Mt. Antero

Route: Little Browns Creek
Posted On: 7/21/2024, By: abmarchiani
Info: 2WD can easily make it to trailhead. We tracked approximately 17 miles RT. Besides a few muddy spots from melting snow- it is summer hiking conditions. For the first 2 miles you will be dodging horse poop and flies on the trail. The beauty of this trail begins at about 3 miles. The flowing creek, small waterfall, wildflowers, and the hike to the saddle are nice. Good views from the saddle. It was interesting to watch 4WD vehicles attempt/succeed at some of the tougher parts of the road. The ridge to Antero is a short but fun class 2. I don't do well with exposure and I was not concerned with exposure on this ridge. 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 6/29/2024, By: Doggles
Info: Couldn't find a way to do the first creek crossing on foot without getting wet. The major crossings later on aren't much of an issue. Be ready for a long, rocky day if you go this route and start from the 2WD TH. 

Route: Little Browns Creek
Posted On: 6/28/2024, By: scottieconqueso
Info: Started at 6:30am, parking lot only had a couple other cars. Morning clouds looked darker than expected but they cleared out. Super windy at the top today. Took me 8 and a half hours, and I clocked 15.2 miles. Trail is in summer condition. a couple avoidable snow patches up high on the regular road route.
I had put off Antero for a long time because I didn't want to hike the road. Found this trip report and it has fantastic details on the route: https://www.14ers.com/php14ers/tripreport.php?trip=20286 - note that when they talk about the direct saddle route, I took the direct line up, but took the longer way back down because the direct line is steep and loose. I'm surprised this isn't listed as an official route, as it's basically the same distance but on actual, nicely marked, trails for most the hike. 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 6/27/2024, By: Dbrink
Info: Great day even with a late start at about 12:30. Snow avoidable if you're hiking the whole road.

Road drivable up until 12,743 at which point you'll encounter a snowbank. You can park 4-5 vehicles at that switchback (photo #1). No point in going much further because, as someone else noted, there's a boulder at 12,969 (38.66539, -106.25447). Photo #2

If it weren't for the boulder you could park 4WD vehicles at the large parking area at 13,095. There is one last snowfield covering the road at the second to last switchback at 13,506 but unless the boulder gets moved you would only be able to get an ATV or bike up there once that melts (Photo #3). 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 6/25/2024, By: lauren_exploring_
Info: Beautiful day on Antero. There are two creek crossings, one very close to the start of the road and one at the 4WD trailhead that I opted to switch into waterproof sandals to cross versus soaking my boots.The water was up to mid-calf at both crossings. Other than that, the road is clear and snow is avoidable. 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 6/23/2024, By: andrewbdpt
Info: Road is clear of snow except for one patch at ~12,800 with one additional very small patch right on the ridge before the summit push that can be avoided. No spikes needed. We waded both river crossings barefoot on the way up (first a bit more than ankle deep, the second mid-shin deep) and were able to rock hop with some wet toes on the way down. Plenty of cars (a lifted Land Cruiser, TRD Tacoma, lifted 4Runner, seemingly stock Subaru Outback Wilderness) past the second river crossing up to the snow patch at 12,800, with some careful driving could get to ~13,000 before a boulder blocks the road, however no where to park at this point. Not an overwhelming amount of folks out, great vibes, great weather, great peak.

You can see the highest car we saw in the bottom right of the attached photo 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 6/22/2024, By: strayster2
Info: Just wanted to post an additional report for people walking the road from the bottom. There is a creek crossing less than 5 minutes from the start of the hike that is basically impossible not to get your feet wet on, so be prepared (picture is from the way back down) 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 6/19/2024, By: Tommy Burke
Info: I drove up to 10,850 by Baldwin Creek in a Tacoma TRD - no mods. No snow on the drive. On the hike there are snow drifts on the road. One at 12000 that you could get around and one at 12800 that you need a lifted 4WD or a dune buggy. Easy to hike past both. Started at 9 AM and was down by 3:30. There is some snow fields higher up but they were easy to go around. My Garmin recorded/Strava corrected distance is 11.2m and elevation gain 3430ft. 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 6/16/2024, By: zzcarp
Info: From 2WD trailhead, pup Lincoln and I left the car and started hiking around 4:20am. The first three miles to the trail split were easy and beautiful hiking. I think anyone driving a vehicle with higher clearance than a standard SUV could easily make it the first 1,000 feet through the first creek crossing. After that, an SUV could make it to the trail split and likely a ways higher.

The trail split main water crossing was interesting. Ice covered the rocks and I almost bit it. So I decided to wade barefoot across. Ice also covered the log "bridge" over the next crossing. I almost fell and had to borrow two poles from a fellow hiker to get across one step at a time on the wire.

After that, it was smooth sailing mostly to the end of the road. A 4-wheeler made it to midway up the switchbacks before there was too much snow. For a hiker the snow was easily avoided.

Trouble began crossing the snowfield/quicksand field between the end of the road and the ridge. It was postholy in the snow and the bare soil was saturated and flowed down the mountain with each step.

Then the ridge proper. There were somewhat visible trails through the difficulties, though traversing/bypassing the snowfields was a mental challenge. My recommendation is to stay high when possible.

Once past the troubles, we just attacked the direct route and summited. It was a sunny summit for us. Then we made it carefully past the difficulties on the ridge and back to the road.

The water crossings were flowing much higher on the way down, though the bridge and the rocks were no longer icy. Otherwise, it was a great hike down back to the car. 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 6/15/2024, By: bluepic
Info: There's still a few snowbanks covering some of the switchbacks, but they aren't that difficult to get through or around as they're melting pretty fast. I saw a couple folks still able to climb the gully instead of the taking the switchbacks. As you get to the ridge, there's short section where you still need to traverse a small angled snowfield, which could be uncomfortable for some depending on snow conditions. I brought traction with me, but didn't feel it was needed. Otherwise if you stick to the ridge, you should be able to avoid any remaining snow to the summit. 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 6/12/2024, By: Ellwood
Info: Road is clear to the 278 turnoff at Baldwin Lake Meadow, though it is quite a bumpy ride. We chose not to cross the creek on Friday night but saw one Tacoma make it up to about 11,800' before snowbanks covered the trail. Snowbanks covered most of the switchbacks and we opted to climb up the gully with microspikes. Final ascent past the mining road is a fun one. Was able to glissade the gully back down to cut off some significant mileage, though this was probably the last weekend to do it. Snow is melting fast and road should be clear in 1-2 weeks. 

Route: South Face/ SE Gully
Posted On: 5/18/2024, By: jmanner
Info: Skied the South Face to the SE Couloir/Gully from Browns Ck TH. All three faces are very very fat, some guys were dropping the north face when I skied off the south face. Hiked to (3.2 miles)10,600 threw the skins on and was able to tour up the SE gully to 14,000 on the summit ridge. Skied the south face into the south east gully down through the Couloir that the prior group talked about, ski cut a nice soft wet slab, so its probably not worth a ski now. Skied out to 10,260(2.5 miles) and hiked back from there. The ski out wasnt the best, a lot of rock hooping and tree bushwhacking. Probably not worth going past where I threw the skis on, in hindsight. 

Route: South Face / SE Gully
Posted On: 5/9/2024, By: ejfahren
Info: Parked at Browns Ck TH - road is clear and dry. Hiked Browns Creek trail until the Little Browns Creek trail split, and followed that drainage until transitioning to skins around 11k'. Continuous snow from there to the summit via SE gully and South face. Able to link turns through the sastrugi waves on the ridge from the summit into the South face proper at 14k'. The entire SE bowl has amazing coverage. Great new snow to boot tops made for wonderful turns in the loaded south face. Several exit options from there - one of our party skied the SE gully and the other skied a steep SE couloir that branched from the gully with steep granite walls. Both had excellent snow. Skied the Little Browns Creek gully to 10800' and walked the dry trail back to the truck. Not the traditional West slope ski but a beautiful basin with much better snow coverage, just a longer walk. FYI, looking down the NE face (that you see from 285), several lines are continuous through the rock bands. Might need to come back in a few days for that. Overall, ~15 mi, 5.7k'. 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 5/4/2024, By: ILnoise
Info: 4wd road: large alternating patches of snow and dry road, icy/solid in the morning. Lots had melted and the rest was soft by the afternoon. Enough room on the road to sidestep most of the snow to avoid postholing on the way down. There were 3 relatively large downed trees across the road, first one about 1.9mi from the bottom of the road, second around 2mi, third around 2.4mi. Once the snow melts anyone with a mind to drive up to the 4wd TH might consider bringing a chainsaw and a few friends.

4wd trailhead: mostly continuous snow from 4wd TH to treeline, but melting fast. Icy in the morning (we got by without spikes just fine), floatation highly recommended in the afternoon. Lots of posting without.

Switchbacks: still plenty of snowdrifts along most of them. We opted to take the ridgeline direct and avoid the switchbacks. The ridge had lots of snowy and dry patches lower down, lots of rocky and snowy patches higher up. I don't think we would have made it up the steeper slopes without spikes and an axe, though another person on the mountain today did it with spikes and poles.

Summit ridge: the standard route is lower down and still snowed in so we stuck mostly to the ridge proper. A few class 3 moves and some kick-steps were needed in a few places. The final push after the exposed section of ridgeline is loose talus, but snow up there isn't a major issue.

We found a helmet with a gopro mount just before the summit ridge. If it's yours and you want it back please message me with the brand and color and I'll do what I can to get it back to you! 

Route: West Slopes
Posted On: 2/29/2024, By: BobAugenthaler
Info: Antero: I climbed Antero on Saturday, 2/24/24 with 2 others. There was another group of 3 on the mountain that day, but no one else. All 6 of us summited successfully. The 3 of us wore snowshoes from trailhead to tree line, but there was not any significant trail breaking/post holing involved. When we arrived to tree line, we put our snowshoes on our packs. In hindsight, we could have just left them at tree line. We had decided to climb directly up a ridge rather than hike along the longer, switchbacking 4x4 road. The route we chose was steeper, but a shorter, more direct route, and it didn't require any trail breaking/post holing that the 4x4 road likely would have. Weather was favorable: clear skies, relatively low winds, high visibility. It was definitely cold...our fingers and toes were feeling it during parts of the early morning hours...but we pushed through. Full moon lit up a dark mountain as we exited tree line!

Some stats:
3:15AM start
10:30AM summit
4:45PM finish
This included several breaks, including about an hour spent on the summit...we weren't moving fast.
Distance: 11.6 miles
Elevation gain: 4,967 feet
Mountain forecast.com was forecasting (as of Friday night) a high of 18F at peak (0F with windchill), with winds of 25-30mph. I don't know actual weather stats.