Cutthroat Lakes via Walt Bailey Trail — Sunday, Jul. 15, 2018

The drive up the trail is good, the road is in great condition. Taller vehicles may have trouble passing under a fallen tree over the road. My Tuscon had a about 12-14 inches of clearance. We were the first to the TH and left at about 8:00 this morning. The trail is in mostly good condition, it is rutty and steep for the first bit. Once you get up to the first meadow you will shortly start to find the snow. It isn't that difficult to traverse, however it is pretty easy to lose the trail. It was a benefit having 3 in our group so we could wander short distances to find the trail. However, the rate the snow was melting in another week or two most of this snow should be gone. We made it to Cutthroat lakes in about 3 hours, the lakes are still partially covered, and the bugs were starting to get annoying, so we didn't stay long. Our destination was the summit of Bald mountain. The going was a bit slow, due again to the snow and losing the trail, however knowing the general direction we needed to go, we ultimately made it up to the ridge trail and eventually the summit in about 4.5 hours. On the way down just past the Upper and Lower Cutthroat Lakes, near the smaller lakes we found 3 sets of Cougar tracks following our boot prints (we we're the only ones on the trail at this point). It was clearly mother cougar and her 2 kids. These tracks followed our boot prints for a good 2 miles, which was a bit disconcerting. Ultimately we saw nothing, except 4 other groups on the way down. This was a challenging hike and definitely worth it.