In July 2020, Nate and I had kicked off the summer with a giant 3.5-day trip traversing the Rocky Mountain National Park Skyline, which we called the "Estes Skyline High Route". This trip had given us a nice boost to our fitness at had set in motion a great alpine climbing season. So when mid-July 2021 rolled around, Nate and I decided it was high time for another fitness hike. We decided to do attempt a 2.5-day, 11-summit high traverse of the Never Summer Mountains. The plan was to hike to Thunder Pass and traverse the range from The Electrode just west of Thunder Pass all the way to Baker Mountain at the south end.

The Never Summer Mountains are a mountain range whose summits form the northwest border of Rocky Mountain National Park. To the west of the summits is the Never Summer Wilderness and to the right is RMNP (our adventures on this trip took place on the east side inside RMNP). The range is small and tall, covering only 25 sq mi with a north-south length of 10 mi while rising to over 12,000 ft (high point being the summit of Mount Richthofen at 12,940 ft). The Continental Divide makes a loop in these mountains. The name of the range comes from the fact that the area is in a secluded storm-catching position, receiving a healthy dose of snow year round.

On Friday afternoon, we drove the one-way Old Fall River Road (a nice drive in itself) to the Colorado River Trailhead and hiked nearly eight miles and a few hours to just below Thunder Pass, where we set up camp. On Saturday, we embarked on the traverse. It took us roughly two hours to traverse The Electrode, Static Peak, and arrive at the summit of Mount Richthofen. The terrain moving southwards to the next summits of the range looked complicated and loose. Clouds were building as well. We debated whether to (1) stick to our original goal and continue the traverse despite the fact it was not all that enjoyable of terrain and would become less enjoyable when it started to rain or (2) bail out to the east and hike out and get out early enough to regroup and spend the rest of the weekend climbing sunny alpine granite in Upper Glacier Gorge. We decided on Option 2. Given that it did rain for about an hour starting at 1pm and we got in a couple of fun days of climbing on Arrowhead, this was probably the right choice.

Despite the fact that we changed our plans to a 1.5-day, 3-summit high traverse of just the northern portion of the Never Summers, it was a nice fitness hike including the highest summit of the range. This page gives the trip report. Enjoy!