Mt. Hope

Route: Hopeful couloir
Posted On: 4/26/2014, By: taylorzs
Info: Snowboarded the Hopeful couloir yesterday. It was in good shape and should have good snow cover for quite a while this season. Somewhat continuous snow starting about 10,500‘. Not sure how long that will last. Below treeline seems to be melting out pretty quickly. 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 11/11/2013, By: Grover
Info: Mt. Hope is in excellent shape right now if you are looking for a sporty outing while the weather is stable this fall. From the Sheep Gulch TH parking lot to 10,900', the trail is about 98% snow free. Above 10,900', there is snow on the trail, but it is soft and does not require snowshoes or traction to navigate. Hope Pass is clear of snow thanks to the wind. The first part of the East Ridge Route is holding some snow, but it can be easily avoided when needed. To climb the scruffy sections of the ridge, around 13,600' and above, I put on microspikes because there was enough snow covering portions of this route. It is definitely a mixed climb during this section, with a mixture of 60% rock/40% snow as I climbed up to the false summit. I thought of using crampons here, but I went with microspikes instead. And I used poles instead of my ice axe because there were more rocks than snow. Once above the false summit, there is a section of snow that you can easily walk across, and then you have a snow-free walk of 150 feet to the summit cairn. 

Route: Hopeful Couloir
Posted On: 6/9/2013, By: mrickers
Info: Climbed the left branch of the Hopeful Couloir this morning. It is still good with an early start...the apron is getting kinda thin and post-holes were abundant. The snow in the couloir itself is good. Chose to go up the left branch due to some recent looking rockfall in the main branch. Sheep Gulch trail is 99% snow free to Hope Pass. 

Route: East Ridge via Sheep Gulch
Posted On: 1/11/2012, By: Matt Lemke
Info: Climbed Mt. Hope yesterday via E Ridge from Sheep Gulch. Road all the way to Winfield still drivable by any car. Trail up to treeline in Sheep Gulch was packed snow except for area around treeline where we lost the trail a little and broke through 1-2 feet. Above treeline, 1-4 inches covers about 60% of the ground with many areas having a very hard, thin (1 in.) slab that sheared off very easily. We avoided these on the bigger slopes but crossing smaller slopes proved fine. Once on the E Ridge, there was a mixture of exposed rock, snow and rock with a little snow in between making travel a little difficult since your foot will occasionally sink down 3 feet into a gap in the rocks you couldn‘t see. The final climb to the summit plateau was steep and crampons/microspikes/axe were a must and I wore spikes from 500 feet below the summit, to the summit, all the way back down to the car. Summit views towards the Ellingwood Ridge were stunning to say the least. Beautiful winter day! This currently is my favorite Sawatch summit I‘ve done. 

Route: East ridge from Sheep Gulch
Posted On: 6/6/2011, By: CarpeDM
Info: big_red_pride had asked about conditions on Hope and Huron. After looking through my pics, I guess I got only one pic of Huron - and not a great one. The smoke from the wildfires made everything pretty hazy, too. #1 - Mt Hope from just west of Hope Pass (we didn't go all the way to the pass, just angled up toward the peak) #2 - Belford and Missouri #3 - Missouri on the left, Huron on the right #4 - La Plata, Ellingwood Ridge, and Rinker Peak We used microspikes on the ascent - not crampons. I used my axe; Shawn just used trekking poles (except for the glissade). We stayed below the ridge until the last bit of rock before the false summit (about where Hopeful Couloir hits the ridge, I guess). Did NOT like that section. On the descent, we went down to the top of the southeast ridge and glissaded from there. There was still plenty of snow with good run-out. But there were a few places with exposed rock, so pick your glissade path carefully. For the first glissade from the ridge, the snow was steep enough and soft enough that it took me at least 100 feet to self arrest with axe and feet firmly in the snow (just practicing), but then we didn't start super-early or go super-fast. We took snowshoes, but I used mine for only a short section on the way down; Shawn did without and was fine.