Humboldt Peak

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 3/26/2025, By: j12miskin
Info: Parked at 2wd trailhead, summited 3/25. Road is covered in snow about halfway up to the Rainbow Trail turnoff. Initial climb to the ridge is snow free, about half a mile after that it would be helpful to have flotation still, fairly continuous calf to waist deep snow until the tree line, though it is melting fast. I post-holed from 10500-11600 on the way up and the way down. Once you get above tree-line it is easy to avoid all snow, most of the ridge is dry with patches that aren't hard to navigate around. 

Route: West Ridge
Posted On: 3/28/2025, By: Danganman
Info: Summited midday, overall good weather, clouded up in the afternoon. There was no harsh weather, storms, or more snow. Was plentiful snow in the forest section. morning was fine pushing through, but the afternoon was pretty miserable, sinking, slipping, and falling knee-waist deep into the warmed-up snow. The road was decent but in the tree sections was rough. Avoid the tree wells near the trees and downed trees. stashed the snow shoes before the switchbacks to the ridge. Needed snowshoes, gaitors, trekking poles, and spikes for some patches of snow on the switchback sections. It was pretty steep and felt more manageable and safer in those parts. 17.5 mile day, 5.7k elevation from the 2wd drive TH. Few trucks made it up farther up the road to the pulloffs, only a few tracks were to the colony lakes TH. started at 5:30am and ended about 8:30pm. tough day but worth it. good luck if you try this spring 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 3/22/2025, By: ebpavlik
Info: Overall snow levels were not bad. I would recommend snowshoes and spikes- relatively bad postholing for around an hour before reaching tree line. Once above tree line, ridge is very exposed and snowshoes weren’t needed. Weather on this day was awful—extremely windy and a snowstorm was covering the peak and surrounding peaks, so we ended up turning around. 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 3/8/2025, By: MaryinColorado
Info: OMG. The end. Just kidding! But really. Let's talk about the road first. Rocks underneath the snow layer are covered with ice! (That's me in the red jacket splayed out. One of two falls on the sneaky ice.) Microspikes don't bite into the ice, so that's no help. Bottom line: my goodness, be careful. The snow below treeline is bonkers. Whatever trench may have existed previously is no more. We trenched our little hearts out, frequently sinking thigh/waist/chest deep. As my friend said when we put on snowshoes, "Oh, great. Now instead of sinking to my neck in my boots, I can sink to my neck in snowshoes." The layer of loose powder is so deep in parts, the snowshoes were honestly of neutral helpfulness. After 5.5 hours and 3K gain, physically I knew summit at a reasonable time was out of reach for me, and we still hadn't even broken treeline. So, we called it good and are ok with that. (Trench goes until about 11,7.) We were snowed on and socked in almost the whole time - until some time after we turned around, which seemed oddly fitting. Ha! 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 3/2/2025, By: down8104
Info: Summited 3/1, about 10-12 people out on the mountain. Conditions still pretty spot on from 2/22 update. Low wind and sunshine made for ideal weather. Trench is in great shape from Rainbow Trail turnoff through the trees and really made for expedient work. I used snowshoes for second half of it but was able to boot pack a bunch with spikes with early start. Stashed snowshoes at treeline and kept spikes on the remainder of the way up. I could've taken them off for the final ridge portion but was to lazy to do so. Coming back down, postholing wasn't as bad as expected. Hiking poles were a must in keeping me from falling/sliding excessively during that portion though. In it's current condition, this is a fun route for someone newer to winter climbs albeit it is long. It's a good step up from Quandary and less steep than Sunshine or Columbia (others I've done/attempted for comparison). Finally, here's a few last notes and photos. I never saw the sign for Rainbow TH turn off from route description (might've been further up road) but taking a right at the one pictured leads across the bridge and gets you there. Also including photo for Southeast Gully. Not quite continuous snow for skiing but better than I thought based on overall lack of snow on east ridge. 4:15AM start, 1:30PM finish, 12.53 RT and 5496 ft gain. 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 3/4/2025, By: imoe1
Info: Parked at 2WD lot and walked to the rainbow trailhead. The road had considerable ice on it. Floatation is required from the rainbow trailhead to the treeline. Route finding skills are something to consider because the trail is poorly maintained. Not much snow above treeline but enough to bring gaiters or pants that can tighten down on your boot. It was a hard day because of the snowshoeing, but not technical...be ready for a workout. 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 2/22/2025, By: ILnoise
Info: Summited Saturday 22 Feb 2025. Weather was amazing- felt like summer with a bluebird day and zero wind. Parked at 2wd TH and hiked the road up to Rainbow TH. Left the car 6:42am. Summit at 1:08pm. Returned to car 5:18pm. My tracker gave 12.52mi RT and 5490ft gain. Initial part of road was dry with patches of snow, but quickly becomes continuous snow. Fortunately someone had recently driven the road and the tire tracks were well packed 2.1 miles to rainbow trailhead. I don't know how far up the road they made it beyond rainbow. Snowshoes optional from rainbow trailhead to the start of the bushwhack, but pretty mandatory once you make your way onto the ridge. Once on the ridge we pretty quickly found some trench remnants from the last person up there and mostly followed it through a good 3/4 of the trees- trenching fresh would have been pretty tough. Postholes were going down about mid-thigh in places, but we floated across plenty, too. Heel lifts were very nice to have. Above treeline no snowshoes needed whatsoever- it was mostly dry with a few snowfields. I did throw spikes on for one icy pitch after the false summit and was glad I had them, however briefly used. 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 2/7/2025, By: APancoe1986
Info: Made the summit on a gusty day. First - thanks to Jason who a few days prior made a trench to 11200. Finished the trench to tree line. It was knee-hip deep but theres enough intermittent dry spots that snowshoes would be impractical. The rest of the mountain is either dry or largely avoidable windswept ice and snow. Honestly even the snow in the forest on descent felt like it was consolidated rapidly. If you can navigate the 1000 feet of snow through the trees (which is trenched) it’s very straightforward right now. FYI I would bring two pairs of footwear. It’s worth it to have a solid boot, ideally with an integrated gater for the forest. For everything else a trekking shoe will suffice. 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 2/3/2025, By: JasonCrane
Info: Humbled on Humboldt earlier today. I parked at the 2WD TH at ~8800 ft. S Colony Lakes Rd is packed down with tire tracks & easy travel to the Rainbow Trl junction. Rainbow Trail had a layer of fresh snow & then patches of dry rock & gravel past the pedestrian bridge & up to the start of the East Ridge route. There are rock cairns visible along the lower East Ridge, but shortly became a bushwhack through an obstacle course of blow-downs & thickets. Warm temps created wet, sticky snow that snowballs to your spikes & snowshoes. There were no remnants of previous hikers’ tracks on the East Ridge & trail-breaking was in ankle-high to knee-high snow at times. The upper ridge forest gets pretty steep & is still holding a good amount of snow. I opted to turnback at ~11.2k. Unfortunately, did not attain tree line, however once you exit the trees, Humboldt appears almost completely barren & dry from a distance. Climbers who can navigate the lower ridge & push through the trees will likely find themselves in much easier, dry conditions for the final ~2k ft. summit push. Micros were helpful for gaining footing on slick, wet melting snow. East Ridge has mixed coverages of snow & bare ground that would render snowshoes lesser effective unless you’re ok with a consistent juggle of taking them off & putting them back on. I did a full day of skiing on Saturday & lingering soreness was a contributing factor to why I turned back. If you’re not 100% physically, winter 14ers always find a way to exploit your weaknesses & require a wider margin of error. I’ve been on Humboldt’s East Ridge 2x in Jan/Feb & once in April & today’s conditions didn’t feel much like winter, but more like mid-to-late spring season. If you’re looking for a snowflake on your 14ers checklist, conditions on Humboldt are unseasonable right now & the opportunity is there. 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 1/23/2025, By: markf
Info: micro spikes and snowshoes to tree line; lots of bare ground above tree line. Very easy travel. 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 1/5/2025, By: Ecravy
Info: Snowshoes and spikes needed now. Ice axe was helpful for glissading. Most snow gone above tree line but we came down during a snowstorm so could be snowy the whole way now. GPS is very helpful as its very easy to get off trail with all the snowshoe trails going off trail. VERY windy above tree line. 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 12/31/2024, By: anw0001
Info: Started at the 2wd trailhead Saturday morning at 2am, wind was minimal till daybreak then it was a sustained wind in my face all day, miserable conditions. Didnt use snowshoes at all, postholed some coming out of treeline but nothing terrible. There is a good trail in the woods to follow for the most part, but can be wind blown, take a GPS! The ridge is wind blown as mentioned in previous reports so any snow is avoidable. Summited at 12:45 just in time, while on the summit clouds started pushing in and the wind became unbearable and dangerous, quickly down climbed and began the miserable trek back down, haha. See photos 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 12/21/2024, By: bfaulkne
Info: Bomber conditions on Humboldt right now. Snowshoes were helpful from 10,000 to treeline, especially with heel risers. Extremely bare above treeline. See photos. 

Route: West Ridge
Posted On: 12/8/2024, By: daniel_a34
Info: Hiked up to Broken Hand Pass, took 7 hours from 2wd South Colony trailhead (DID NOT CLIMB HUMBOLDT). Road to 4wd trailhead is packed by snowcat or snowmobile tracks, no flotation needed, and we didn't use snowshoes until the trail split. We took the south route (lower lake) in and the north route (upper lake) out. Route to the upper lake was easy to find because it looks like someone's skied the couloir on the south face of Humboldt? It was an easy trip out in showshoes. South faces have nice snow that sinks enough to be secure but not enough to be annoying. Snow is sporadic on these faces - see photos. 

Route: East Ridge
Posted On: 11/21/2024, By: bigfoot1
Info: There is a nice mostly packed trench on the road (was fully solid this morning, sunk down an inch or 2 on the way out). I broke out the east ridge up to treeline so there is now a rough snowshoe track. Snow from the road is about 1.5 ft deep, but is patchy until you get up to the first ridgeline. I would recommend not putting on your snowshoes until then. Below treeline, snow is an unpredictable amalgamation of faceted powder and granular mashed potatoes with a thin 1" crust on top. Had to kick in steps in the powder. No/very little snow above treeline and any snow patches are completely avoidable. I didn't use spikes or snowshoes above treeline.