This was a 2 day trip of 4 friends. We picked up our permit from the ranger station in Trout Lake - shout out to the Gifford-Pinchot ranger lady who ran through our entire plan with us to make sure we knew what we were doing - and then headed up to the mountain. The drive up to the trailhead is rough but passable if you go slow. I scraped bottom a few times in my low-riding Hyundai Elantra, but there was never a concern of getting stuck. We were able to hop on the trail by 3 pm.
(As an aside: Make sure you don't hop directly onto Cold Creek Trail, as that will lead you in the wrong direction. Sounds obvious, but we accidentally did it.)
Trail is clear up to Lunch Counter at 9400 feet. The hike up is right around 4 miles and took us 3.5 hours with packs. Bit dusty, but the trees are changing color and there are sections of wildflowers and beautiful views, so it's all worth it. There is one section of snow still left, but we did it in hiking shoes as the grade is slight enough. Lunch Counter was windy but there are tons of little rock fortresses that you can hunker down in and setup camp. There are also various water sources from which you can filter at Lunch Counter.
This late in the season it is very chilly at night. Sub-freezing and incredibly windy! We got to bed by 8:30 pm and woke up the next morning for an alpine start.
We got moving right around 3 am. This section here to the false summit of Pikers Peak (the summit immediately in front of you) is by far the most challenging section. It alternates between some snow fields and rock. The rock is horribly chossy, of a 2-steps-forward-1-step-back variety. The snow fields are very very icy right now and crampons are a must. We saw people going up in microspikes later in the day, but the early morning freeze is pure ice and crampons are strongly recommended. Glissading back down later was entirely out of the question.
After a long struggle up this section, Pikers Peak flattens out for a while until you reach the last 1000 feet or so to the true summit. By this point the sun was starting to rise, with morning colors and light rays starting around 6 am. Got to stop and take some gorgeous pictures of the sunrise, which was totally worth it.
We reached the summit aroung 6:30, which was right at 3.5 hours. At the summit there is an old hut which you can hide behind to avoid most of the wind. It was still incredibly chilly, even without the wind. We stayed for maybe 30 mins on the summit before everyone needed to move for warmth. Bear in mind the descent can also be pretty slow going, especially when you are trying to take care not to knock rocks down on climbers below you.
All in all it was a great trip. The descent took us right about the same time, and our total travel time ended up being around 13 hours not including time needed to setup and break down camp.
Bare minimum of must-haves for a climb this late in the season: heavy gloves, puffy jacket, outer shell, gaiters, crampons, ice axe, trekking poles (recommended). Most of our party climbed in hiking shoes/boots and then switched to mountaineering boots for the summit push from Lunch Counter. One in our party only had hiking boots (with strap-on crampons).
Have fun and good luck out there!
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