Mt. Elbert

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 5/10/2025, By: notidealbutfine
Info: Started 1.2 miles below the 4wd trailhead. The road up to the 4wd trail is definitely subaruable, but it rained a lot the night I arrived and I wasn't able to get up the difficult section about .6 miles up the road in my stock CRV with 8" clearance. Definitely doable in a similar vehicle when dry if you pick a good line. Road is dry as a bone today. Wore trail runners all day, added spikes right around treeline. Didn't use skins all day. Was able to ski directly off the summit, following my up track for the most part. Skied continuously to just below treeline, then back to running shoes on mostly dry trail. Fantastic quiet day on Elbert. 13.41 miles / 4,678' gain / 7 hours, 10 minutes 

Route: Box Creek Couloirs
Posted On: 4/18/2025, By: Sumsumthepanda
Info: Post hole city. Was able to get to upper trailhead in stock 4runner and started hiking around 3:30. Decent amount of snow at TH, but not enough to put skis on for. Ended up skinning at close to 12k. Was not long after this we started postholing with skis on. Reached the ridge around sunrise and thats when the wind got really nasty, forcing a decision to turn around. Once the snow had warmed, we post holed nonstop on the flattest terrain, resulting in me postholing my entire splitboard in snowboard configuration. Definitely wait until snow pack consolidates more, or simply melts. We at least got some good low angle skiing in, but much of the trail had wind striped snow with rocks poking out. It is also worth noting that it rained at camp at twin lakes the night before, which could have been a factor in snow conditions. 

Route: Box Creek Couloirs
Posted On: 4/12/2025, By: coflosmo
Info: Got within sight of the 4WD th in a 4Runner, last 300ft is messy. Conditions were nice and hard early below tree line. Spikes up and skis down, but you’ll want snowshoes if you’re anywhere near snow after 12. Summited at 1030, 3hr from car. Thought it was a little late but high winds slowed warming and ski conditions were great. You can ski from the summit, through the chutes, and to the pond for a continuous 1700ft. A total of 3 parties met at the bottom of the runout and we grouped up for the final descent, (Joe send those videos!) Ski conditions were poor and sketchy from here; trapdoor snow and bad postholing for a lot of the ridge trail. Hard to time the good corn up high with solid conditions below. 

Route: Box Creek Couloirs
Posted On: 4/6/2025, By: Veory
Info: Pretty nice conditions in the Box Creek couloirs, a little firm up top but soft snow for most of it. Wintery cold up there today with the wind, colder than some of my proper snowflakes this year. Was able to drive about half a mile up the south trailhead 4wd road, a few people made it considerably past that. Walked up the road with skis on shoulder for a bit, then kept them on to the summit. Ridge itself would be tough to ski with several rocky sections. Pretty cruiser to the summit though, a little under 5 hrs for us. Was able to traverse back to the route with some shuffling and never took the skis off to get back to the ridge after the chutes. Dropped into the basin and had some bushwack skiing back to the trail. 7:40 RT. Great day with great folks! 

Route: Box Creek Couloirs
Posted On: 4/6/2025, By: ballardwf04
Info: All-time conditions out there. We were able to drive to just before a stream crossing on the 4WD road, cutting off probably 1.5 mi of hiking. Ascended via a variation of the E ridge route listed on onX as "South Mt. Elbert Trail." Shorter route but overall not worth it for the amount of bushwhacking we had to do. Connected w the E ridge just before the saddle and crossed over to the couloirs. After digging a pit (photo attached), we assessed avalanche conditions were safe enough for an ascent and ski and then bootpacked up the main couloir highlighted in blue in Bill's photos of the Box Creek couloirs. Hard work! We gained the summit around 1:30 and met two fine gentlemen who were also dropping Box Creek. We skied down far skiers right between two huge rocks. You can spot our tracks in the final image. Skiing was all time- knee deep powder all the way. By the afternoon, much of the lower portion was melted out, but we were able to make it all to the way to the car without transitioning. Sharks to be found on the way from summit to couloir entrance and on the way out of Box Creek basin. Classic day! 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 3/25/2025, By: HikesInGeologicTime
Info: Wind and heat have not been kind to the snow on this one. The theme from when AndyFromDenver skied on 3/16 of it being technically possible to ski from the summit to 13.3k still applies, arguably with more force: it is doable as long as you are okay with straddling/stepping over varying amounts of rocks and tundra to connect patches of snow. Snow quality and quantity improved the farther we dropped below the summit (although we did give up and carry skis between snowfields below 13.3…until we reached treeline. What had been merely slightly punchy but bootable crust overnight turned into the bastard love child of quicksand and a half-melted Slurpee in late afternoon. Partner and I marveled that we experienced every kind of postholing imaginable - boot, snowshoe, ski, and full body. Still nice to get this ski off the bucket list, even if it did turn out to be way less boring than anticipated. 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 3/16/2025, By: andy_schlichting
Info: Update from the recent post that said you can ski from summit to car--no longer the case (perhaps you could find a way in avalanche terrain). I had to carry skis from 13300 to 12900, but got some great turns in above and below that. Conditions are variable below treeline. Anything from powder to mashed potatoes to crusty ice to tree wells. The road up to the summer trailhead is melting fast. Lots of mud and some sheer ice spots. Great meeting the couple from Oklahoma that camped up there! 

Route: Northeast Ridge
Posted On: 3/14/2025, By: tothestars
Info: Fastest conditions I've seen this winter for hiking. The trench is well packed other than some deep foot prints through the meadow that you need to navigate around. Lots of snow melted out of the meadow after treeline. Nice route pretty straight up Elbert around 12k through snow that's a quick ascent. Used snow shoes for first 4 miles on the way up but didn't use them at all on the way down - that's how well packed it is. I did use microspikes as it's bit icy. Beautiful almost-full moon sunset descent. 6:25 total time (4:12 to summit) from South Elbert trailhead. 12.5 miles 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 3/11/2025, By: jeffh7
Info: It was possible to ski from the summit to your car without taking your skis off if you manage to pick the right bands of snow to follow and don't mind dodging/hitting some small rocks. Pretty patchy above 13k. Added photo of La Plata North Couloir / Sayres BM. 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 3/1/2025, By: kevancdee
Info: Not continuous snow, snow on summit but a little gap before snow continues. Have to boot a few rocky bits to connect snow fields if skiing. Trail is very well packed in by snowshoes. Snow below treeline is crusty and punchy making for a very exciting ski. 4x4 road is snow covered solid about a half mile from the parking. 

Route: Southeast Ridge
Posted On: 2/24/2025, By: jakethesnake_630
Info: Continuous ski line from top to bottom - enjoy :) 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 2/22/2025, By: tothestars
Info: Started at 4:30PM for a mostly night ascent and descent. Lots of animal prints: mountain lions, fox, bunnies, you name it. Just me and the critters. As usual there's a pretty obvious trench until treelike, though it was covered in fresh snow and no one had been up Friday daytime. After treeline I was able to mostly follow an old path and the GPX, so not too much postholing and a fox must have had the same idea because he made it a bit easier to follow as he was also trying not to posthole. The path after treelike was only barely visible if you know what to look for, though I probably left a better one! No path really after 12,000 feet, though was able to follow the route mostly through experience and keeping an eye on the GPX. It's much easier to do in the daylight but at night it all looked the same :) Quite a bit more snow than when I ascended in late December. Cold enough to need ski mask and all layers. Descent was uneventful. Advantage of the night ascent/descent: amazing view of the stars! Used snow shoes the entire way. Was too cold out to bother to take them off for the 12,200-13,000 rock section. 

Route: Northeast Ridge
Posted On: 2/17/2025, By: algryno
Info: No intention to summit today with a noon start from South Elbert TH. Great path along the road to the upper TH and along the Colorado Trail. I was scoping for a trench spur (per Will_E) along the CT but didn't see it. I suppose that i could've gone in a bit further to see if it was along the actual trail... instead, I forged my own path along what was an obvious trail (aspen carvings, cut trees, very subtle depression in snow) and made a trench from the CT to 11,500' where I turned around. It was just below (~120') where i would've met the trail on the map. Most of it was knee-hip deep with at least 2 crust layers. Lightly snowed most of the time with negligible wind. Car had a dusting when i returned. Regardless, it was a great day, and I'm looking forward to better weather for other peaks this week. 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 2/15/2025, By: Will_E
Info: Cold and windy theme of this winter continues, but at least I also had no views today. 3-4 inches of fresh snow on the existing trench most of the way through treeline, I put snowshoes on at the trailhead. Existing trench was easy to follow most of the way until the last half mile or so of treeline, got pretty juicy there. A group of three skiers caught up to me at treeline, they did a few laps in the trees, the trench was much better on my way down. I stayed in snowshoes much higher than normal on Elbert, probably 13k or so, the east ridge is really holding a lot of snow. No traction needed today. 

Route: Northeast Ridge
Posted On: 1/22/2025, By: jace_reber
Info: Went up the Northeast ridge and the parking lot is about 3.5 miles from the summer trailhead. I was on a splitboard and was able to skin all the way to the treeline at about 12,000 feet. Flotation definitely needed once i reached the start of the summer trailhead. I was breaking trail on completely untouched snow all the way to the treeline. Above the tree line there is patchy snow, some areas mostly rock, some ice, some new snow. Microspikes or crampons are definitely recommended. Avy danger was never high throughout the climb. In total the climb was about 5700 ft and 16.5 miles with the extra winter road.