"Amazing hike for my first 14er! Anything after 13k ft is double the effort but entirely worth it once you get the view from the top. A bit of mild scrambling over the boulder section over the last couple hundred feet to the top. So much fun!" — BrotherGoldenHair • Aug 27, 2024

"This was my first 14er. I got off from work early enough to where I knew I could make the summit with plenty of sunlight. Started at the trailhead at around 5:15 p.m., and got to the peak at 7/8pm. " — edgar-jlopez-roldan • Jul 21, 2023

"June 6, 2023. 3rd Colorado 14er and 6th 14er overall. Nice summit views. The trail was pretty muddy had had some standing water, so having waterproof mountaineering boots was great. Booted it to the summit and wore microspikes briefly for the descent. No post-holing. It was a cold morning and the mud and water on the trail was frozen on the ascent. There is a little stream crossing that would normally be easy to rock-hop, but the rocks were icy. I crossed slightly upstream over a sketchy snow bridge. The ice melted when I came back down and I easily rock-hopped. " — runningvegan • Jun 6, 2023

"Becca, Whitney, Jeremiah and I drove out crazy early and saw sunrise from the foothills of Bierstadt. We summited earlier than we thought, and the altitude gave SOME OF US gas. Jeremiah and I both had a headache for much of the climb, but his slow steady pace allowed us to make progress and take far fewer rests than the other hikers on the trail. For each of us, it was the first 14,000+ ft mountain!" — mikebenjamin • Jul 29, 2021

"10/10/2020: Rare clear day in the land of smoke. Over 200+ people on the mountain today but thinned out at the top. Golden Eagles, Pikas, and momma and baby Mountain Goats were better company. Took old decommissioned “trail” down to willow crossing. (6.5/2600)" — LoneWolf • Oct 10, 2020

"Fun climb, in spite a there being a huge number of people climbing and on the summit. Not an epic climb in terms of distance or elevation gain, but it's steep all but the first mile. So it will work your legs. Decent trail most of the way, but the last ~1/4 mile is a rock scramble that takes a while to get up or down." — stevebrown • Sep 24, 2020

"Made the trip with a friend from town. Luckily she brought running spikes and poles. Managed to get to the top in 1:56, which we are pretty proud of considering this was my second ascent and her first. Super windy close to the top but a lot calmer on the actual summit. We were glad we started around 6. It started getting busy as we were headed back down." — amybowen09 • Jun 27, 2019

"Started well before sunrise with the intention of reaching the summit in time to watch it. We were close. The going was a little slower than anticipated due to one of our party not feeling 100%. Still an awesome day!" — Kevin • Sep 2, 2017

"Started at sunrise. Obstacles included crossing a flooded stream and battling chilly wind gusts. Sun came out at the top and turned out to be a beautiful day. Took a little less than an hour to descend. This was my 2nd summit!" — melissakwriter • Jul 15, 2017

"My first winter fourteener! I can't stress enough how much more difficult this was than I ever expected. We started at about 5 am, made summit around 2:30 or 3 pm, and made it back to the car around 6 or 7 pm. A very long day! There was a pretty solid trench for a lot of it, but in places the wind had completely covered it so people had made their own new routes. Without snowshoes this would have been nearly impossible in some places. We made tons of wrong turns and bad route finding decisions on the way up that added tons of extra time to our accent. Following other people's tracks proved to be a huge mistake in several cases. The way down went a lot smoother and we made it down in much better time, reaching the summer trail head just as it was getting dark. It was a beautiful clear day and there was no wind at all on the way up, not even at the summit. The wind picked up a little bit on our way down, but still was not to bad. This climb kicked the crap out of me, and was a very humbling experience. We made a lot of mistakes, but fortunately none that led to any life threatening situations. In different circumstances they could have been. I learned a lot from this climb and gained..." — IanWright • Jan 27, 2016