Best Winter Route for Rogers and Warren?

[Tornadoman]

I am looking for info on the best way to access 13ers Rogers and Warren (Near Mt. Evans) in the winter. My thought is that it may be easiest to just park near Echo Lake Lodge (i.e. beginning of Mt. Evans Road) and head straight south through the trees and then over Goliath Peak. Looking at trip reports it seems like some approach that way, while others stick more to Mt. Evans road for a while. What is the preference (with avoiding avy terrain being paramount).

Thanks!

[Jay521]

I did them in winter some years back using exactly the route you describe (park @ Echo Lake and head south). I don't recall going over Mt. Goliath - I think I went just west of it and the only "sorta" avy terrain I remember was down the eastern side of Goliath (which is why I went just west.) Not following the road (just heading straight south) made for some serious trench building, but that made the summits more worth it!

And a disclaimer - I did it in a year that the avy danger wasn't all that high.

[rijaca]

I am looking for info on the best way to access 13ers Rogers and Warren (Near Mt. Evans) in the winter. My thought is that it may be easiest to just park near Echo Lake Lodge (i.e. beginning of Mt. Evans Road) and head straight south through the trees and then over Goliath Peak. Looking at trip reports it seems like some approach that way, while others stick more to Mt. Evans road for a while. What is the preference (with avoiding avy terrain being paramount).

Thanks!

Head south but stay west of Goliath. There is some avy terrain on the NE side of Goliath that should be avoided (it has slid and buried a hiker).

[DArcyS]

Stay on the road until 10,900' (which is fairly close to the second hairpin turn) and then head south towards Goliath. If you cut up from the road too soon, you'll encounter a fair amount of downfall. From rijaca's description it sounds like some people have stayed on the road for quite a distance, but I've always tried to minimize the time on the road. There is frequently good snowshoeing in the trees above Echo Lake, but I suppose that may not be a good thing if you're by yourself and heading up.

Goliath.JPG (54.22 KiB) Viewed 365 times

[Tornadoman]

Thanks for the pointers. My wife and I made a try at this today. Went roughly the red line on DarcyS post. We followed a snowshoe packed trail for about half the way to treeline and then left it as it seemed to go too far right and start descending? From there we trudged southward through knee deep snow, sometimes over deadfall, and then rediscovered the trench right before treeline. Followed the road from there staying west of Goliath, and then went on to the saddle between Goliath and Rogers, and ascended a couple hundred vertical from there. We called it a day as my wife was blown down a couple times due to the high winds and I was nearly thrown airborne when a gust hit my pack at an awkward angle. We pretty much descended the same way we went up, strengthening our trench. Will probably try again in the next couple months and would plan to follow the same general route. Note: Above treeline there is virtually no snow.

[DaveLanders]

I am looking for info on the best way to access 13ers Rogers and Warren (Near Mt. Evans) in the winter. My thought is that it may be easiest to just park near Echo Lake Lodge (i.e. beginning of Mt. Evans Road) and head straight south through the trees and then over Goliath Peak. Looking at trip reports it seems like some approach that way, while others stick more to Mt. Evans road for a while. What is the preference (with avoiding avy terrain being paramount).

Thanks!

Head south but stay west of Goliath. There is some avy terrain on the NE side of Goliath that should be avoided (it has slid and buried a hiker).

I don't know if rijaca is thinking of the same incident, but there was a fatality a few years ago when somebody was following the road, and got caught in an avalanche where the road crossed a gully, which slid.

[BillMiddlebrook]

When I lived in Evergreen, I did this route a bunch of times... Hike up the Evans road, bypass the corners near the now Mt. Goliath visitors center (or whatever it's called) and go over Goliath to Rogers and Warren. I haven't updated this route in a while, but the one photo gives you a good idea of the route, plus the topo map.

https://www.14ers.com/route.php?route=e ... =Mt.+Evans