Route: Northwest Couloir Posted On: 2023-06-03, By: blazintoes Info: Went up Spanish Ck and a river runs through it so I decided to bushwhack then Sonic my way up tree fall per usual. Spanish creek is always challenging. Killed the first mosquitoes of the season and predict they will be bad this year. Put away your snow baskets and snowshoes and instead bring trail runners and extra socks. This is a pro Boggy tip. Clouds rolled in and that was good since I was behind schedule. Found a sweet line to the right and below Bears playground and chose this so I could see the steep snow conditions because the snow has been weird this season. It was good. Once on The Peaks NW face its a challenge to find and get into the couloir. There are slabby rounded rock ribs but eventually I figured it out. The fog rolled in furthering the route finding difficulty along with grauppel and thunder snow. The couloir had long stretches of sticky snow that balled up on my crampons. The upper half is very steep so go full chipmunk thunk into the ice and grab a rock when you can. Theres a good boot pack in the couloir now. This is probably the hardest couloir Ive ever climbed. There was a small cornice at the top out and couldnt see the summit d/t fog then decided to front point down the Red Gully. The snow was very firm. There was one icy choke near the bottom. Retuned via cottonwood. Had the Bulldog pick me up at the TH. 7500 feet of climbing and a lot of miles. Awesome day. |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2023-05-13, By: HoosierWaffles Info: Started from south colony lakes area around 4:15am, booted and showshoed to base of red gully by around 7:30. Snow softened up at the top 200 feet of the gully to where it was tedious to keep moving up so we moved to the rocks where we cliffed ourselves out and headed down. Used floatation going down. Also used ice axes and crampons at points earlier in the day when the snow was harder. The night before only froze to 13k so we probably started too late. Snow is continuous in the South Colony Basin and the cottonwood basin above 10,700 on the road, before them its avoidable. Snow came in Thursday so this may all be irrelevant. |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2023-04-15, By: milesmorris Info: Skied south face 4/13 same approach as trip report below. Made it 1.5m to th do to snow coverage. Broken hand pass has some snow going up it, but not much on the other side, walked on rocks for a bit till we could find a patch of snow. Looked up at the line to find a very thin sliver of snow and a downclimb required to ski it. We skied steps from the summit. Conditions were mostly wind buffed ice, and at the bottom near the lake where it was flat we post holed a bit with skins on. That is right post holing 2ft deep with 183cm and 95mm wide skis on. Very little snow out there. |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2023-04-08, By: astephens Info: Skied the south couloir, steps from the summit, all the way down. We found "every kind of snow imaginable" on the south couloir, and spectacular recycled powder on the NE aspect of Broken Hand Pass. The choke about 1/3 of the way up the south col had us throwing skis on our backs to surmount, but overall, the line is in great shape. What an aesthetic ski descent! We observed dust blowing in while climbing. I knew this was forecasted, but I had never seen it come in so quickly! If I were to guess, this line will be skiing well for maybe 2 weeks? I drive a 4runner and was able to get about 2 miles from the South Colony Trailhead-- just a few snowdrifts still too long for my comfort. |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2023-02-11, By: RobLowe Info: Super highway from TH to turnoff around 12,300. Carried snowshoes but never used them. Crampons and ax necessary. Gully was layered with wind slabs. Nice to cross paths with Kelly, Justin?, and Kyle. |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2023-02-04, By: notidealbutfine Info: From Cottonwood Creek TH, departed at 6:15AM. Great bootpack up to about 3 miles, from there, we were breaking trail the rest of the approach in snowshoes. The snowshoeing was awful and we moved very slowly from the 3 mile mark up until the base of the Red Gulley. Most of the approach was traveling on weak, sun baked, mashed potato snow and was a serious sufferfest. We missed the trail for about half a mile at about 4 miles and ascended some steep rock to gain the headwall before the trails split for the Peak and Needle. Got to the base of the couloir at about 1:20PM. The climb was about 95% on snow and the rest on rock. Avy conditions seemed safe. The snow quality in the couloir proper ranged from decent to fantastic. The snow on the bottom was weak enough kick ledges with your feet, but not so soft to sink down. Near the middle of the couloir, there was a fantastic section about 700 feet long of perfect, wind swept, ultra consolidated snow. Perfect for daggering and front pointing. The run out from here was real. Try not to look down. My partner had to turn around about halfway up, but I managed to summit at 3:40PM. Stayed just long enough for a quick snack and pictures, then booked it down. We managed to get off the treacherous terrain (and our off-trail down climbing shennanigans) just as at turned dark. Hiked the remaining 3.5 miles in the dark with headlamps. It was a blessing to get back on that bootpack and take those snowshoes off. Overall, this was a seriously committing and strenuous day but so worth it. Saw nobody all day. Trip report coming soon... We made a fantastic trench just for you all the way up. Go get after it, folks! It's easy now! |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2023-01-01, By: moon stalker Info: Tried the peak from cottonwood. Trail is very dry compared to other times I've been on it this time of year. Dirt and only scattered snow for the first two miles. Then consistent snow but not deep. Used snowshoes for a short while in the slab section but spikes would have been better. Switched to spikes and was fine. Turned around at 12300 due to gear issues. Couldn't see the gully, visibility was low due to blowing snow. Based on what we did see, I think there wouldn't be too much snow built up in the gully. I was hopeful we'd be able to rock hop going up it. The trail still has many downed trees but it's not nearly as bad as it used to be. Two others on the trail as well on the same day. Hopefully they will post conditions. They were trying both peaks. The trail was packed down by four people so as long as this next storm doesn't dump a ton there will be good tracks. |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2022-10-15, By: WildWanderer Info: From cottonwood creek, Dry the entire way. Some water in the gully, but easily avoidable. No traction needed. Met two guys who attempted the traverse from the peak to the needle, and was told “there was too much ice on the last 2 or 3 pitches” and they turned around. |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2022-10-12, By: Jirwindisc Info: Glorious hike to Crestone Peak. Long day from 2wd parking. Some snow in broken hand pass gully but clear up Crestone peak gully all the way to the top. Took 14 hrs at leisurely pace with summit nap and snack stops. Used micro spikes in broken hand gully only. |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2022-09-25, By: EthanBeltramo Info: Writing this from the summit, summer conditions all the way up. No snow to be found anywhere even in the shade. Same should go for the rest of the crestone group |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2022-09-15, By: jordanthebuff Info: The trail was very straight forward. We camped around the lakes and started around 4:30. Made it to cottonwood lake just after sunrise but didn't go at a blistering pace either. I hiked Humboldt back in July and noticed there are way less bugs now. The flies were everywhere around South Colony lakes before and I hardly saw any this time, perhaps due to drier weather. The red gully, the bacon highway, the blood river, or whatever other nickname you have for it was very solid and safe, but high effort. It took us about 2 hours up and maybe an hour fifteen to get down. It was genuinely a great time, despite stopping to catch our breath often. HARD work, but definitely worth the journey there! One note: when you reach the notch at the top of the gully and turn left, the ledges you take to the summit weren't the easiest to see at first. There was one cairn that looked like it was in the wrong place, but actually that's where you need to go. If you stay on the ridge proper, you make it a class 4 climb to the summit, but the class 2/3 ledges were fun enough for me! |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2022-08-25, By: the_hare Info: Made an attempt for the traverse but just ended up with the Peak, still had an incredible time out. Road up is Subaruable, there are several spots we had to slow down and think about our line but we made it up and down with an Outback just fine. Some nice camping spots close to the 4WD trailhead, at the Humboldt trail split near 11.1k elevation, and many more at the lakes around 11.7k. The Humboldt trail had quite a bit of deadfall, might be just as fast to keep straight and take the old road trail that contours the basin on the way up. There was plenty of water to filter in the Cottonwood lake basin just over Broken Hand pass and even from the lower section of the Red Gully. If I were to do this again I'd just carry enough water to get over the pass and thru the basin and filter where the horizontal shelf meets the bottom of the Red Gully at 12.8k, there were some heavier rains forecast over the past weekend. The Red Gully was a beast and we definitely underestimated how fatigued we might feel, especially after a 4 mile 1.8k hike up to our camp the night prior. The gully is a stiff 1.2k gain in 1/3 of a mile navigating a mix of sloping rock, loose gravel, stray scree and sturdy class 3 climbing. The loosest area though was on the initial descent from Broken hand back to S Colony Lakes basin but there's enough rocks anchored in the dirt to avoid slipping too much. This was an incredibly gorgeous hike from the very start. Innumerable stars at night, incredibly prominent vista of the Needle from the S Colony basin, views sweeping peaks all around in the Cottonwood basin, aesthetic rock up the gully, and dream-like cloud movement swirling all around us and the surrounding peaks mid-morning. Looking forward to being back here again! |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2022-08-11, By: TheSpaceForce Info: 8/7: With recent rains, the Red Gully was very wet - water was flowing most of the way up, with the exception of the last 100 feet or so. Be advised: The trail around the bottom section of the gully was well cairned, but deviates a bit from legacy GPS map data and the 14ers map line. Finally, the trail from Broken Hand Pass to Cottonwood Lake was very wet (standing water) in the lower section just east of the lake. Enjoy! |
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Route: Crestones Traverse Posted On: 2022-08-01, By: samfarmer789 Info: The Crestones are in great condition! Perfect rock, views are amazing, little to no scree on these peaks they're definitely some of my favs. For doing the traverse, definitely start early. We started at 430am, summited Peak at ~930am, traverse took us 2.5 hours, chilled on summit of Needle for 30ish mins and then it took us a hot min to get down the Needle and back to our car. Could've been done faster but we got back to the upper TH lot at ~545pm. That road up to the TH is treacherous btw! The red gully going up Peak takes a while- really fun scrambling though! The traverse is well marked with cairns, just make sure you're always looking for the next one. You have to downclimb the gully to about 13,700 before turning left onto the traverse. The 'bulge' took some creativity to get up haha was not graceful getting up that but it's not exposed or anything. The mini knife's edge was cool and the last headwall is not that bad. There's great hand and foot holds and it's about a 60-70 degree angle. If you've climbed the flatirons it's kinda like that. It is pretty exposed though, we swung left where it was less steep and got a great view of the 1000+ ft drop down into the valley Overall, the traverse was really fun!! Climbing down Needle was harder than we thought- had to downclimb a gully that seemed to never end and then the dihedral seemed to require a class 4 move to get across- but we were also pretty tired by then. Super fun overall!! |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2022-07-20, By: skyrme17 Info: Did Crestone Peak from 4WD South Colony trailhead in one day. Great hike, even if exhausting. The Red Gully is in great condition. That said the rockfall potential in the upper half is significant, as some have said previously. I may have been the only person on the Red Gully in both ascent and descent, but on a day with more traffic people should be careful. I took the climber's left side for both ascent and descent, which worked well. |
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Route: NW Couloir Posted On: 2022-07-10, By: kyaera Info: Couloir mostly free of snow and definitely avoidable. A small amount of avoidable water flow, some loose rock but more stable rock easily found in the gully. We were the only ones on this route on a very busy Saturday. It's a good link up from Humboldt if you take the ridge traverse that leads to bears playground. From bears playground to the gully proper it was very well carined. Overall great route to link Humboldt to both the Peak and Needle and less busy then standard route. |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2022-07-05, By: Shawn Ironman Info: Summer conditions. Some water in center of red gulley but you can climb either side to ridge and it's dry all the way to the summit. Cairns helped a lot to direct crossovers and path. |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2022-07-05, By: Shawn Ironman Info: Summer conditions. Some water in center of red gulley but you can climb either side to ridge and it's dry all the way to the summit. Cairns helped a lot to direct crossovers and path. |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2022-07-05, By: Shawn Ironman Info: Summer conditions. Some water in center of red gulley but you can climb either side to ridge and it's dry all the way to the summit. Cairns helped a lot to direct crossovers and path. |
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Route: South Face Posted On: 2022-07-05, By: Shawn Ironman Info: Summer conditions. No snow along path. Very foggy |