft	at the saddle	climbing the glacier
climbing with protection one pitch to the top of Polemonium	enjoying the views	far above the lake
first snow fields	glacier lake from above	great scenery on approch
great spot for camping grass is trimmed as on a golf course	great views 2	great views on the way
hope I do not fall into one of these	lake at the base of the glacier	lake from above
lake from far above 2	lake on the way to Palisades	lake on they way to the base camp
last lake on the way	long way down	on our way up
pack animals on the trail	palisades glacier in all its summer glory	palisades glacier in the summer
palisades view	rapelling down from Sill	river crossing from use trail
series of lakes seen from use trail	sun rays in the lake	taking a long break with Wendy in the middle
the color of the water is just hard to see anywhere else	this heavy bulder is just there ready to go into the lake	this is where the official trail ends
view from the Polemonium peak notch	Wendy on the way back from the top	wish to have these
you can see all three lakes in a row

Album created on 2007-09-03 and last updated on 2007-09-03