West ridge and east ridge clear and dry. WARNING: THERE IS A CRAZED NIBBLE-OBSESSED JACKRABBIT ROAMING THE BASIN AND CHEWING ON YOUR GEAR. He is not afraid and he loves the taste of slings and straps. He also tried to taste tents, backpacks, water bottles, etc... but is not interested in the food we had at camp. This rabbit is aggressively cute -- he resisted attempts to be pepper sprayed or snowballed... because that would just be heartbreaking. Eventually I think he found some people at a higher camp to bother.
Don't bother with snowshoes, microspikes, or ice axe if attempting the west ridge route. Just bring waterproof footwear (gaiters too) as most of the trails resemble small streams right now.
Snow begins after departing the road at the start of the wilderness area. However there are no patches that are particularly deep, and coverage is spotty. Later in the day it's mushy but the trail has been packed heavily and is still pretty supportive. In the morning it is pretty bulletproof.
There is widespread snow cover after entering the S. Colony Lakes basin. Again, not particularly deep, and very supportive if following the bootpack. Most of the campsites near the lakes are inundated with water or still covered in snow. We found a nice spot though. The trails are mostly submerged in water-- wear good shoes and trudge down the middle of it.
The saddle is probably the hardest/sketchiest part of the west ridge route right now. There are three or so steep snowfields that need to be crossed. However they have deep bootpacks making the traverse pretty trivial if you follow the footsteps. I just wouldn't want to fall early in the morning when that steep snowfield is iced over. After ascending the switchbacks to the saddle there is no more snow.
In contrast to other recent conditions reports I found the trail very clearly and was able to follow it all the way to the summit with almost no departure from the trail. The trail through the S. Colony Lakes basin is very clear, as well as the switchbacks up to the saddle (looks like a massive, recent rockslide ran across part of the trail, there is huge gouges in the ground and boulders laying in fresh craters in the snow at the bottom). After the saddle, we thought the trail was extremely clear and straightforward up until about 13,750ft, where it turns into talus-hopping between cairns with bits of trail visible. No issues, really solid and clear trail. No snow except for a few small patches of ice and packed snow near the summit.
Broken Hand Pass is a mess right now. Still totally socked with snow (at least on the NE side), some recent slide activity, and I didn't really see any footsteps headed up that way. The Crestones (from the back) looked pretty snowy.
The lower lake is almost completely melted out and there were a lot of fish jumping (and some sort of large rodent -- marmot? swimming around and dunking under the water), if you're into that whole thing.
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