Macomber Peak

Nearby Peaks: 

From Silverton, drive north past the county courthouse and bear right on County Road 110. The road becomes County Road 2. Continue for about 4 miles until you can see the first bridge just before the community of Howardsville. The road continues further towards Eureka and onto popular alpine scenic tours over either Engineer or Cinnamon Passes. Stop about 300 yards before this bridge and look for an old jeep track leading up into the grassy field on the left. Park on the side of the road. 

From the TH follow grassy road track up the meadow, gradually gaining elevation on a sloping open grass area. Our route goes up into the Hematite Gulch. Go through the open meadow on an easy trail until you can see the remains of abandoned rusty car. Follow the trail into the gulch and close to the creek. Continue through many switchbacks up the gulch. The views into Cunningham Gulch and Stony Pass on the east side are spectacular. The trail is steep, and in a good condition, it is easy to follow. The basin is supposedly good for checking out wildflowers during the summer (I visited in the autumn). There are few aspens there and the autumn provides nice golden colors. The trail is hard to follow high up in the basin, just before the Hematite Lake, but at this point it is obvious where to go - head for the lake. The lake is beautiful with a little island. 

Macomber Peak sits just above Hematite Lake. It appears steep from here, but there is a winding sort of a trail to gain the east ridge of Macomber Peak. There is a small exposure and the difficulty does not exceed class 2+ with careful route finding. Once on the ridge, the route becomes much easier and very obvious. Macomber Peak looks like a peak while Tower Mountain looks like a bump along this horseshoe shaped ridge. The hike is easy, mostly grassy slopes, very little or almost no scree. The summit is not huge, there was no summit register, no cairn (I build a small cairn). 

You can either return the same way, but much better and more sensible option is to continue onto Tower Mountain. Drop slightly along an easy ridge, class 1-2 and then start gaining height again on mostly grassy slopes. There is a semi-trail visible at places, but even without the trail the route is obvious. The views down into Hematite Gulch are great, also great views of Storm Peak, all the way into Yankee Boy Basin with Mt. Sneffels, and to the north Handies Peak and high 13ers: Jones and Niagara, just to mention few. 

Remember to check the weather report prior this long ridge hike, if conditions worsen (lightning) there are a few places near Tower Mountain where you can drop down into the basin. Otherwise, continue to reach the summit of Tower Mountain - there is some metal signal structure on its summit. Again, I found no summit register, and did built a small cairn. 

Continue further along the ridge - you have to descend slightly and the ridge gradually turns towards the east, running parallel with the east slopes of Macomber Peak across the Hematite Gulch. You get great views into Cataract Basin with its several lakes, and Dome Mountain A looks really nice and interesting from here. Descend at the end of the ridge via a steep grassy gully. The descent is long, but not technically difficult. It does connect with Hematite Trail way below the lake. Hematite trail takes you back to your car.