Blanca Peak Trip Report 07/05/2009

Report Type	Full
Peak(s)	Blanca Peak - 14,350 feet Ellingwood Point - 14,057 feet
Date Posted	07/05/2009
Date Climbed	07/03/2009
Author	NJTransplant

Socked in on Blanca / Ellingwood
I've not posted to this site before but figured that since I value the trip reports of others for intel before a climb, it would be good karma to post one as well. My wife Brooke, my dog Aspen, and I left Denver on Thursday 4/2 at around 2:30- about :45 later than we wanted to... stupid work, always getting in the way of fun. Our plan was to climb Blanca and Ellingwood on Friday and then drive to the Lilly Lake Trailhead to camp and climb Lindsey on Saturday. We arrived to Lake Como Road at 6:30 after suffering through about :30 of traffic at exit 52 on I-25. There is construction that closes 25 SB and routes everyone through this exit and through the town of Walensburg. Good for Walensburg. Bad for us. This road is not 5.5 miles as it states in the directions on this site... at least not from where we measured it. From the turn off, off of 160 its about 7.5 miles. Now, this wouldn't ordinarily be a big deal, but when you are carrying a fairly cumbersome pack (including all of your wife's gear), hiking up hill, and planning on climbing a couple mountains early the next day, the unexpected extra 2 miles are a kick in the stomach. In any even, we drive in on the road about 3 miles and start hiking. After about an hour an a half we see 2 folks on their way down who inform us we have another 2.5-3hrs to go... huh... okay. We grunt out the miles and arrive at Lake Como at around 10:45, quickly set up our tent in the closest spot we see and attempt to get some sleep, which is a lot harder than it sounds at 11,000' with the wind gusting hard, and a loudly snoring 80 lbs labrador. No pictures up to this point yet as the camera was packed away and we weren't stopping to find it until we got to the lake... 4:30 AM wake up the next morning to set off on our climb. As we were getting ourselves together I commented to my wife that there weren't any stars in the sky, which I thought was strange... shrugging off the lack of stars, we begin our hike along Lake Como. Here's Aspen getting an early drink... she'll need all the energy she can find. Sun rise with a mountain goat. As dawn breaks we see that there are some clouds in the sky, but nothing too threatening. Here is a look at the approach. And a look at back to the valley. We are making our way toward the waterfall and there is still quite a bit of snow on the ground and some of the lakes are almost fully frozen. The ledges were definitely a slight challenge and Aspen was having a very hard time. She couldn't make all the moves and I had to lift her several times. Maybe we didn't find the best route up, but there were several instances where we were doing some class 3 climbing. The approach to the ledges and the ledges After getting up the ledges we made what I think was our first mistake. We headed off to the left toward Ellingwood as this was the peak we were planning on summitting first. There was so much snow on the ground and we followed some tracks... I'm not sure if this was the way to Ellingwood or not, and at this point we were getting socked in by some serious cloud cover and visibility was deteriorating rapidly. We couldn't see anything above us and could not find any resemblance of a trail. Luckily we saw to other climbers coming up the ledges and go off to the right toward Blanca. We decided to alter our plans and do Blanca first. We headed back down to the top of the ledges and then began the ascent up a thinly cairned trail. Aspen was struggling a lot at this point and her paws were starting to get a bit torn up. We had ruffwear booties for her but they were not staying on well and she was not as confident in them so we packed them away. We finally made it up to the ridge for what we thought was the final ascent to Blanca. At this point Aspen refuses to go any further. We decide that my wife was going to go ahead first while I stayed with the dog- her summitting was a lot more important as her goal is to finish all of the mountains (she has 21 under her belt as opposed to my 5...) and we figured that once she came back, I would then make a go of it. Not so much. Visibility was horrendous, here is our view or lack there of: . Aspen and I holding down the fort, er, ridge while Brooke treks on: Brooke comes back about 15 minutes later and says she isn't sure if she summitted. After talking with a few other climbers back down at the lake, it appears she came within 30 yards of the summit, but due to the lack of visibility and overall sketchiness of being there alone, she turned back... I'm very impressed and proud she made it as far as she did. Here is her coming back down... yes, she really is in there somewhere, but it didn't show in the pic: We decide not to do Ellingwood for two reasons: 1) the weather seems to be getting worse and 2) I have no idea where the trail is. I could not find the mine that the route discusses and couldn't even see the mountain. Unfortunately we decide to call it a day and head down. Of course it begins to rain. Here is a wet, bummed wife: Our weekend plans call for us to now drive to the Lilly Lake Trailhead for an attempt at Lindsey. We decide that we'll come back next year on the 4th of July and redo Blanca, hit Ellingwood and throw in Little Bear for good measure... Sounds like a good plan, but that does mean we'll have to tackle Lake Como Road again. Here is a pic of a few Jeeps at JAWS 84.5 or whatever number obstacle that road throws out there... Coming down was as bad, if not worse, than coming up... it was hot and Aspen was crying and limping the whole way down. Not only did we not summit, we broke our dog. Although disappointing, it was a learning experience (don't bring Aspen on anything above a class 1) and it was a good scouting mission for next year. Now we look forward to celebrating our independence on top of Lindsey the next day... trip report will come soon... hope this is helpful for someone. Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):

Socked in on Blanca / Ellingwood

I've not posted to this site before but figured that since I value the trip reports of others for intel before a climb, it would be good karma to post one as well.

My wife Brooke, my dog Aspen, and I left Denver on Thursday 4/2 at around 2:30- about :45 later than we wanted to... stupid work, always getting in the way of fun. Our plan was to climb Blanca and Ellingwood on Friday and then drive to the Lilly Lake Trailhead to camp and climb Lindsey on Saturday. We arrived to Lake Como Road at 6:30 after suffering through about :30 of traffic at exit 52 on I-25. There is construction that closes 25 SB and routes everyone through this exit and through the town of Walensburg. Good for Walensburg. Bad for us.

This road is not 5.5 miles as it states in the directions on this site... at least not from where we measured it. From the turn off, off of 160 its about 7.5 miles. Now, this wouldn't ordinarily be a big deal, but when you are carrying a fairly cumbersome pack (including all of your wife's gear), hiking up hill, and planning on climbing a couple mountains early the next day, the unexpected extra 2 miles are a kick in the stomach. In any even, we drive in on the road about 3 miles and start hiking. After about an hour an a half we see 2 folks on their way down who inform us we have another 2.5-3hrs to go... huh... okay. We grunt out the miles and arrive at Lake Como at around 10:45, quickly set up our tent in the closest spot we see and attempt to get some sleep, which is a lot harder than it sounds at 11,000' with the wind gusting hard, and a loudly snoring 80 lbs labrador.

No pictures up to this point yet as the camera was packed away and we weren't stopping to find it until we got to the lake...

4:30 AM wake up the next morning to set off on our climb. As we were getting ourselves together I commented to my wife that there weren't any stars in the sky, which I thought was strange... shrugging off the lack of stars, we begin our hike along Lake Como.

Here's Aspen getting an early drink... she'll need all the energy she can find.

Sun rise with a mountain goat.

As dawn breaks we see that there are some clouds in the sky, but nothing too threatening. Here is a look at the approach.

And a look at back to the valley.

We are making our way toward the waterfall and there is still quite a bit of snow on the ground and some of the lakes are almost fully frozen.

The ledges were definitely a slight challenge and Aspen was having a very hard time. She couldn't make all the moves and I had to lift her several times. Maybe we didn't find the best route up, but there were several instances where we were doing some class 3 climbing.

The approach to the ledges and the ledges

After getting up the ledges we made what I think was our first mistake. We headed off to the left toward Ellingwood as this was the peak we were planning on summitting first. There was so much snow on the ground and we followed some tracks... I'm not sure if this was the way to Ellingwood or not, and at this point we were getting socked in by some serious cloud cover and visibility was deteriorating rapidly.

We couldn't see anything above us and could not find any resemblance of a trail. Luckily we saw to other climbers coming up the ledges and go off to the right toward Blanca. We decided to alter our plans and do Blanca first. We headed back down to the top of the ledges and then began the ascent up a thinly cairned trail. Aspen was struggling a lot at this point and her paws were starting to get a bit torn up. We had ruffwear booties for her but they were not staying on well and she was not as confident in them so we packed them away. We finally made it up to the ridge for what we thought was the final ascent to Blanca.

At this point Aspen refuses to go any further. We decide that my wife was going to go ahead first while I stayed with the dog- her summitting was a lot more important as her goal is to finish all of the mountains (she has 21 under her belt as opposed to my 5...) and we figured that once she came back, I would then make a go of it. Not so much. Visibility was horrendous, here is our view or lack there of:

.

Aspen and I holding down the fort, er, ridge while Brooke treks on:

Brooke comes back about 15 minutes later and says she isn't sure if she summitted. After talking with a few other climbers back down at the lake, it appears she came within 30 yards of the summit, but due to the lack of visibility and overall sketchiness of being there alone, she turned back... I'm very impressed and proud she made it as far as she did. Here is her coming back down... yes, she really is in there somewhere, but it didn't show in the pic:

We decide not to do Ellingwood for two reasons: 1) the weather seems to be getting worse and 2) I have no idea where the trail is. I could not find the mine that the route discusses and couldn't even see the mountain.

Unfortunately we decide to call it a day and head down. Of course it begins to rain. Here is a wet, bummed wife:

Our weekend plans call for us to now drive to the Lilly Lake Trailhead for an attempt at Lindsey. We decide that we'll come back next year on the 4th of July and redo Blanca, hit Ellingwood and throw in Little Bear for good measure... Sounds like a good plan, but that does mean we'll have to tackle Lake Como Road again. Here is a pic of a few Jeeps at JAWS 84.5 or whatever number obstacle that road throws out there...

Coming down was as bad, if not worse, than coming up... it was hot and Aspen was crying and limping the whole way down. Not only did we not summit, we broke our dog.

Although disappointing, it was a learning experience (don't bring Aspen on anything above a class 1) and it was a good scouting mission for next year.

Now we look forward to celebrating our independence on top of Lindsey the next day... trip report will come soon... hope this is helpful for someone.

Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):

Comments or Questions

lodidodi	ha 7/6/2009 3:07pm ha i have a white siberian husky and his name is Aspen too, nice pics by the way!
jamie	feel your pain 7/6/2009 4:32pm I‘m pretty sure we ran into you at the lake and creek crossing. Me and my friend had the orange and blue helmets on and prob looked pretty bummed too. We had the same issues with weather and such on Little Bear. I feel your pain with going up the Lake Como road again. Nice report!
NJTransplant	re: feel your pain 7/6/2009 4:35pm Jamie, I do remember... I believe Aspen barked at you when you guys were coming back and we were breaking camp? guarding our tent as a vicious lab...

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