"Successful summit of Middle Palisade, using the red rocks chute. Late August, so there was no snow crossing required. Doing this as a day hike is pretty brutal, as there's a lot of boulder hopping, which takes a lot out of you, and the final vertical 1300′ is a sustained class 3 scramble at a rate of about 6000′ vertical per horizontal mile. I would argue, as have others, that there are a couple class 4 moves required just below the summit—though nobody agrees on how to define these things. You can go either to the left or the right when you hit Finger Lake. My advice would be to go to the right on the way up, which is slightly less direct but requires less technical work. If you want to save time on the way back, you can do some scree skiing below the moraine to quickly descend if you want a faster (but trickier) descent. Any approach will require some route finding skill, as conditions are variable, GPS is imperfect in some of the valleys, and the top is fairly technical scrambling. The consensus seems to be that, for the final climb, the red rocks route is easier than Secor's ramp, which is hard to spot out to the left on the glacier, especially given the dodgy state of th..." — sareine • Aug 29, 2020

"Finally snuck in a legit peak for Peak Month. What I thought would be a very easy, straightforward outing took a few turns in the opposite direction. Started out as a trailrun but petered out into a rhike. The Class 3+ scramble up to the true summit block took me by surprise; I have a strong suspicion that the vast majority of logs of this peak just stop at the end of the more established trail on Castle's west peak. The sun was long gone by the time I scrambled up to the summit. I didn't linger up there because I could see an approaching storm headed right for me. A few minutes later while downclimbing from the summit, major adrenaline kicked in as saw first lightning flash and heard a loud thunder very soon after. With no other good option, decided I had to run toward the storm down the long exposed ridge to escape. At one point while flying down I completely wiped out, but I didn't even feel it, so much adrenaline. " — scott • Aug 28, 2020

"Climbed up New Army Pass - Very Scenic. Returned down Old Arm Pass - the non maintained trail was easy to follow, but obvious rock slides over the trail have made it a bit loose / tricky to negotiation in a few areas. Although the morning started with clear sunny blue skies, by early afternoon smoke from the "Castle Fire" about 15 miles to the southwest made the final push to the peak difficult. Smoke / Ash made visibility down to ~1 mile. So no views from the peak." — kenmiller • Aug 27, 2020

"Had to get in one more major sufferfest before the end of summer. 32 miles from Roads End in 15 hours. Cut up through Arrow Creek to the SW Ridge, not a bad class 3 route but not optimal for moving quickly on a 30 plus mile day. " — Christopher • Aug 27, 2020

"Summitted Mount Langley (14,026') as part of a 3-day (2-night) backpack. Took the Cottonwood Lakes trail from Horseshoe Meadows trailhead. Day 1 we backpacked 6 miles in to Cottonwood Lakes, set up camp at Lake #3. Day 2 we tackled Langley. Unfortunately, my full GPS track (all 3 days) is incomplete (died before the summit) due to me not properly recharging my batteries (or keeping them out of the cold), so using the day's track from my Fenix6 on my wrist. We started from our campsite and walked south to rejoin the New Army Pass route. A gorgeous morning - the smoke and haze from the nearby wildfires had blown off overnight, so we enjoyed a crystal-clear and calm morning with cloudless blue skies and mirror-like reflections in the Cottonwood lakes. We went up New Army pass, down to the saddle, and joined the trail to the summit. All was smooth sailing until the last 2 miles. That's the... less fun part. In 2.3 miles, you go from 12,000' to 14,000', and really, it's in the last mile where you go from 12,600' to 14,000' that's the killer. The trail is loose-packed fine gravel - very slippery and slide-y, which is not so good going up. Going down, you go fast - but you need to watch f..." — psychikingjes • Aug 27, 2020