Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2023-02-13, By: angry Info: Pro tip: don't forget your pants. Big ups to kalestew for coming in clutch with the bibs so I didn't have to do this pantless and for joining me to upper th and figuring out my garmin issues to track progress and make sure I got out safe. Snowmobile tracks from gated road closure to Matterhorn Creek turnoff. Faint skin track that fizzles out half mile below upper 4WD th. Broke trail in snowshoes, punching through anywhere from 6 inches to knee deep. Doing this solo took hours longer than anticipated. Crampons/axe useful. Minor wet slide activity on NE aspect of neighboring peak. Rollerballs on SW, very warm day meant even more postholing on way out. Uncompahgre looks wind scoured compared to photos I saw last week. Storm incoming so this is probably irrelevant. |
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Route: East Face Posted On: 2023-02-08, By: Chrisfish25 Info: Went up Uncompahgre first. Skied over to Wetterhorn. Awesome snow. Awesome day. Stability is in, for now. Skimmer going up Needle TH to Unc & out the Wetterhorn road. Go get it! |
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Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2022-10-31, By: Will_E Info: Did Wetterhorn and Matterhorn Saturday, I started just above Capitol City. Several vehicle tracks up to the start of the 4wd road, but no tracks up it. Consistent snow started around the start of the 4wd road, but never got more than 6"-8" deep. I took snowshoes with, but left them at treeline, snow was pretty sugary. The boulder field before gaining the ridge was a slow going pain in the butt, lots of trap door snow. Most of the snow along the ridge was avoidable or inconsequential. A little harder getting up the final pitch due to where snow was than I remember from my winter trip a few years ago. I cut across the boulder field and cut up the west side of Matterhorn before joining the main ridge route. Snow at the top of Matterhorn made for a couple tricky spots, I wasn't expecting that. Nice day, warm, sunny and very little wind. |
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Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2022-09-19, By: dustinbarrett Info: Lovely trail conditions, a little bit of frost accumulation in the shadows but nothing yet that made the technical sections feel slick or unsafe. The road is very spicy...we managed to make it all the way up in a stock Nissan Rogue but it was questionable. A couple spots we bottomed out and had to back up and retry. I've driven up a lot of bad roads in stock vehicles; if I could do it again I'd likely just park at the bottom and save the wear & tear on the car. It's only 0.7mi and you're driving so slow it barely saves you any time. Wouldn't try it if you don't have something with good clearance, good tires, and a skilled driver. The road up to the Unc TH is not quite as bad as this one, and much longer so feels worth it to attempt. |
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Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2022-09-16, By: jtfoss1 Info: Despite a clear forecast, there was some small hail and a bit of rain. After the final notch, the slab to the final ascent wall and the final ascent wall were wet and had a little bit of snow on them. Given these conditions, these sections felt a lot scarier than we were expecting. Some warm weather (or even a little bit of sun) may dry it out to make it more easily passable. |
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Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2022-09-02, By: mtgoatmike Info: Such a great mountain! The class 3 section is really fun. Cairns all the way from the yellow dirt section to the summit. I went straight up from the catwalk to the summit. Plenty of flowing water above treeline...there was one small stream that did have a rainbow sheen to it. |
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Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2022-07-28, By: slinda Info: Awesome climb the morning of Tuesday the 26th! Saw about 3 people total during an overnight (camped around 11,700, some good campsites in the area, definitely easier to find a spot with a 1-man tent, but right at treeline there were plenty of spots). Hit the trail at 5:30, got up to the top around 7:20. Had plans to do Uncompahgre, but clouds started rolling in around 8AM, so I figured I'd cut my losses and feel satisfied with just the 'horn. The class 3 stuff was an absolute blast, and the info on the site is super accurate and incredibly helpful! A great intro to some higher class 14ers - cannot WAIT to get on some more technical terrain. Because I had so much extra time allotted to bag Uncompahgre, I hiked around the area and found a huge herd of sheep on the northwest facing ridge just under Matterhorn. An unforgettable couple days! Incredibly bummed to go back to Chicago next week. (( |
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Route: Traverse to Uncompahgre Posted On: 2022-07-18, By: bsiegs Info: Summer conditions on both Wetterhorn and Unc - linked them up by traversing over to the stock ridge trail and more-or-less following that until the meet up with the Unc standard route and then returning back to Matterhorn Creek TH. The stock ridge trail gets pretty narrow in spots with a lot of high grass / other plants so it's not the most pleasant but it's fine overall. From the lower TH (before the final 4wd section) it ended up around ~17.5mi and ~6.5k vert. Also, there was a rescue in the late afternoon off of Wetterhorn due to lightning - reminder to start early this time of year! |
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Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2022-07-10, By: codyli34 Info: Summer conditions. Didn't try 4WD road, but looked pretty bad while walking up it. |
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Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2022-07-10, By: cloudPeak Info: Summer conditions for sure. A car with a good foot of clearance can make the 4wd road albeit the road is still difficult. Trail was well maintained and easy to follow up to the yellow dirt section, then cairns along the way are the best guide. Had no problems following the trail using the photos. |
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Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2022-06-13, By: zootloopz Info: Summer conditions! Traverse from Matterhorn. Loose. Class 4+. |
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Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2022-06-06, By: seanhouseworth Info: A few snowfields in the valley up to the ridge, and a little snow/ice lingering in first climbing section, but it's ready for summer. Didn't try the 4WD road as it looked pretty rough this year and there were a couple of good camping spots at 2WD trailhead we couldn't pass up. Saw a Tundra at 4WD trailhead that looked like stock clearance but really good tires. |
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Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2022-06-08, By: Terrapin17 Info: Pretty much Summer conditions besides minimal snow crossings. There was some snow in the class 3 portion of the hike but it can mostly be avoided. |
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Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2022-05-29, By: soundchaser2112 Info: Route is about 95% dry but poles and microspikes were still handy in a few places. There are several steep gullies still filled with snow up in the class 3 section of the route that you'd want spikes and ax if you chose to traverse them, but it's probable easier just to scramble around them to avoid the snow |
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Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2022-05-27, By: coopergould Info: Near summer conditions on Wetterhorn today. Common sense snow work arounds and you'll be good. Unreal climb and a killer glissade to be had - go get it |
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Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2022-05-01, By: kcovingt1 Info: Very beautiful day in the basin. Didn't quite make the summit (bailed near the rock rib). Steep soft snow and lack of crampons had us turn around. Snow became soft quickly (~9 am in the basin). Around 12 we were post holing even with snowshoes in a few instances. Nearly continuous snow from the TH, where the 4WD road is not yet passable where there is still large drifts and we post holed in the afternoon to waist/chest deep snow. A truck and Forrester made it to the bottom of the 4WD road and we made it a mile past Central City in a Malibu. |
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Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2022-04-17, By: Will_E Info: Summitted Wetterhorn Saturday, I was expecting (and sort of looking forward to) a 20 mile day, but to my surprise, the road was open and dry all the way to Capitol City. I found a nice campsite just north of Capitol City, so started there. From the Capitol City turnoff to the start of the 4wd road, it a mix of dry and hard packed snow. After the start of the 4wd road the snow was fairly continuous, I used snowshoes from there to partway up the ridge. Didn't need anything from there to summit. Nice day, wind was bad on the ridge, but mellow at summit. |
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Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2022-02-13, By: Wildernessjane Info: Summited Wetterhorn today via Southeast Ridge/Matterhorn Creek. Road was snow covered with the exception of two dry patches from 1.25 to 1.75 miles in from the winter closure. There were old tracks up to the final turnoff approximately 1.2 miles after the lower summer trailhead. Final crux section of the route was completely dry. To this point, we wore crampons due to intermittent sections of crap snow and ice. We got some surprisingly good turns on the ski out, but expectations were low. As expected, conditions were highly variable above treeline. |
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Route: East Face Posted On: 2021-11-06, By: jtfoss1 Info: Reached the 4wd trailhead with a 4runner - it required a little creativity and perseverance due to the snow. Didn't encounter anyone else on the route. Snowshoes were necessary for large portions of the trail above treeline. The face appeared to have had a small avalanche, so we veered to the right side and ended up taking the east face instead of the standard route (probably a big mistake). We were less than 20 meters of elevation from the summit block when we noped out. The snow was questionable but also not deep enough to make the rocks easily passable. Rotten rock, slabby, slippery, etc. An ice tool was helpful but not enough to make us feel like we were 100% in control of the outcome of every move. Would not recommend this in the current conditions unless if you're super hardcore. It was fun, but super sketchy. My gps also recorded about a mile more than the track posted on the route description. |
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Route: Southeast Ridge Posted On: 2021-10-21, By: topekaavenue Info: In a party of 3 (including self) we had a successful summit of Wetterhorn on 10/21 via Southeast Ridge. Road is mostly dry all the way to the trailhead. After passing the 0.7 miles left marker, you'll get a couple patches of ice. We carried snowshoes for a bit then eventually ditched them cause we realized they weren't necessary. We had microspikes but didn't use them. We had our ice axes but didn't use them (some spots along the trail when on the ridge could have maybe used it but not necessary), We did wear our mountaineering boots. The hike in is good, snow but not much postholing. Going through the rock field was interesting, had trouble finding the route (not many cairns placed) but managed and got to where we needed. The ridge is spotty with snow and dry spots. We did more of a "choose your own adventure" going along the ridge and also skipping the V section. Picture 19 though is all in snow. The slab approaching the crux is dry (as of now) with no snow or ice. The final/crux section is also dry, there was one spot of snow but was powder snow. The summit has snow. Will add pictures later, wanted to get something on here in case anyone had this peak on their mind. |