Blanca Peak

Route: Lake Como Approach
Posted On: 7/14/2025, By: Bonesaw
Info: Summer conditions unless you hike after a massive hailstorm. The hail is probably gone by now but it was surreal seeing the mountain covered in it 

Route: Lake Como Approach
Posted On: 7/6/2025, By: Ariella6
Info: Dry and summer conditions! Dispersed camping options all the way up to 8800 feet elevation gain. We made it in ford expedition with 8.7 inches clearance. road is definitely ROUGH even early on. Only gets worse from there. We backpacked the road up to lake como. Stayed the night and hiked the rest on 7/6/2025 Even on a holiday weekend there were not a lot of folks out. Saw handful of off road vehicles. and 10 hikers on 7/6/2025 (other than our group of 3). Was a quiet and beautiful weekend. Lots of flowers popping right now. The lakes are stunning. We went the route up to the ridge that was closer to blanca, which seemed to be different than what is on the 14ers.com route for standard for traverse route. We also opted to come down this as well after completing the traverse. 

Route: Lake Como Approach
Posted On: 7/6/2025, By: MaryinColorado
Info: Summer conditions all the way! The headwall above Crater Lake is still experiencing some run-off, though, so be mindful of some slick, wet rocks. Easy to avoid. We started with Blanca and did the C3 traverse between the two peaks, and that was super fun if you like class 3. But if you start with Blanca, I would recommend coming back across the traverse again from Ellingwood and descending from the saddle. The standard route descent from Ellingwood was tedious as heck because of how loose the rocks are w/ no consistent, distinguishable trail. FYI - I posted a separate *trailhead* update just for Como Road up to 10,100 if you're looking for insight on the road, specifically. 

Route: Blanca and Ellingwood
Posted On: 6/30/2025, By: 5meodimte
Info: Complete summer conditions. Blanca to Ellingwood Traverse and Little Bear to Blanca Traverse also completely dry. 

Route: Lake Como Approach
Posted On: 6/21/2025, By: seoulman
Info: Basically summer conditions. A few minor snow crossings that are no real obstacle. Neighboring peaks look to be in similar shape. 

Route: Blanca and Ellingwood
Posted On: 6/15/2025, By: bryan-whitesel
Info: Outside of a few snow crossings the standard route up Blanca is nearing summer conditions. Found that spikes made the handful of snow crossing more secure in the early morning. All snow avoidable on direct route to Ellingwood. Harder to say on trail conditions on descent of the standard Ellingwood route as a couple of glissades were taken. Likely similar story to Blanca route. 

Route: N/a
Posted On: 6/7/2025, By: hanada
Info: Didn’t go up Blanca. I did california yesterday, so just sharing some pictures from that side of the Blanca group yesterday and taken from driving 160 today. The area is very dry for early June. Lindsey also looked mostly dry. I didn’t get any pictures of the crestone/KC area bc it was in the clouds when I was on the summit of Cali, but I would expect similar conditions. 

Route: Lake Como Approach
Posted On: 2/23/2025, By: wintersage
Info: There is a solid bootpack/trench all the way up to the camp sites by Lake Como. We parked at 8800’ but it’s certainly doable to get to 9300’ or a bit more before the snow gets too deep. From the Lake, there’s a trench to Holbrook Creek where it looks like another party went up LB’s west ridge or to the hourglass. We kept our snowshoes on until past Crater Lake and switched to microspikes but the snow was still quite slippery by midday so we tried to avoid treadmill-ing on the snow by sticking to the rock ribs. Microspikes were a good choice on the ridge to the summit of Blanca due to the rock hopping. Our plan was also to grab Ellingwood but figured it would be possibly better with crampons and a bit more time. Overall a good warm day with minimal wind, a rarity for this season. 

Route: Lake Como Approach
Posted On: 1/17/2025, By: jacolc
Info: Jan 15: For E/B used flotation to 13330' (0-18in snow deep, average 4-6 where switch to crampons) and generally fallow bottom of drainage. Especially above Blue Lake do not fallow summer road/trail. Very windy. On my way down most of my trench was filled with snow. Jan 16: To LBear used flotation only below initial couloir, but deposit it above on the ridge. However after additional snow maybe useful on last part of traverse to bottom of hourglass. Traverse in little unconsolidated soft snow was slow moving with or without crampons. Maybe micro spikes will be better option. Hourglass was in great climbing condition. Very little avoidable ice, hard snow required technical crampons (long section of front pointing in excellent hard snow 50-65 deg)) and two ice tools. However I use one tool and tool/pole hybrid (BD Whippet). For every 10-30 feet I kicked rest steps, mainly for my climbing down. In this condition this is NO Error zone. 

Route: Lake Como Approach
Posted On: 1/6/2025, By: bigfoot1
Info: attempt. moderate boot trench until lake como, didn't need any traction. some moderately icy bits where the rocks poke out of the snow on the road. broke out in snowshoes until 12.5k ft. some parts were easy, other times I sank down to mid thigh. i would not follow my tracks after blue lakes.. ended up meandering around trying to pick a good line. it would probably be easier to take one of the snow gullies directly up. snow seemed pretty stable. gully up to the ridge of little bear is snowed in, but ridge looks dry. turned around at 1230 because i didn't want to get stuck driving back in the snow. yeah, i should have started earlier and summited but i really hate mornings. 

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 9/30/2024, By: Flatlander35
Info: While the weather was dry and sunny, the snow/hail from the previous few days was apparent on the trail. Starting at the headwall above Crater Lake at about 13,000 feet, slippery and frosted rocks were common. Small patches of snow were common from the saddle at around 13,800 feet until the summit. Overall summer-like conditions except extra caution should be taken due to slippery, frost-covered rocks. 

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 9/29/2024, By: dweiss
Info: Ascent was nice and safe. Hailed multiple times throughout the day, but not enough to make people stop. There were plenty of caves to hide in on the final ascent up if hail were to become a problem. Hail/Snow buildup made finding the Ellingwood/Blanca split-off point and the trail afterwards to the ridge difficult, but not impossible. Even if you get off the trail at that part, it is easy and safe to climb straight up to the ridge. 

Route: Lake Como Approach
Posted On: 9/26/2024, By: Ohio14ers
Info: Route is fairly clear up until the ridge scramble in which snow and ice are still around. Of note is right before the summit there is a difficult move where it is completely snow covered. I have 42 14ers done and felt it was just a bit too dangerous. Another fellow also turned around although a young couple made it. With benign weather conditions it could be melted out in a couple days. Just be aware it exists. One wrong slip and you would be in a world of hurt. 

Route: Lake Como Approach
Posted On: 9/20/2024, By: Androzs
Info: There is some hard crusty snow near the top that obscures and also makes the route more dangerous. 

Route: Blanca and Ellingwood
Posted On: 9/3/2024, By: chelsluckb2
Info: Hiked on 9/2. I decided to go the Zapata Falls route to knock off a bit of distance and avoid the labor day Lake Como crowds. The approach hike is gorgeous. I have seen a lot of high alpine lakes, and I thought South Zapata Lake was stunning. I went up C2. The hike up wasn't bad. As others have said, I would stick to the right mostly as there are decent holds and more solid rock. I was a little demoralized when I got to the top of C2 and saw the length of the talus section to the summit, but knocked it out without too much trouble. Lots of fun class 3 climbing near the summit! I traversed over to Blanca and tried to stay high on the traverse as much as possible. The rock is pretty loose at times but overall nothing too bad and the traverse is fairly short. With having to re-summit Ellingwood to get back to the TH, the elevation gain on this is no joke - I came in just over 6500 ft in 15 miles. The downclimb of the talus field and C2 was the lowlight of the day. Pretty much everything moves on the talus field, including huge boulders, so I went slowly. C2 is very loose and a slog of a downclimb, but I stuck to the more solid rock as much as possible. Overall, it was an awesome hike and I recommend this approach if you want fewer crowds on these peaks!