Argentine Pass and Peak (part 2)

If you haven’t seen Part 1 of this series, go check it out for photos of the trailhead and the beginning of the hike.

After climbing up to 13,207 feet, we reached the Argentine Pass. This is the location where a wagon trail actually used to cross over the mountains dating back to 1867. I have no idea how they took wagons up and over this mountain, and if the trail has not changed much since then, I further have no idea how they managed it with how narrow the trail is. But the view is fantastic…

Unfortunately the USGS marker at the peak was broken in half and I couldn’t find the second half so I didn’t take a photo, but it was still cool to find the one at the Pass.

You also get a look at the ridgeline and the couple false summits you have to traverse to reach Argentine Peak – another 500 or so feet up…

And across the way are Grays Peak and Ruby Mountain (I’ll leave you to figure out which is which)… and you can just barely see what we dubbed “Emerald Lake” in between them (but I have no clue if it has an actual name)…

Not shown in these photos is Mount Edwards which is just a tad higher than Argentine Peak. We had originally thought about visiting that peak as well, but time and energy prevented that. Had we been more acclimated, prepared, and energetic, we could have even made our way over to Grays Peak from the Argentine Pass and that would have been what the locals call a “14er” meaning it is above 14,000 feet in elevation. Instead, we focus just on the summit of Argentine Peak at 13734 feet.

And were not disappointed…

The marker on that post indicates that this is part of the Continental Divide Trail, which was a nice little bonus to this hike to get to visit such an iconic trail.

Soon I will share another set of photos from this hike which will include some of the beautiful alpine flowers and some other plants found along this hike, so stay tuned!