Little Bear Peak

Route: Lake Como Approach
Posted On: 3/30/2025, By: Cruiser
Info: Had the day off so I ran down after work yesterday to see how the Sangres were looking at low tide. I drove up to the large pullout at 10.2k and camped there. Intermittent snow from 10k on the road until the lake then continuous snow afterwards. Lake is still frozen but there's a little bit of creek poking thru just below the lake for filtering water. I didn't use traction until the lake but snowshoes were helpful (I post holed up to my waist a couple times and then put em on) along the shore and up the apron below the gully to gain the west ridge. Gully was filled in despite low tide but the snow was punchy even after a solid freeze last night so I shut it down and opted for the fun run instead of the summit. Last time I climbed LB it was a month later in the season and a lot better snow year so the snow in the gully and hourglass were isothermic and far more confidence inspiring than what I found today. Sorry, no pics as I forgot my phone. 

Route: SW Ridge via Tobin Creek
Posted On: 3/2/2025, By: wintersage
Info: Bone dry from base, along the long talus section to Mama Bear. From Mama Bear to Little Bear Summit there is snow in all the wrong places. Microspikes and ice axe were considerably useful, not only for navigating snow patches but also for dry tooling at times. The bushwhack is still there and it still sucks. As far as wind and weather went, it was the perfect day to tackle this: there was only mild wind at sunrise and nothing during the technical sections. 

Route: West Ridge and Hourglass
Posted On: 2/27/2025, By: bigfoot1
Info: I'm baaaaaack and have been reacclimatizing in co for the past week and a half from my sea level trip but still have altitude sickness anyway woo! Another attempt... 14.8mi, 5.8k ft and NO SUMMIT! Ridiculously good weather though. Very early start in the dark for me, originally set out to take the ridge to south little bear and go onto blanca and ellingwood but was too scared to leave the road in the dark to bushwack so decided to take the standard route instead. Didn't need any traction until Lake Como and switched to snowshoes there to re-break out a filled in trench. Stayed in snowshoes until the top of the gully. There were some hollow sounding bits and a lot of faceted underlayer, but the top crunchy layer only got to 4" or so thick at most, probably on average 2" so I wasn't worried about being buried if it let go. It's definitely better to stick to the ridge as long as you can. The lower trail is hard to follow and covered with annoying slabs that take forever to cross because they are all unconsolidated/faceted/granular and your feet are going to slide. Definitely got worse as the day went on with the temps rising. Started up hourglass gully and while there is snow on top, under is almost all rock solid ice or rock. I kept sliding down and having to self arrest to not lose progress. I reached the point to where the green rope is, had to make some sketchy moves to grab it, and then picked at the ice to free it for maybe 5 or 10 minutes until I gave up and came to the realization I would have to descend the same way as I was way behind schedule. Super sketchy on the way down, ice was melting enough that my ice axe could "stick" but a self arrest at speed due to a fall would have been out of the question. I also learned why most crampons have the front pokey spikes... mine do not. I honestly got really lucky to make it down and I'm not even sure how I did. I wouldn't do it again with my current gear. It wouldn't have been a nice 1000ft slide down to the basin. Got some frostnip on my fingers due to my gloves ripping from some aggressive rocks and ice. On another note, the west ridge proper looks pretty dry and that might be an easier option for climbing with minimal snow and ice. I was tempted to try but didn't want to cliff out on an unfamiliar route. The other west ridge (southwest ridge) where South Little Bear is looks 98% dry and like an easier climb. Saw 2 other climbers going up the middle to Blanca/Ellingwood as well so that is also freshly tracked again! 

Route: Lake Como Approach
Posted On: 2/23/2025, By: daway8
Info: Did Little Bear via West Ridge Direct after camping Friday night at Lake Como to get practice with climbing after a night of winter camping. There was a remnant trench up to Lake Como, which was a huge relief, because my pack was nearly 50lbs. As expected, the ridge was largely dry thanks to wind/sun, but there was plenty of snow in the gully leading up to the ridge. There were enough sections of exposed rock scattered around that I gambled that any cohesive slabs there might be, in theory couldn't be too large or connected, despite that gully being within the potential target zone identified by CAIC as moderate danger. Used snowshoes partway up but then stuck them standing up into the hill and switched to crampons. On the ridge, all the class 4 and 5 sections were practically summer conditions. It was actually the class 2 and 3 sections which were made more challenging because the snow piled up there and trapdoors on a narrow, highly exposed ridge can be hazardous. So ironically, I felt more at ease on the class 5 sections than the class 2 sections. Looking down at the Hourglass from above made it look like a treacherous mix of steep snow and ice so I stuck with just returning down the West Ridge Direct route. Got past most of the main obstacles before the sun set but still had a lot of ridge to follow in the dark as the wind picked up. Watched a pair of headlamps coming from the direction of Blanca as I navigated the ridgetop in the dark - apparently wintersage and partner. At the gully, I decided to risk trying to glissade down with ice axe in hand. At first it was working well, and I could easily stop whenever I wanted but then I hit an almost bulletproof section and it took me probably 30-40ft to self-arrest, which really got my heart pumping. Eventually worked myself to a spot where I could put on crampons, which made it much better. Did some more glissading and triggered multiple mini-slides where a swath maybe 15ft wide would run for perhaps 30 feet or so, mostly just stripping off a thin wind crust. Whenever a decent amount of snow started moving, I paused and made sure it came to a stop before continuing on. In short, I agree with CAIC having this zone in the Moderate region right now, despite how dry much of the region is. Overall, West Ridge Direct is a viable winter route if you don't mind highly exposed class 4 and 5 to both go up and downclimb. In my opinion that was less sketch than what the Hourglass was looking like from my vantage point. 

Route: West Ridge and Hourglass
Posted On: 1/17/2025, By: jacolc
Info: Jan15: 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: 10/13/2024, By: summit21
Info: Mostly dry with a smattering of snow on the upper shaded areas of the NW face. It is easily avoidable and not enough to alter the climbing or route up the NW face. The traverse, Blanca, and Ellingwood were bone dry with late summer-like conditions. 

Route: West Ridge and Hourglass
Posted On: 10/7/2024, By: kevinnikolaides
Info: LB standard route plus traverse to Blanca and Ellingwood. Summer conditions. Small amount of water running through the hourglass but easy to avoid. Get after it before it snows again! 

Route: West Ridge and Hourglass
Posted On: 10/2/2024, By: lyrichildner
Info: Some left over snow patches and mud in the first gulley up to the ridge but dry after that. Hour glass was easy to climb up but some afternoon graupel and really light rain did slicken it up for the decent. Got lucky with no one on the hour glass with us as the loose rock was awful. 

Route: NW Face and traverse to Blanca
Posted On: 9/15/2024, By: climbingyogi
Info: Dry conditions all the way. This was my second time up Little Bear and Blanca, but my first time on the NW face and traverse. NW face does seem quicker than the standard route. Think we parked around 9800'. Started hiking the road around 4:30am. Got to the base of the NW face around 6:30am. Summit of Little Bear at 8:30am. Started traverse around 8:40am, summited Blanca at 10:50am. Descended Blanca at 11am and back to car at 2pm. 

Route: West Ridge and Hourglass
Posted On: 9/12/2024, By: crowdsurf
Info: Conditions in the Hourglass were as good as could be on this day. It still seems to be getting warm enough during the day that the small amount of water running down the gully is not completely freezing yet. It is getting cold at night so this will likely change soon. No verglas during our climb but the peaks are getting snow up high as was evident in the shaded sections that do not see much sun. My tent at Lake Como had interesting ice formations on 2 of the 3 nights I was there. There is a new blue rope in addition to the green rope that has isolation knots. It is a little longer and likely 70m. As always, do not rely on it even though it appears to be new. Rain and graupel were visible in the Hourglass after exiting on this day. Please remember to be responsible with your waste. Poor backcountry etiquette was visible at the campsites east of the lake. 

Route: West Ridge Indirect
Posted On: 9/3/2024, By: sean23
Info: We climbed LB via the Indirect Route that daway posted to the forum. The route seems much safer to us than the hourglass, and we plan to post a trip report soon. Conditions on the route were solid. No precip to contend with on the ridge 

Route: West Ridge and Hourglass
Posted On: 9/3/2024, By: caesarsalad
Info: Perfect weather for climbing - sunny, low wind, no storms. Gotta love September! Hourglass has a steady trickle in the center, but pretty easily avoidable. Bright green rope is still in great condition and we used it as a sanity hold on the way down. Going right of anchor is definitely loose - had some people knock sizeable rocks down toward us from there, would heartily recommend going left of the anchor. It's fairly well cairned. 

Route: LB to Blanca to Ellingwood
Posted On: 9/3/2024, By: ballardwf04
Info: Drove up the road around 9PM Friday night. We made it to 9500' in a first gen stock Honda Pilot. Could have gone higher, but honestly it wasn't worth the pain of hearing more rocks hit our undercarriage. As mentioned in other reports, if you can make it up the steep and rocky 200' section near the national forest boundary, you can make it to at least 9500, if not 9800. I would strongly recommend skid plates for this road. We didn't have any, and it was truly awful. Keep in mind the drive down will be worse. We made it to the lake around midnight, slept from 12-6 (missed alarm), then cranked out LB. 2:30 to the summit, no one in the Hourglass. I found LB comparable to the Red Gully on Crestone Peak, but then again no one else was in the Hourglass and we didn't have to downclimb. The traverse took about three hours. I did the Bells traverse a few weeks prior, and this is a completely different beast. The exposure is massive and sustained, and the whole thing is just so dang long. The crux for us was a highly exposed move left of the first tower encountered on the downclimb. Apparently others have climbed up and over the tower, which would probably be better. Bivwacko was chill. Catwalk is spicy but short. All in all a great time, but close to my limit of what I'd want to do. Blanca to Ellingwood went quick. It looks much longer than it is. A storm rolled in over Lindsey and we had some light graupel, but were blessed with no storm. Such is the consequence of a summit at 2PM. Made it back to camp around 4, and back to the car by 5:30. As mentioned, the drive down the road will be worse. Keep that in mind. In summary, a great and heinous day. Go get these ugly beasts before the snow falls! 

Route: West Ridge and Hourglass
Posted On: 8/25/2024, By: swilson753
Info: Hiked into the lake on Sat afternoon in a thunderstorm. We had a couple additional showers before midnight as well. We debated whether we'd stick with the original plan to do Little Bear or pivot to Blanca/Ellingwood. We decided to take our chances and go for Little Bear. It wound up being the right choice - the route was mostly dry except for water in the middle of the Hourglass. We were one of four parties on LB today. One guy soloed the traverse, the other two parties just did LB. At least one other group we talked to made the switch to B/E instead of attempting LB due to the rain. One interesting fact we learned today is that there's actually two sets of fixed lines. The first one (currently neon green, with an orange rope tied up at the anchor) is the one shown in the route description and goes through the choke. The second (currently blue) is above to the climber's right of the first. We found both ropes and anchors to be in good condition (albeit wet) and used them for arm-wrap rappels on the descent. We found this to be very helpful for our group. I didn't touch the ropes until I or my partners fully inspected them top to bottom. While they might be in good condition today, that might not be true in a week. Use your best mountaineering judgment to evaluate the system. Doing an actual rappel with an ATC/rap device and harness would be a nightmare due to knots in the lines. We had the Hourglass to ourselves for most of the climb. As others have said, it's 100% possible to ascend and descend without kicking down any rocks. We ascended left of the water and the first anchor. We ended up descending climbers' right of the first anchor because it was less steep, but had lots of loose rocks. We found descending the first gully to be the worst part of the climb. It's loose and tedious. It's not as bad as descending Challenger or South Maroon, but it's definitely not one of my favorite gullies. This one lives up to the hype. It's a challenging climb. If you've done other class 4 climbs and can tread lightly, you can do this one. I really enjoyed the challenge, but I'm not in a hurry to repeat it due to the objective hazard and tedious road walk and first gully. 

Route: Lake Como Approach
Posted On: 8/24/2024, By: buckfina
Info: The summer monsoons are here and first night camping it rained all night so we waived off LB and did Blanca and Ellingwood. A few short rains the evening of 8/21 did not add much water and about 4 groups climbed LB on 8/22. Much has been said about how difficult LB is, some hyperbole and some downplayed. It is a physically taxing climb d/t in part the hike in, as well as the steep gully and hourglass combined w the most loose rock I've encountered in 44 climbs. Lake Como is great camping w/ plenty of water so hydration is good. The hourglass has a small amount of water in the center which you can avoid by staying left, or use the decent rope to help steady yourself, but don't "rappel" on the rope - its deteriorating every day. The downclimb was tougher for me and ruined a good pair of pants. Agree w/ other comments about the gully - go left or right and use the wall to steady yourself as the rock is super loose. Give yourself time - the weather can change quickly due to monsoons and by noon it was clouding and by 2P there was minor rain. One group climbed the gully in the dark - not for me - but you could get there at sunrise about 6A if you feel the same way. Enjoyable climb but may not repeat as that hike in is an effort.