Burroughs Mountain — Saturday, Jul. 6, 2024

Started out a little after 5am on Saturday to catch the sunrise on my way up to Burroughs Mountain via Frozen Lake.  Beautiful clear morning, passed a few small groups that had camped off the trail just up from the parking lot.  There were a couple of hard packed snow crossings as you reach the "saddle" and turn towards Frozen Lake.  Not difficult to cross but were icy this early in the morning.  Arrived at Frozen Lake and saw two folks headed up Burroughs.  As they neared the top of the first climb, I noticed them leaving the trail and picking their way straight up a snowfield.  As I approached the snow field, a young couple was coming down and they said they didn't try and cross because it was icy and they was not trail going across it.  They thought I could do it since I had poles and micro spikes with me.  As I arrived at the snowfield I decided it wouldn't be safe to try since I was on my own.  Instead of opting to go straight up the icy snowfield, I decided to scramble down, around and then back up on the other side.  I made it but it was not easy.  I made the decision I would be taking the trail to Shadow Lake on the way back.  Once on top of the 1st Burroughs, I missed the trail and crisscrossed the plateau a little until I found it.  There are a couple more snowfields to cross heading up to 2nd Burroughs that I was able to cross without putting on my micro spikes.  Made it to the stone chair and enjoyed the view for a while and watched the two hikers ahead of me continue their way up to 3rd Burroughs.  Looked like they had a number of snow fields to navigate.  Headed back to Sunrise via the Shadow Lake route.  There were two snow fields to cross that were manageable with hiking poles and the right shoes.  I passed a couple that was trail running up and they turned around at the second snow field, not wanting to cross it in their running shoes.  Passed the "lake" and continued towards Sunrise.  The groups coming up told me the rangers were directing hikers up this route instead of the Frozen Lake route.  Maybe by next week the snowfield will be melted out enough to take the Frozen Lake route safely.  About a mile from Sunrise I came across a younger female bear grazing across the meadow to my left.  I watched her for about 15 minutes and then started to continue along the trail.  My timing was bad, she turned towards the trail just after I started to move.  She huffed and stomped her front paws once and I slowly backed up the trail away from her.  She continued down to the trail on crossed to the other side.  I waited for while and then slowly moved forward on the trail, making plenty of noise.  I didn't see her and continued my way back to my car.  Beautiful morning on the trail and highly recommend trying it if you can get yourself up early enough to be there by sunrise.  You avoid the timed entry.  I was somewhat surprised that the parking lot wasn't more crowed when I got back (around 10:30am) but activity seemed to be picking up.