Thanks for the info guys.
I ended up doing Moriah on Tues. It was patchy snow up to 1500’ where I put on my snowshoes and kept them on all the way up to the summit. It was a long trek up. (It took me 6:15 to make it up.) After about 1/3 way up the tracks stopped, and I was on my own. I don’t know if you can call it breaking trail, but not having any tracks to follow was new to me.
As Enapai said , it was hard to follow the trail at times, and I lost it a couple of times. I used my GPS to get back on track. I realized that I was hiking with my head down, and not watching the trail. After I paid more attention to the trail and its surroundings, I found I could follow (read) the trail (even with the faded blazes) and I didn’t get off track the rest of the day. It was one of the highlights of the day, a lesson learned on the trail, if you will. Just call me Jeremiah Johnson from now on.
How long will the snow last? Not long, by my return trip, (which took 3:15) my tracks from the morning were already melting away.
Coming down was interesting. At times, I resembled the classic telemark skier, one leg bent as I slid down the steep sections. Other times, Body Miller, ski poles up in front of me blocking the gates (branches) in my way. There were those times where I looked like a snowball too.
The best, though, was how I felt - like a kid sliding on my butt (what’s the name for that?) down the mountainside.
Moriah Pix here
