This trip report will be half about the drive to Lake Como and half about climbing the peaks in the Blanca group. This trip combines two of my favorite activities, four wheeling and hiking, so how could a weekend get better than this?

7-8 years ago (before I was interested in 14ers) I camped along the Lake Como road and I also day hiked to lake. The road still sucked back then and I knew I didn't want to hike that nasty hot approach again when I went to climb Blanca, Ellingwood, and Little Bear. So I decided to drive. The star of this TR is my trusty 2001 Jeep XJ (Cherokee). The antiquated 4.0L straight six is so reliable and this Jeep is unstoppable on the trails. Until this year it had been sitting on 33s with front and rear lockers and a sway bar disconnect. I knew to tackle Lake Como road that 35s were probably in order so I started the upgrade back in February. With the larger tires, I also wanted to upgrade the Dana 30 front axle to a Dana 44 with RCVs to ensure I would not snap an axle shaft. After about 3 solid days of wrenching in February and March we were ready for Lake Como road.

Fast forward to Friday July 7. My plan was to drive to Lake Como on Friday, climb Blanca and Ellingwood on Saturday, climb Little Bear Sunday, and drive home Sunday afternoon. I had car camping gear with me as well as my backpacking setup in case I could not make it to the lake for whatever reason. Friday morning I left Arvada and got to the trailhead at 11 am. Proceeded to air down to 12 psi for the first time on the new beadlocks and disconnected the sway bar. Plodded along for a while until the first infamous Jaws obstacle came into view. The easy line is up high to the right but that can be very tippy. The hard line (but less tippy) is right down middle but you need serious clearance/breakover angle to conquer that line. Tried the hard line and was so close to crawling it, but I set it down on the transfer case skid plate and could not go forward. For reference, there is 20" clearance to my transfer case skid plate. Backed up and took the tippy high line. Made it just fine but it was very unsettling.

For the rest of the drive I was way too stressed out to grab any pictures but below are two borrowed pictures of Jaws 2 and 3 that Bill posted to the Lake Como trailhead page.

Jaws 2 is the most infamous of the obstacles. This is where the memorial plaque is and several deaths due to rollovers have happened here, including most recently in September 2022. The actual obstacle on the right is gnarly and there is no way I would attempt such a hard obstacle on an off camber cliff. I took the bypass which has been widened and is fairly easy now. Compared to the other obstacles, if you take the bypass, this is nothing to worry about. The bypass is far left so the pucker factor of the drop off comes into play.

After Jaws 2 there is a spot in the road called Tippy Spot. Its not really an obstacle but its just what the name implies...an extremely off camber section of road...next to a huge drop off. For me this was the scariest part of the drive up. On the initial attempt I tried staying too far left (away from edge) and got my rear diff hung up on a rock. So I backed up and got closer to the edge. In the process my right rear tire went over the edge and started sending rocks down. Major panic moment. It felt like I was teetering and about to roll. I quickly got out, assessed the situation, and immediately hooked up the reliable Warn 8K winch to a solid tree on my left to prevent the Jeep from going over. I used the winch to keep tension the opposite direction (left) of the off camber direction (right). If the Jeep did roll, at least it wouldn't be 200 feet down over the edge. With the security blanket of the winch I was able to get back in and drive over Tippy Spot. At this point my nerves were absolutely shot.

Jaws 2.5 was a fun flexy obstacle that the XJ crawled with no issues.

I got to Jaws 3 and had to wait due to the first other vehicle I had encountered on the road. It was an ATV with two guys that were on their way to camp at the lake. They were having trouble with the first half of Jaws 3 so I got out and helped push the ATV up. They pulled off the road before the second half of Jaws 3 and let me pass. I had some issues with the second half of Jaws 3. The Jeep was on a good line that it should have crawled but couldn't make it. I was a little confused but pulled synthetic rope on the Warn again and winched over the obstacle. It was smooth sailing to the lake. Got to the lake around 1:45 pm which surprised me since most things I had read said the road would take 5 hours to drive. At the lake I did a once over of the Jeep to make sure nothing was damaged when I noticed the wire to the front E-Locker had been stretched too far and was ripped off. It was completely gone. No front locker the rest of the weekend...and now it all made sense why I couldn't make it over Jaws 3. I'm guessing the damage happened while fully flexing over Jaws 2.5.

I set up camp by 2:15 pm and was sitting in a camp chair when I noticed the weather was perfect. There was only a 20-30% chance of afternoon storms and the weather was looking great. At 2:30 pm I decided to give Blanca and/or Ellingwood a shot. I had never summited a 14er in the afternoon so this was a new experience for me. Kept a close eye on the weather the whole way up to the Blanca/Ellingwood ridge. Weather was still perfect so I went up to Blanca. Summited Blanca at 4 pm. Having fresh legs from not hiking the approach was amazing. Felt like a super human above 13K.

After a short break and snack on Blanca, I made my way over to Ellingwood. Didn't take ridge direct, but stayed pretty high on the ridge on the way over. I believe this was the class 3 variation, and thought this was a fun route over. Summited Ellingwood around 5 pm. Got back to camp at the lake around 7 pm and made dinner.

The following morning my alarm was set for 3:30 am to climb Little Bear and get to the Hourglass before everyone else. I was woken up by the unmistakable sound of rockfall crashing down around 3 am. A bad omen for the upcoming climb.

As I approached the Hourglass, I saw there was a spread out group of three ahead of me. At the bottom of the Hourglass I caught up with them. No one was ahead of them. I didn't want to pass and I didn't want to be behind them. We decided it would be best for all four of us to go up close together to reduce rockfall risk. These three guys were awesome climbers and none of us sent a single rock down the Hourglass on the ascent. I was very lucky to have met up with this group. Going left at the rappel station is key. The rock was very solid to the left. At the summit the group of three proceeded to the traverse and I returned via the Hourglass.

Going down I knew no one was below me and I wanted to test the climber's right side above the rappel station. This side was terrible and I sent a couple nasty rocks down. Luckily no one was below me. Definitely stay climber's left at the rappel station!!!

Successfully made it down the Hourglass, but here is where the fun began. In the picture approaching the Hourglass you can see the snow below the Hourglass. On the ascent I avoided the snow to the right. On the way down I was lazy and thought it would be a fun and easy glissade down the short snow patch. It wasn't fun or easy. It was a terrible and stupid decision. The snow patch was only 30-40' long where I crossed so I figured I couldn't get going too fast. Again, that was wrong. Of course my ice axe was at home since I knew the snow was avoidable based on condition reports. I grabbed a sharp rock to use to slow me down, a technique I have used before with great success on easy glissades. The issue here was the snow was completely iced over still around 8 am and the rock did no good. Well I started the glissade and got going way too fast. I immediately knew I made the wrong choice and this was going to end terribly. As I approached the rocks below, I lifted my feet and my butt made solid first contact on the rocks below. My glasses flew off and chaos ensued. The dust settled and everything hurt. I had a huge throbbing bruise on the left side of my tailbone. My left forearm was cut and bruised. My right wrist ached and the hand very scratched up. I stood up. Everything still worked and, by some miracle, no bones were broken and no tendons/ligaments torn. My adrenaline was pumping and I resumed the descent before the real pain set in. The whole hike back to the lake I reflected on how lucky and stupid I was. That could have ended much worse...with a helicopter ride home or even worse. What did I gain with this stupid decision? Saving 3 minutes to walk around the snow. Wow. Valuable lesson learned.

I got back to the Jeep and packed up camp. Dread set in as I realized driving down Lake Como road still awaited me. The drive out was mostly uneventful. Tippy Spot was again terrifying. I used the winch again to anchor the Jeep to the tree in the event I rolled. Jaws 2 felt worse going down but overall was not an issue. Going down Jaws 1 was by far the sketchiest obstacle. Its much more tippy on the way down versus going up because of how the vehicle is pointed relative to the slope of the road. I believe this is where most rollovers on the trail happen. It doesn't get the notoriety of Jaws 2 since there are trees right below the obstacle to catch you. Ended up dragging the rear diff the whole way over. Had to get out about three times to ensure I was on a good line and my wheels were pointed where I wanted. When I was sure everything was lined up correctly, I gave her the beans and somehow crawled over without rolling. The remaining 5.7 miles out was uneventful, but very uncomfortable on my freshly bruised tailbone. Made it back to the TH at 1 pm. I survived one of the most dangerous and memorable weekends in my life...all in 26 hours TH to TH. Despite the glissade fail, everything worked out amazingly well and I made it home a day early.

What a weekend, three more 14ers down. This road is absolutely terrifying and I will never drive it again. The obstacles aren't too terribly hard but its just so off camber with high consequences. I felt that driving the road was about 10 times more dangerous than climbing the Hourglass. Call me crazy but I actually thought climbing the Hourglass was fun. I told my buddy I did this drive, and his response was: "Lake Como road would be a 5.8-5.9 if Jeep roads were rated on the YDS!". Well said. Seriously think twice about driving this road. If you do, bring a reliable well built rig and lots of experience.