Awesome hike in the snow today! Basically, this hike turned into a straight up the side of the mountain for 2.5 miles to the summit of Mount Baden-Powell, instead of the normal route which is about 4.5 miles to the summit. I stepped off at about 0640 wearing microspikes, as the beginning of the trail was pretty icy and snowy. Still lots of snow on the trail. Some packed, some not packed. Prior to reaching the bench (about 1 mile in) I decided to put on crampons and pull out the ice axe. After the 5th switchback, the trail was pretty much covered and hard to follow, so it was straight up from there, hence the reason it was only 2.5 to the summit.

I saw no one on the trail on my ascent and spent about 40 minutes at the summit all by myself. There is easily still about 2.5 feet of snow at the summit. The snow on the way up was hard (icy) in spots and soft in other spots, so post holing up was a slow battle. On my descent, I ran into at least 10 groups and solo hikers. Some prepared, some not so prepared. I saw some hikers with crampons and axe, some with just microspikes and a couple with no traction devices at all. I’m 100% certain that the individuals with microspikes had a slippery descent and the two with no traction at all, had a very difficult time on their descent. I highly recommend, if you go, wear crampons and a helmet and use and axe. Can you make it up and down safely without, sure, but why risk it.