GC5K2CP Sheep Nose Bonus Cache
Type: Traditional | Size: Micro | Difficulty: | Terrain:
By: Colorado Gypsies @ | Hide Date: 01/16/2015 | Status: Available
Country: United States | State: Colorado
Coordinates: N39° 08.465 W105° 11.616 | Last updated: 08/30/2019 | Fav points: 0
       

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A cache too dangerous for our Sheep Series (especially in the winter) but an irresistable location.

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We really wanted to place Sheep Series: Sheep Nose here but on 2 different trips we tried to find a way up that wasn't 4.5 stars and couldn't. The Lady Gypsy got to the top with several hands from me in the summer but I hoped to find an easier way up so I came back with muggleisaiah. There was about 2 inches of snow and it was what I called 'pretty sketchy' and The Lady would probably have called 'patently suicidal'. Beautiful views with all that snow though.
We parked at the provided coordinate and skirted the rocks to the west until just below the saddle. There's not much of a trail in the valley and it's scampering around boulders the rest of the way up the fairly steep hill to the 'start climbing' coordinate and the only way up we found that didn't require ropes and tri-cams.
If you're not completely comfortable please turn around and find our Sheep Series cache.

The route we took in the picture above was more scrambling than climbing. If you can make it up the first 30 ft. you'll do fine on the rest. Total hike from the parking spot is less than a mile each way.
The container is a large micro with some room for small trackables.
Also thanks to mugglepaul for coming on the placement trip.

Congrats to hartsdale for being FTF.

Additional Waypoints

PK5K2CP - GC5K2CP Parking
N 39° 08.172 W 105° 11.505

SC5K2CP - Start Climbing
N 39° 08.495 W 105° 11.651

04/09/2016 By -E T-
Sheep Nose Bonus Cache was transferred from colorado gypsies to user -E T-

03/06/2016 By estes01
OK wait. The cache description states, " If you can make it up the first 30 ft. you'll do fine on the rest" ... It should have gone on to state that this doesn't apply if you are 5'2" tall or smaller. In that case, you may have a challenge getting your foot up to the required notch. Make sure you bring someone to drag you up. In that case, I suggest knee pads or some very thick hiking pants. It was a 5 terrain for me and an unexpected challenge outside of the 13 and 14er season. Thanks for the challenge.

03/06/2016 By ernie66
I've been eyeing this cache since the series was published. When doing another hike in the area last week, we could see that Sheep's Nose was pretty much snow-free on all but the north slopes. So we decided to give it a try this week.

The climb to the saddle was uneventful other than a few scratches from prickly vegetation. Then the real fun began. We went to the Bonus Cache first. We did encounter some snow but only in a few pockets that didn't really affect the climb. Once on top, the force of the wind hit - probably only about 30mph, but still enough that you wouldn't want to stand close to the edge. We signed the cache, left a geocoin, and headed down. Great spot, thanks for putting a cache up here!

05/15/2015 By Rob14erGuy
This cache was our main goal for today. It looked pretty intimidating as we first saw it on the drive in but Snailman1 and I made our way up to the saddle and after surveying the ascent, we found the way to the top. I saw a glass jar with a log and pencil inside and figured that was it. The log only showed one person had signed it earlier this month. We found out that was not the cache but a summit log instead. We followed the GPS and found it a little ways to the east. Nice to have this one done.
Thanks for giving us an excuse to get up there!

05/15/2015 By SnailMan1
Rob14erGuy and I headed up to get the two Sheep caches today. We head up towards the saddle way too early thus making the difficult journey even harder. Big rocks and lots of downed trees to navigate, not to mention that it was quite steep. We finally reached the saddle and we were trying to decide what to do next. Only now do I see the spoiler picture for the route, but we did not have the photos for reference. Rob14erGuy thought it was up and over, but I stay lower looking for a different path. I soon heard Rob14erGuy call out so I dropped my backpack and headed on up. One certainly wouldn't want to slip and fall on that ascent. Once on top we immediately saw the container and as we were signing it we discovered that it was the summit log. Oops. Luckily Rob14erGuy had his GPS because I left mine below. We made the short walk to GZ and it took us several minutes before we finally found the cache. After that we headed back down and on to the sheep cache just North of here. After reviewing the spoiler picture I did see that we followed the path. Thanks for a tough one!