Last year we discovered the beauty of Cherry Creek Canyon (before the Rim Fire). We benefitted from information found here (lurking). We'd like to return, and want to improve on our previous adventure, hence this first post. Despite some challenges, it remains one of the most beautiful hikes we've ever experienced.
We entered at Shingle Springs, down the brush to the creek, eventually to Lord Meadow, up out of the canyon and back on Kibbie Ridge Trail. We had planned to do much more, avoiding most of KRT, but we made much less progress each day than expected and had to take the express route back.
We had two major setbacks. First, between the Chockstone Route (we were able to ford the creek at the beach and avoid the Chockstone) and Camp Flintstone, we struggled to find a way around the waterfall. Timing was remarkable such that we met a group of three seasoned hikers that claimed to visit each year for over 20 years, having seen bears drown in the creek, etc. They suggested a way around the first fall, crossing to the west of the creek, up and around the back of a dome. We decided to continue as we had originally planned, expecting to find a route beginning at the fall, on the east. We searched for a route away from the creek, but each time came up short. We then tried to find a route close to the creek, but the slope of the granite was too step to give purchase underfoot. Eventually we decided to look for the route on the west side. We crossed the creek and scaled the dome readily, but spent hours trying to find the way around the back, or over the top, back to the creek. Finally, we ended up backtracking to the creek, not far above where we originally crossed, but luckily above the falls. That was the better part of an afternoon. We are still not sure how we missed the route on the east side, and wonder if there really is any way around the back/top of the dome that we had attempted on the west side.
The second challenge was of course circumnavigating the Cherry Bomb. We set out from Camp Flintstone fully energized, and found a route up to the granite ramp to climb out and around the next falls. It was after this first success that we again became stuck. I've searched here and everywhere I can think of but have unfortunately not found what I'm looking for. Chick-on provided a GPS track in some post somewhere, and we tried to follow that at this point. We tried to get up to the high bench above us, thinking that there was a ledge traversing the steep face that would reach the top. I ended up abandoning that route at a block about 20' high with a sheer drop down on the left and a sheer wall on the right. Backtracking, I found a wide, steep granite ramp (with a mylar balloon apparently marking something) but again, the ramp was so steep that without a rope, and without any handholds, friction was not enough to maintain forward progress - and I found no way around this ramp. Ultimately, we ended up backtracking quite a bit, descending half way back to the creek, then moving up along a crack (dry creek bed) with boulder fill, finally reaching open granite, before our final descent back to the creek (down a steep, rugged and brush-covered slope, to a small meadow, and finally past the 3' diameter round erratic perched on polished granite shortly before reaching the creek.
My hope is that we can learn from our mistakes, with the help of others that have found a better way.
Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/29/2014 08:43AM by ags.