Mt. Princeton, 14,197 Ft.
June 29, 2001. I climbed Mt. Princeton with Ginny La Forme. Instead of the standard route up the east slopes, we took a more difficult route, approaching from the north on the Colorado Trail to Maxwell Gulch, traversing the summit, then descending to the south into Grouse Canyon. This is the route we will probably use for Nolan's 14. The hike took 8 hours from the start to finish.
We followed an obvious, steep old jeep road that left the trail to the east, just north of Maxwell Creek, and disappeared into a meadow at 10,600 ft. From there we climbed to the top of the basin at about 13,000 ft. From here, all of the routes to the summit are steep and dangerously loose rock slides. We chose a route that went almost directly to the summit.
On the summit.
Ginny shows no fear, descending the steep ridge SW of the summit, just past point 13,971. The trail comes within a foot or two of the cliffs, dropping hundreds of feet.