8/28/2024 Route: Grizzly to Lenawee Traverse Posted On: 8/28/2024, By: jpacheco1982 Info: We did a car shuttle trip between Loveland pass and arapahoe basin. We started at Loveland pass and went up to grizzly. From there we took the ridge to black mountain, lenawee, southwest Lenawee and a bonus peak right above ski resort. From grizzly/black mountain saddle to red rock is the hardest part of the route. Some places have an intermittent social trail but it is hard to find in these places. There are three gendarmes (including black mountain) and a notch after each of these. We climbed to the top of each of these gendarmes and I would personally rate this as class 3. There were some route finding challenges in this area. At the base of the second notch we went a little left on a ledge and then found a class 3 route to a social trail which went to top of black mountain. Getting down from black mountain to the red rock area is the hardest route finding of route. A little ways down from black mountain summit is a ledge system on west side that goes to a gully. Once at base of gully we stayed ridge direct on some solid class 3 scrambling until an obvious loose gully appeared that led to the base of the third notch, this gully was on west side of the ridge. From here the route finding was much easier, but there were some optional class 4 sections we did (although can walk around all but maybe one of these). Once back at the ski area we took a combination of roads, trails and ski slopes back to the parking. |
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9/24/2023 Route: South Ridge Posted On: 9/25/2023, By: ColoNativeGal Info: Dry. Some tiny patches of snow on the ridge on the north side - no issues though. Traction not required at this time. Watch out for bears jumping in front of your car in the early morning hours on Loveland pass from the summit towards A-Basin. It literally came out of no where and I slammed on the brakes thinking I was going to hit it, but luckily it got out of the way. Whew. |
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7/3/2023 Route: Loveland Pass to A-Basin Posted On: 7/3/2023, By: -wren- Info: Ran the ridge from Loveland pass to arapahoe basin today and its all clear, summer conditions. This includes the standard routes for Sniktau, Grizzly and Cupid. |
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7/1/2023 Route: South Ridge Posted On: 7/2/2023, By: Danger_D Info: Summer conditions, even on the ridge. Some new deadfall in a couple places, but only a handful |
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7/30/2022 Route: From SW Lenawee Posted On: 7/31/2022, By: csf-lhiver Info: Hung ridge direct as much as possible to get more class 3 and low 4 moves in. Can hang left (on way to Lenawee/right on way back) around most of the obstacles to make it class 2(+) if you want. Cool views of ABasin and rocks. |
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6/21/2022 Route: South Ridge Posted On: 6/21/2022, By: daway8 Info: No snow worth mentioning along the trail but off to the side of the trail there were some impressive cornices still hanging on over the valleys below. Solid trail to follow until it's time to gain the ridge to SW Lenawee, then you have to be alert on when to cut right and gain the ridge (gets steeper the longer you wait to make the turn). I hadn't researched the route so was surprised how much scrambling opportunity there was between SW Lenawee and Lenawee - you can potentially keep it pretty easy (difficult class 2 is how it's ranked) and avoid exposure or you can choose to stay top of the ridge and squeeze in a little bit of highly exposed class 3 action if you feel like spicing up an otherwise fairly easy hike. This was the perfect little hike to squeeze in on an unexpected day off with a very late start. |
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3/12/2022 Route: South Ridge Posted On: 3/13/2022, By: gluckhikes Info: Did not make it to treeline. Peru Creek road is doable without flotation. Snowpack on Lenawee Trail is 6 inches of powder on a mostly supportive 1 inch crust with a foot of rotten icy stuff below. Not good, but manageable for the first couple miles of the Lenawee Trail. Once it turns north and starts climbing along the west slopes, the snow becomes impassably deep and the slope angle gets sketchy. |
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10/12/2021 Route: South Ridge Posted On: 10/14/2021, By: wolfgangstiller Info: Trail starts out dry but gets more and more snow until is all snow above 11,500 ft. Snow is just 1 to 4 inches and not icy yet. Micros helpful but not required. Rocks near summit require care. |
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6/11/2021 Route: South Ridge Posted On: 6/11/2021, By: cougar Info: A few downed trees on lower part of trail. Small snowdrifts starting at 11500 obscure a couple switchback turns so keep an eye out. Summer conditions up high, ridge traverse from southwest Lenawee is dry, despite the snow and cornices on south face. Great peak. |
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9/24/2020 Route: South Ridge Posted On: 10/24/2020, By: mbolt Info: Started from Arapahoe Bain (surprised they still let hikers in this late), no snow worth mentioning, very gusty/high winds almost entire time on ridge. Saw one other dude who had traversed all the peaks from loveland pass, sounded like a great time. 2/3 of my trekking pole just fell off while it was attached to my backpack somewhere on the ridge (need to tighten them better I guess). If you find it please let me know (and sorry for the accidental litter). |
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9/12/2020 Route: South Ridge Posted On: 9/12/2020, By: LetsGoMets Info: Beautiful day on Lenawee. Unavoidable (but melting quickly) snow above 12,000'. NW face of the traverse holding a few inches of snow on average for the entire section. Didn't need traction or any special equipment - wore trail runners and was fine. Saw a SAR chopper in the area, but couldn't tell where exactly it was going/coming from. |
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9/11/2020 Route: South Ridge Posted On: 9/11/2020, By: bmcqueen Info: Not much accumulation up high, but enough snow coverage to make the rocks slick and cover a few trapdoors. |
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6/14/2020 Route: South Ridge Posted On: 6/14/2020, By: goldenite Info: Only made it to Southwest Lenawee, it was windy af and didn't want to chance the ridge solo. The trail has some snow patches around treeline, but nothing major. There's also avoidable snow near the summit. #1: southeast into Chihuahua Basin, Grays, Ruby #2: southwest into Thurman Gulch #3: Lenawee and connecting ridge, G&T, Grizzly - there was a dusting of snow up high overnight, so that should melt soon #4: connecting ridge from a little lower |
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3/25/2020 Route: South Ridge Posted On: 3/26/2020, By: Kiefer Info: Ascended from parking lot at Peru Gulch. Heavy snow all the way to treeline. The upper plateau's are holding snow with occasional bare/tundra patches. Summit of "SW Lenawee" and Lenawee holding a lot of snow. The summit of "Southwest Lenawee" is partially corniced. Snow is typical spring corn, hard-packed with occasional pockets of powder spindrift. Snowshoes required. |
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8/31/2019 Route: from Grizzly Posted On: 9/4/2019, By: shaunblair Info: Fun traverse - lots of routefinding - available descriptions from Wolfe and others are somewhat poor. Never saw the two cruxes of route, golden gendarme and knife edge - maybe I was enjoying the scrambling too much to notice? Never encountered anything that gave me pause, just a fun, enjoyable trip. |
