8/29/2021 Route: Northeast Ridge Posted On: 8/29/2021, By: LetsGoMets Info: Route is dry and in good shape. |
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8/29/2021 Route: Northeast Ridge Posted On: 8/30/2021, By: taylorharris50 Info: Recent trail work around the boulder field. Summer conditions. Epic peak. |
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7/31/2021 Route: Bells Traverse Posted On: 8/2/2021, By: Been_Jammin Info: The Bells Traverse is closer to 12 miles round trip from TH to TH. Not the 9.5 listed in the route description. This makes sense when you cross reference the Bells Traverse route stats with Maroon and North Maroon stats. |
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7/30/2021 Route: Northeast Ridge Posted On: 7/30/2021, By: Camden7 Info: Route is totally dry. Creek crossing is very easy. Honestly one of they easiest high peaks in the elks. Not much to it. |
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7/29/2021 Route: Bells Traverse Posted On: 7/30/2021, By: kalestew Info: Ascended Maroon and descended North Maroon- route is dry and well cairned. There are some pieces of climbing gear left along the traverse (webbing around a rock at the top of the second spire, a cam above the left side of the third) but you don't need them to gain the c5 sections. Had to move slow down North Maroon's second gully to avoid dislodging all those loose boulders. Was a really fun and scenic day, but as many others have said that descent down North Maroon is soul crushing after the fun traverse. That final wide talus field before you're back to treeline starts stable but becomes increasingly loose the closer you get to grass. |
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7/10/2021 Route: Northeast Ridge Posted On: 7/13/2021, By: William Musser Info: Last bit of snow at one place on trail was punched out and fell away. No snow at all. Rock gully area and grass gully had according to my expert companion, more small rock than normal because of all the rainfall this spring and so more loose material than normal. Groups above us kept knocking rock down on us. Soft feet critical. |
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7/9/2021 Route: Northeast Ridge Posted On: 7/10/2021, By: durkan Info: Full summer conditions. Ice aforementioned at the base of the chimney is gone. |
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7/4/2021 Route: Northeast Ridge Posted On: 7/5/2021, By: heathcliff Info: The route is great condition for summer. Recent rainfall Saturday morning made things a little slicker. There was no snow to cross, except there is about a 2x2ft ice area at the base of the chimney which makes it a little harder to descend. Hiking poles (or the axe that I had) help with balance and traction in the mud, but no foot traction needed. Good bit of rocks falling down the gullies, even being the first climber of the day with nobody above me..so bring a helmet! |
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6/23/2021 Route: Northeast Ridge Posted On: 6/23/2021, By: sarahw Info: Summer conditions. Several snow patches, all can be avoided. Took spikes and axe but used neither. Mound of snow at base of chimney can be stood upon and makes entering the chimney a bit easier, but exiting a bit more difficult. |
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10/22/2020 Route: Bells Traverse Posted On: 10/23/2020, By: jmctigue Info: Summer conditions. The odd patch of snow that could easily be avoided. Snow is forecast this weekend, so this information probably isn't very useful. It was very gusty in the afternoon, so extra care had to be taken on the scrambling. Roach's book mentions a place to rappel, and there is currently a sling around a large rock here. I was able to downclimb just before this: I thought the scrambling could be kept to class 4 with careful route-finding. There are quite a few cairns to help. Descended the south ridge of Maroon Peak. The ridge itself was pretty good fun, but the descent off the ridge was interminably steep and loose. |
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10/3/2020 Route: Bells Traverse Posted On: 10/4/2020, By: bmcqueen Info: Did South Maroon standard route, Bells Traverse and descended North Maroon standard route yesterday. No meaningful snow on the route and the N Maroon descent chimney is dry. |
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9/29/2020 Route: Northeast Ridge Posted On: 9/29/2020, By: skyjumper Info: Was able to Summit on the 9/26. No snow on the mt until Chimney. The Chimney had no ice/snow. Section after Chimney had minimal snow. |
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9/26/2020 Route: Northeast Ridge Posted On: 9/27/2020, By: JIntfen Info: Route is clean to the Chimney. Some snow after the chimney until you regain the ridge, clean after. If down climbing the chimney seems sketch with snowy shoes there's an easier class 3 downclimb about 150' before you get to the chimney (Theres an anchor rope at the top of both). |
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9/19/2020 Route: Northeast Ridge Posted On: 9/20/2020, By: Geckser Info: There was snow from 13,000 feet up. No major difficulties regarding snow outside of the chimney which was slightly icy but certainly doable. I don't really know how hard it would ascend the chimney as we only descended on it but I was able to hop down relatively easily. No worrisome snow outside of that. Microspikes could help on the chimney but nowhere else. Aspens were nice on the way down. |
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9/16/2020 Route: Northeast Ridge Posted On: 9/17/2020, By: Makbrad Info: A lot of snow has melted since the last conditions report below was posted. Almost all of the traverse itself is dry with the exception of a few patches and pockets, some avoidable, some not. The chimneys on the spires are dry. The downclimbs off both Maroon and North Maroon are holding snow and some pockets of ice. These are currently the two cruxes of the climb. The downclimb off Maroon toward the traverse is pretty hairy in a few areas. Spikes are helpful. There are a couple of small pockets of ice on some of the rocks. Downclimbing snow and ice sections took the most time outside of route finding along the traverse. The biggest crux is the class 4 chimney downclimb off North Maroon as it is still holding a small amount of snow and ice on each step of the 20 foot downclimb. We climbed down this chimney in spikes very slowly and carefully. Doable, but gnarly and sketchy on some of the moves. Beyond this, there is still snow as seen in the photo with the goats above my partner. Full Trip Report: https://makbrad.com/14ers/curious-bells |
