Mailbox Peak

So, Sophie the dog and I started the hike around noon. The weather was around 50°F and partly sunny. The wind gods smiled upon us all day--very little wind at all. The trail was pretty dry to dusty/loose for the first half of the hike. The second half of the hike, the soil was squishier with mudholes in places. At about 2.25 miles into the hike, we saw the first signs of snow. We then had patchy snow until the summit. Most of the time we could sidestep the spring-like snow; the exception being the first large rock field above the tree line. Someone was nice enough to kick deep steps in prior to our ascent so boots and trekking poles sufficed with no other traction devices needed. (Their was a foot deep glissade slide next to the steps that was tempting but we passed on it.) The summit was beautiful!!! 360° view of the surroundings, plenty of sun, and we had it all to ourselves, just the dog and me. The descent required trekking poles most of the way. We tried to make friends with a squirrel but he wasn't interested. We encountered 8 other humans and two dogs throughout the hike that seemed to have just as good a time as us. No bugs/mosquitoes. We were very excited to get back to the truck and find all the windows intact--saw evidence of a prior break-in/glass in the gravel. Sophie recommends this hike to all other pooches and humans, too.