Humboldt Peak
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A couple weeks after Memorial Day I thought I'd try again to climb my first 14er of 2019. There was too much snow in the Sawatch mountains, (see Browns Creek) so I thought I would try farther south in the Sangre de Cristo mountains. My plan was to try the east ridge route of Humboldt Peak instead of hiking all the way past the peak to the South Colony Lakes and then climbing up the standard west ridge route. I tried to arrive at the South Colony 2WD trailhead about sunrise, but parked at the trailhead just a little behind schedule.
After a couple of miles I turned off the road at the Rainbow trail junction and had no trouble finding the climbers trail along the ridge. As I hiked along the ridge a large ground foraging bird didn't like my presence and flew up into a tree to yell at me. 
After another couple of miles, that trail faded out as more and more snow started to cover the ground. I continued climbing, working my way upwards, sometimes on solid ground, and more increasingly on the snow and through deep drifts. Struggling through the snow was slow, cold, and wet. I finally made it to treeline, where the sun was warmer, but I no longer had any protection from the wind. A very strong and frigid wind. With wet and cold legs, the chance of frostbite was high, so I decided to turn around.
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