Quick report for Granite Mountain. Our group of 5 plus one dog hiked to the lookout on a partly-cloudy Wednesday. It was a great day out, the hike took us just over 5:30 with a decent stop for lunch at the top.
TRAILHEAD
About a dozen cars at the trailhead, but we only saw two or three other groups on the mountain, so some must have headed toward Pratt Lake. Bathroom is open and there is a new electronic permit machine at the trailhead.
TRAIL
No snow until you get about to the pond at the 4850' level. The trail was affected by the avalanche that happened in the spring, a couple of the paths through the chute have tread damage that will need to be repaired. Nothing hard to get through, and there are no blowdowns on the trail.
SUMMIT RIDGE
We went up the summit ridge from the pond area rather than taking the normal summer trail. The boulders on the summit ridge are fully melted out. In some places you can stay on snow to the right of the boulders, but this is too steep in many places, and in other places you risk punching through to the moat next to the rocks, which happened to one of our party. For now, the boulders are the safest route, but they're quite large with big gaps in between, so not really appropriate if you don't like scrambling, or have a dog with you. One member of our party with a dog dropped into the basin a ways up, then climbed up the snow to rejoin the summit ridge higher up.
Plenty of rocks to sit on at the lookout, with fantastic views all around. We got clouded in now and then, but it was a great day overall.
SNOW FUN
The back side of Granite is a glissading paradise right now, as is typical for this part of the season. If you drop down from the lookout about 100' vertical along the ridge you came up, you can easily glissade down to the summer trail in the basin about 250' below. We did this in three segments, as there are some rock outcroppings that make it infeasible to do in a single long glissade track. Normally one wants an ice axe to glissade, but if the snow is soft (ish), it works with a trekking pole or just using your boots, elbows, etc.! Lots of fun.
You can also just plunge or "boot ski" down the slope with no gear at all, three of our party went this route and they got down just as fast. Much nicer that having to scramble back down the boulder field. You might want gaiters to keep the snow out of your boots, but on a warm day you may enjoy the cool-off. :)
Hiking out the snow-filled basin along the summer route was easy on our trip, as there was no post-holing and we only sank in a couple inches. Your mileage may vary on a warm day.
If the boulder ridge to the lookout or the steeper glissade area are too adventurous for you, there is excellent safe sliding available off the lower part of the ridge at the bottom of the basin. Just follow the trail left of the snow until you run into the boulder field, and turn right - approximately where Picture #1 was taken. Be aware, if the snow is too soft, you may no be able to get a glissade going on the lower-angle hill without a sled! You can see this "bunny slope" in Picture #3 in back on the left.
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