Torreys Peak

Torreys Peak, 14,267 feet, near Grays Peak in the Front Range of Colorado, is a great looking mountain. It has an awesome steep face,

a pointed top that juts into space

and a beautiful view from the top (below, Lake Dillon, next to Frisco where we stayed in a hotel; 

Mount Evans to the left - which we drove to the top of, and Mount Bierstadt, both fourteeners, in the distance;

and some other unidentified mountain views).

It is just .65 miles away from Grays Peak, separated by an easy to hike saddle,

and both peaks can easily be done in a day. However, if ever confronted with the choice of only doing one of the two, it should be Torreys  hands down. Unlike Grays which had monotonous switchbacks zigzagging across its monotonous face, the Torrreys Trail mostly headed in an upwards direction and

had a couple of sections

where you could view the abyss below its steep face on the way up.

Sections of the trail were more than the CCC variety switchback (Torreys and the trail up it as seen from Grays Peak):

some loose scree, some hand-holds, some tight-switchbacks (the hikers in the center of the picture below are taking the trail back down from Torreys which cuts across the side of Grays from the saddle - on the way up to Torreys we went down and up the saddle ridge);

not much of it, but enough to make it more fun. As we reached the top of Torreys (Sam, Andrew and I on the summit)

the weather was beginning to turn (Andrew and Sam with Grays Peak in the background).

We shared the top with way too many other people, got some pictures that pretty much were hard to get without other people in them, and then headed back down.