Vance’s Cabin Snowshoe

Trail Length: 6 miles round trip
Elevation: 10, 550-11,120 ft
Elevation gain: 1,040 ft

Standing on the back of Vance's Cabin

A trip to Vance’s cabin is a moderate snowshoe out of Ski Cooper near Leadville with potentially spectacular views of nearby 14ers as well as the Continental Divide. On this trip unfortunately, most of the views were diluted with low hanging clouds but anyone. Since the cabin is well used in both winter and summer this is not a trail for total solitude although the intrusions are limited to the two-footed kind. Snowmobiles are prohibited.

From the Ski Cooper parking lot head up the side road to the obvious sign and take a left.

I was snowshoeing to Vance's Cabin because a group of 12 of us were in town for the MLK weekend. The group split into two groups, with a few of us going to Vance's Cabin and the rest to the 10th Mountain Hut, a much longer trip.

Leadville has the reputation for being one of the coldest places in Colorado and I was afraid that I would freeze my num-chucks off (they take six weeks to grow back) but the weather was relatively mild, so don’t let the forecasters scare you off with -30 wind chills.

After making the left at the sign, the route travels up a small drainage towards are large meadow.

Finding the trailhead is not difficult as long as you can manage to find highway 24 out of Leadville, since the trail starts at Ski Cooper, at the top of Tennessee Pass. From the Ski Cooper parking area there is a maintenance road heading east with a prominent red sign that reads “Vance’s Cabin” in 2000 pt font. Miss this and you should not venture outside of the nearest Starbucks.

Turning left (west) and heading up a large meadow.

The first half-mile of the trail is along a well-groomed road bordered on the left by a creek and the right by drifting banks. An equally prominent sign marks the next turn off. This one has a large arrow pointing to the left that made us hearty mountain folk roll our eyes. In the woods though, it is always useful to know where you are so disregard our condescension and be thankful for the good folks at Ski Cooper who are minimizing their search and rescue budget.

Approaching the far end of the meadow.

After this well-marked left turn, the trail crosses a creek and heads up a wide valley. Mid-way up the trail turns sharply upwards to the left and climbs 300 feet. At the top are two large meadows that are perfect for power hopping. I would have killed for a clear day because this spot must contains some lovely views to the east.

After the meadow, the trail spends a part of time in the trees.

After the meadows the trail continues for 1.5 miles through the trees. Usually I find this sort of thing monotonous but today there was so much snow on the trees that the trail really was winter wonderland. Modern art sculptures abounded as the copious “snow blobs” transformed both tree and stump into mythical creatures.

The final pitch to the cabin is down a broad slope.

The trees end at the highest point of the trail, which resides at 11,300 ft. From here you must descend down a broad slope to the cabin. The slope is dotted with the burnt out remnants of a long forgotten fire. To tell you the truth, I did not notice these until the return trip because I was having too much fun bounding down the hill in a blur of “we’re almost there” frenzy.

The interior of Vance's Cabin

Vance’s cabin itself is the smallest hut in the 10th Mountain Division’s hut system. It was being occupied by half of Denver’s EPA office that kindly let us in to scope things out. I have never stayed in a hut since I can’t imagine having to carry enough gourmet food on my back to keep me happy for three days. One of these days I need to try it though.