There aren’t too many truly remote wilderness experiences left in Colorado. Places you can go and not see another soul for days. If any do remain, the San Juan Mountains are likely where they’ll be found. Situated in the southwest corner of the state, far from the Denver metro, these mountains still hold some of Colorado’s best kept backcountry secrets.

The San Juan Mountains contain some of Colorado’s most magnificent and beautiful terrain, including 14 peaks over 14,000′ and more than 300 peaks over 13,000′. At the far western end of the range lies a large massif known as the “Wilson Group”. Within this group resides three 14ers…

Little Bear Peak is one of Colorado’s most difficult and dangerous 14ers. Its West Ridge route currently sits behind only Capitol Peak’s Northeast Ridge route (i.e., the knife edge) as the 2nd most difficult 14er standard route in Colorado, according to the 14ers.com user rankings. However, the route description on 14ers.com actually states that it is “probably the most difficult standard 14er route”…