Cirque of the Towers — mountain
U.S. Geological Survey · Public domain

Cirque of the Towers

  • 2 min read
  • 42.783° N 109.232° W

Interesting facts

  • The name Popo Agie, of the wilderness that holds most of the cirque, is pronounced roughly "poh-POH-zhə".
  • Pingora Peak, the tower above Lonesome Lake, reaches 11,889 ft (3,624 m) and is linked to neighbouring Wolfs Head by a narrow knife-edge arête.
  • Wolfs Head, at 12,165 ft (3,708 m), sits right on the Continental Divide on the north-west side of the cirque.
  • Lizard Head Peak, the cirque's highest summit, is the third-highest peak in the southern Winds and stands just east of the Continental Divide.
  • Small glaciers still cling to Lizard Head Peak, including Lizard Head Glacier just west-north-west of the summit and the South Fork Glacier.
  • War Bonnet Peak, 12,487 ft (3,806 m), rises steeply from Jackass Pass on the south side of the cirque, less than a mile from Mitchell Peak.
  • Among the cirque's other spires are Watch Tower, Overhanging Tower and Bollinger Peak, lined up along the rim between Shark's Nose and Pingora.
  • The Popo Agie area was first set aside as a primitive area in 1932 and gained full wilderness protection under the Wyoming Wilderness Act of 1984.
  • The Popo Agie Wilderness covers about 101,870 acres, with twenty summits above 12,000 ft, and forms part of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.

Why it is worth it

In the southern Wind River Range of Wyoming, a glacier carved out a nearly circular bowl, and along its rim stands a crown of bare granite spires: the Cirque of the Towers. The ice withdrew more than 8,000 years ago, leaving behind walls of the same hard granite that makes up almost the whole range, with the Continental Divide running along the crest of the main peaks. The highest of them is Lizard Head Peak at 12,847 ft (3,916 m). Ranged around the bowl are Pingora Peak, Wolfs Head, Warbonnet, Warrior Peak and Shark's Nose, while four lakes lie on the cirque floor. The best known is Lonesome Lake, sitting directly beneath Pingora.

For a long time hardly anyone came here. The basin was too remote, and it got its present name only in 1941, when the climber Orrin Bonney surveyed it. Today it is the busiest climbing and backpacking destination in the Wind River Range. The granite is sound and takes protection well, and there are hundreds of routes, graded from 5.1 to 5.11a. Two of them were picked for Steck and Roper's book Fifty Classic Climbs of North America: the Northeast Face of Pingora and the East Ridge of Wolfs Head.

The cirque sits on the boundary of two protected wildernesses. Its western part belongs to the Bridger Wilderness in Bridger-Teton National Forest, and the rest to the Popo Agie Wilderness in Shoshone National Forest. The towers stand roughly 1,000 ft lower than the highest summits of the northern Winds, but none of those peaks are grouped so tightly around a single basin. Heavy use has also left a mark on this setting. Lonesome Lake was the first lake in the range to be declared unfit to drink from because of human waste, since granite basins filter groundwater poorly and high alpine lakes clean themselves only slowly.

Getting there

The usual approach is from the west. A 55-mile (about 89 km) drive from Pinedale, partly paved and partly gravel, leads to the Big Sandy trailhead. From there a trail of about 8.7 miles (14 km) runs mostly level before climbing steeply to Jackass Pass at 10,800 ft on the Continental Divide, then drops to Lonesome Lake. The nearest larger city is Rock Springs, about 133 km to the south. The nearest airport is Central Wyoming Regional Airport (RIW) at Riverton, about 70 km away in a straight line.

On these lists

The Most Beautiful Places in Wyoming 9The Most Beautiful Places in the United States 228The Most Beautiful Mountains in the United States 9The Most Beautiful Natural Wonders in the United States 68The Most Beautiful Mountains 91The Most Beautiful Natural Wonders 580

From the encyclopaedia

The Cirque of the Towers is located in the Wind River Range Wyoming, U.S., part of which is in the Bridger Wilderness in Bridger-Teton National Forest, while the remainder is in the Popo Agie Wilderness in Shoshone National Forest. Located in the southern section of the Wind River Range, the cirque is a very popular destination for technical rock climbers. Climber Orrin Bonney gave the area its current name in 1941 after his survey of the cirque. Prior to this, few if any visitors had ventured into the cirque due to the remote location. The cirque is an almost circular hole or valley carved by a glacier that retreated over 8,000 years ago. As is true with the rest of the Winds, the mountains are composed almost entirely of granite. The Continental Divide spans the crest of the main peaks.

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42.78328, -109.23180per Wikidata