Mt. Antero

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 4/3/2026, By: Eagle Eye
Info: Tuesday (3/31) I reached the Mt Antero summit on the West Slopes route from the 2wd TH (start of Baldwin Gulch/277 Rd) The thick ice flows on the road are a yearly late-season tradition and start not even a half mile up, so I don't attempt to drive. I used, and think you need microspikes for the (several places) that were wet and iced over. Between the 3 mile road junction/stream crossing and treeline, the road center is off & on in deep snow with a supportive tracked center. Sometimes it post holed through. It can be avoided. MANY trees and even tangles of trees are down on the #278 road, "at least 22" fitchmt said! Past treeline I stuck with the very wide, and very long switchbacks of the road which always had at least a small section of rock. By the time I got to the mining area/end of the road it was snowing. I took the ridge crest to the summit & did the same returning.
Back below treeline, I talked to two guys in a truck with studded tires that had crossed all the ice flows and also winched a very large downed tree slightly to the side of the road. This happened during the long day I was hiking, so I just saw the before and after! They were the only people I saw, and I had looked pretty closely at Mt White and Browns Creek route from higher up. The snow this day was light & hadn't amounted to much, in fact it was raining & muddy back at the 2wd TH. A big raven spent a while looking at me and my belongings while I was packing up to leave! I'll post the only picture I took. Cheers, Mike 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 3/31/2026, By: fitchmt
Info: We only made it a quarter mile up before the road became impassable to vehicles due to ice. Even if you did make it past, there's several more snow/ice fields and at least 22 fallen trees over the course of the road. The trail is in summer conditions and easily done in trail runners - no spikes or snowshoes needed. 

Route: Via Little Browns Creek
Posted On: 3/29/2026, By: Outbounder
Info: I didn't hike Antero, but ascended Mt. White via Little Brown's creek and got a good look at the route. It seems to be mostly dry (just trying to provide intel). More info on Little Brown's Creek conditions can be found in the Mt. White conditions update. 

Route: Via Little Browns Creek
Posted On: 3/29/2026, By: crdemler
Info: CR 272 is closed at intersection with CR 274 until April 16, 2026 (seasonal / restoration closure for motorized vehicles). There is day use parking available at this intersection which has ample space for several vehicles. This adds about 1.6mi one-way or 3.2mi roundtrip and about 300ft of elevation bringing total distance to about 19.5mi. The gate on the south side of Browns Creek Trailhead is also closed. I'm not sure if there are closer parking options on that side.

Little Browns Creek trail is bone dry until about 11,200'. Throughout the day most of the snow melted. There's no need to bring any traction or floatation. All snow was easily walked across or skirted with little effort. There are a handful of downed trees laying across the trail. The ridge crest has snow on the leeward (east) side but again is easily maneuvered around. 

Route: west gully
Posted On: 1/18/2026, By: jacolc
Info: Used snowshoe only at lower part of west gully on Antero and below north ridge of Cronin . At upper part of west face I fallow shallow depression right of rocky bend. A lot of loose rock, scree. Until more snow, will be much better more to north, directly to summit.
I was not planning to go to Cronin so my nightly descent from north ridge back to valley was not the best choice (steep, rocky, exposed, slippery terrain) . Either the last of bit until packed trail. But there was short sections.
GPX at library 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 1/12/2026, By: NittanyLion14er
Info: As previous CU, much the same. Snow from trailhead up the road but edges mostly exposed with shallow snow. Deeper drifts were passable without too much post holing. Wore microspikes/gators from ice flow to end. Road is blocked by 2 solid ice flows x road about 0.5 mile up the road. No snowshoes worn nor needed. Snow mobiler packed a nice base prior to about 8 tree blow down locations that are easily passable. Once past Point 13800', stayed on ridge direct and easy route and for the rock towers. Ridge direct was pretty clean. Opted for Mt White and the same. Once on the road to fial scramble pretty clean as well. 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 1/4/2026, By: shaines90
Info: Conditions yesterday 1/3 were much the same as the prior post. Full snow coverage from trailhead all the way up the road, a few dry patches along the way and past Point 13800'. I wore microspikes from car to car and wouldn't have felt comfortable without them in a few spots, notably a 100'-long block of solid 6-inch-thick ice about 0.5 miles into the trail on the road. Had snowshoes, did not wear them at all; by the end of the day, a decent trench had been built by a few others traveling through, but the snow isn't deep enough in most places below about 12000' to make a difference either way.

Once you get past Point 13800', I highly recommend staying ridge direct for the second and third rock towers, as the snow on hiker's right was definitely much more punchy and unstable as of yesterday. Ridge direct was scoured pretty clean and will lead you straight to the rock field for the final ridge ascent. 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 12/31/2025, By: JerJerBinks
Info: There was a really good supportive crust from the TH to summit ridge practically everywhere it was needed. Full grown here and with a winter pack etc I'd say close to to 250lbs and I never needed snow shoes. For that same reason, I personally wouldn't feel comfortable leaving them. I'd be really impressed if someone could cross the globs of ice at start without micro spikes.

This definitely seems like the best route for now. I saw no evidence of any kind of traffic at the 667/Brown's creek trail intersection. Conditions up on the saddle were too bare to tell if anyone has been coming from Little Brown's. 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 12/31/2025, By: northeric
Info: Started up at around 12:30pm and encountered those slabs of ice that others have mentioned. Threw spikes on and kept them on all the way to treeline.

Instead of taking the road, which was fairly punchy in the middle of the day, I opted to scramble directly up the ridge that begins at treeline and takes you all the way up to the summit ridge, taking off 2+ miles each way. I summited around 2:30pm in super calm, sunny (but cool) conditions. Descended the way I came and got back to the TH around 4:40pm.

This is a weird time of year where snowshoes wouldn’t have been that helpful IMO. But skis/splitboard would’ve been too much. Just a wintery slog on and off ice, snow, and rock. Gaiters and poles are a good idea. 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 11/23/2025, By: Roughrider23
Info: Winter conditions! 6 inches of snow or more all the way from lower trailhead. I’m not comfortable driving in snow I parked my car at lower TH (making my day 16 miles RT). There’s also a fell tree at 10500’ blocking the road. Left a good trench, snow was 2 feet deep at most and only in certain areas- mostly 1 foot or less across most of the trail. Flotation not needed and wouldn’t be helpful yet. Hopefully this helps others until next major snowfall! 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 11/21/2025, By: AlejandraOutside
Info: Didn’t feel comfortable pushing my Subie past the first 200 ft on the trail given the giant, snow-covered boulders guarding the road.

The trail (road) was covered in 1-2” of snow for the first couple/ few miles, and snow depth increased from there. 3-6” of fresh powder consistently below treeline with the exception of drainage areas which cross the road. Above treeline depth increased significantly to 6-12” plus. I did not summit and turned back a few miles from the summit to avoid a prolonged, miserable and potentially dangerous day of breaking trail the whole way up. Did not see anyone else on the trail. 

Route: Via Little Browns Creek
Posted On: 10/19/2025, By: medleyjosh
Info: snow in drifts above 12k (from the saddle up)...
the trail has drifts which do leave some space for walking to the left or the right on switchbacks,
Then the final .5 mile gets pretty snowy in places. Microspikes help a lot. 

Route: Via Little Browns Creek
Posted On: 10/7/2025, By: izabelaspivy
Info: Great conditions today. Minimal wind.Trail is completely dry, only small specks of snow here and there. Opted for the slightly longer route, glad I did as the 15 miles of 4WD road hiking seemed soul crushing. Little Browns was beautiful. Didn’t see any other hikers until I reached the junction of the standard route. 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 9/9/2025, By: Syde0004
Info: Conditions were perfect! A bit breezy and cold near the peak. Trail not marked once you hit the boulder scramble to the top. Great views. 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 9/1/2025, By: Murphyomc
Info: We decided to take a shot on Saturday given the rain wasnt forecasted until noon. We took the 4x4 to the parking area just below 12,000. The road wasn't bad in the dark, just got out in a couple of spots to take a look at what we were going up, in a mild lifted Tacoma. The hike up to 13,800 was gorgeous, then we ended up in some snow clouds so we didn't get many views from the top. We talked about driving further but compromised that 12,000 was a fair point to knock off miles but also consider it a real 14er summit.

The road to 13,100 is not bad at all it just has some exposure.

The summit push did have some thaw from the night before so there were some slick parts but the trail is still clear of sticking snow. Route finding was also not bad and the trail was fairly compact if you stayed on the route. We had our two dogs who are both well traveled on the trails and they did great but the initial ridge has a couple of spots where you want to slow down and take your time to be safe.