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The Fortress | 2012-07-28
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I waited for the Fortress, Chester-Headwall Lakes traverse for a while now for a summer trip. Unfortunately the weather wasn't as sunny as I hoped, but still I rate this trip as one of my favorites.
Approach:
I met many parties doing the same loop but most of them were doing from Headwall Lakes to Chester Lake. I was doing the opposite. I used Chester Lake trail to go to Chester. This isn't much of a big deal but I believe normally people take the trail to NW shore at the lake but I took the SE shore since there was a bear with a cub (due to the bears I was off-trail for a little while around the lake).
Beyond Chester Lake, the trail became little more faintly here and there especially toward the col to start scrambling up.
The Col:
Scrambling up to the col was little bit pain in the butt. It was a loose steep rubble-ly scree uphill. Ahhhh, this is maybe why people prefer Headwall to Chester direction. Because gaining elevation to the col from Headwall side was easier since slope was still covered with snow.
Summit:
From the col, it didn't get much better. Still the rubble slope continued for another 300 m (page 9). Finally at the summit block, the trail went climber's left to go around the wall to the summit. (page 13)
Descent:
I went back to the col, then went east side to Headwall Lakes. There was a very weak trail I found at the bottom of valley, but really the good trail started from Headwall Lakes.
If you are going from Headwall Lakes:
Not sure how you get to the trailhead of Headwall Lakes trail using the cross country trails, but the Headwall Lakes trail trailhead was about 180 m after waypoint "Bridge" and marked with a big cairn. It's a single track trail and can be missed if you are not paying attention despite of the very obvious cairn.
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