Culebra Peak

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 5/9/2022, By: denverfromdenver
Info: Road is open all the way to 4x4 lot. The west winds can be fierce and you are exposed the whole time.99% dry. No traction or floatation necessary. Cue summer conditions. 

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 5/2/2022, By: ellenmseb
Info: My final Colorado 14er! Now is the time to get Culebra!! Road is open to 4-way. Permits are available until Memorial Day. 95% snow-free ascent by staying left. Glissade descent. 2 people skied but melting fast. Leave the snowshoes at home. Microspikes yes. 

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 4/25/2022, By: Cide
Info: Ranch managers led our group of vehicles approx. one mile up the trail to a pull off. Downed branches were removed by the ranch as we drove up the road. Past the one mile-in pull off was more downed trees and snow although the snow is melting fast at this time. The "Four Way" sign area is blanketed and the snow from there and into the lower bowl is just deep enough to have some postholing but nothing that is going to seriously mess with your ascent/descent time. Snow on the upper bowl has many rocks poking out and is not that deep. Ridges for the remainder of the route are a mix of snow and rock to the summit. Snow shoes may have helped for the lower bowl area and not much else but we managed without them and our ascent time was 5h45 min and descent shaved about 1h30 off for a combined 7h15. We are average to slightly above average speed hikers that were acclimated. 

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 4/10/2022, By: Jbakeman
Info: Road from HQ frozen on way in and muddy on the way out. Brought skis and spikes. Just wore hiking boots to the bowl. Skinned up bowl to ridge and ditched skis. Ridge is clear no traction necessary. Summited 11:30. Very windy. Tagging Red took about 1.5 hours. Skis made descent and road hour+ faster than those on snowshoes. We skied until the road turned back to dirt. Total time just under 10 hours. Maybe skinning up left side of bowl would have been faster. 

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 3/14/2022, By: coopereitel
Info: We had snowmobile tracks to 4-Way and then broke trail from there. We went lookers left of the bowl feature up to Punta Serpiente then the regular ridge over to Culebra. We summited at 1:15. It was quite windy. I skied the bowl on the way down which was holding nice powder. Skis definitely expediate the trip back to the ranch HQ. I got to the HQ at 3:40. We were looking at hitting Red, but were not really feeling it, so we decided to hold off. 

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 2/6/2022, By: laddymac
Info: Extremely unpredictable snow conditions. We were prepared with snowshoes and crampons because of new snow. We were breaking trail the whole way. Snow: 10" at the gate increasing to 18" -"24" at 13,000 and above. Because of low temps, extremely high winds etc. the footing would change from 3 foot drifts to hardened ice pack. There was no correct footware. The wind was relentless at 30mph, gusting to 40 mph. In these conditions I would avoid unless very fit, well outfitted, and you enjoy a long, brutal slog. See video: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1cksIav62GdTn-9N2Xpcw1-v7YDeGKTDL/view?usp=sharing 

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 1/25/2022, By: Lordofthegnar
Info: Woowee, long day on the mountain. Started from HQ. Trail was reasonably packed to about a quarter mile before Four Way. I put on snowshoes early as while I wasn't sinking in initially, my ankles were still sliding around more than I cared for. My friends didn't put on their shoes until closer to Four Way. Beyond that point, snowshoes were helpful the whole way. Snow conditions varied frequently from 1-2.5 ft drifts to supportive crunch. Winds were strong on the ridge and temps very low; bring thick gloves and I'd recommend using a nalgene or bottle instead of a bladder (my hose froze almost immediately once upon the ridge, even with an insulation sleeve). Bring goggles as well if it looks like it will be windy (and it often is). The folks at the ranch said it was taking most people 10-12 hours to complete the climb. Beautiful trek but definitely plan for a long day. 

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 1/17/2022, By: MrSmileweil
Info: Everyone on the mountain was let in at 6 am. Our group started at 6:25 am after building our A frames and doing other hike prep. The earliest group finished at 5:55 pm while our group and others finished 7-8 pm. Road had snow all the way up and so did the west face, but the coverage was not the best. Our group summited and skied down the west face gully. If planning on skiing I would bring rock skis and plan for the skiing to take a longer than expected because the coverage is a bit spicy. Looks like there is more snow in the forecast on Wednesday and Friday this week for those getting after this mountain next weekend. It might be enough to make the road easier to ski, but I don't know about the west face. There were a few parts of the hike where floatation was nice, but all of the hike could be done with no flotation if you don't mind a little bit of sinking. I haven't been tricked by a false summit in awhile, but that false summit really got me. 

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 1/3/2022, By: halfapackofapache
Info: Lots of snow from the recent storm. Broke trail 95% of the way. No snowmobile track from HQ to four way yet. Roughly 6 inches near ranch HQ and 1.5 - 2ft near tree line. Snow was extremely soft the whole way. Wore snowshoes from roughly 10k to 12k. Stashed snowshoes once above tree line. Still found plenty of deep snow drifted along the ridge but it was too inconsistent for snowshoes. Wore micro spikes from tree line to summit. Started at 6:30am. Summit at 2:30pm back to truck at 6:15pm. It was extremely slow going uphill through the snow. Definitely had to earn this one which was fitting as it was my finisher! Yippee. 

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 7/12/2021, By: alohamischa
Info: Summer conditions. A couple of snowfields on the first slope, but very easily avoidable as you can pick your own line up to the ridge. No snow all the way along the ridge to the summit. We also went over to Red Mountain with nothing but dry ground to step on! 

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 6/6/2021, By: Thmpsn_
Info: Road to upper 4WD trailhead is clear, and had no problems for Subaru Forester. Route is mostly summer conditions with only a couple avoidable snow patches. We tagged Culebra and then headed to Red Mountain. Completely avoidable snow for entire descent to saddle and ascent of Red Mountain. Total car-car time including both peaks was 6hrs and 36 minutes. 8 hikers completed Red Mountain this day. Warm weather, needed nothing more than a quarter zip. No microspikes needed. 

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 6/5/2021, By: taylorharris50
Info: Road open to the 4WD trailhead. There are still some snowfields but mostly avoidable. Carried micro spikes but did not use them due to warm weather / no ice. Trail to Red Mtn completely free of snow. Great day! 

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 5/30/2021, By: Ssgustafson
Info: The ranch has cleared the road to 4-Way for parking, which an easy 1 mile hike from the 4WD TH. The early morning hike up to the cairn was on firm snow. I used microspikes much of the way, although they will probably not be needed in a week or two. Past the cairn there is still snow along the ridge, but it is largely avoidable. Some may want spikes here in places. Culebra and Red summits were dry. I took a little shortcut coming back from Red to the Culebra ridgeline to circumnavigate the summit, which worked well. On the descent from the cairn at about 11AM - Noon, the snow was melting (fast!) and mushy, but was largely avoidable most of the way down. Pretty miserable knee / waist deep post-holing the last couple hundred yards to the 4WD TH. I didn't bring snowshoes and didnt see anyone else using them. In the coming week or two the snow and associated post-holing should be done with! 

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 5/28/2021, By: EthanBeltramo
Info: Climbed Culebra and Red today. They are letting people park at the 4 way now, the upper trailhead is still blocked by some drifts. The snow was super solid in the morning and I only needed microspikes. The last mile or so on the descent, things got soft and I was postholing waste deep even with snowshoes, but it is melting fast. However the snow stayed pretty solid on the ridge. Most snow is avoidable on the ridge and all the way to red mountain. A lot of the postholing can be avoided by being creative and taking a longer route around the snow field. Also a lot of the snowfield can be quickly glisaded down to make the descent much faster and avoid some postholing. Took my micros off after the initial climb to the large cairn. Didnt put on my snowshoes until the last mile or two on the decent. 

Route: Northwest Ridge
Posted On: 5/24/2021, By: durkan
Info: Wet day put there today. Similar conditions as previous post. - road dry or snowdrifts avoidable until upper 4wd trailhead. Road muddy with downed trees - No Red, but one person did make it. Looked good with just traction. - HQ start, no exceptions per staff. - Snowshoes helpful on descent, but slipping occurred. Needed between 4wd trailhead and ridge only - clocked about 14 mi, 5k ft of gain for just Culebra