My girlfriend and I started our trip from the Martin Creek trailhead. We hit snow on the road up about a half mile from the parking area. As of today is was a little slippery but I never had to put my truck in 4 wheel drive to make it all the way up. The bathrooms in the parking area were locked. Not sure if they lock them seasonally or if it’s due to the government shutdown. The parking area was mostly full with about 10 other cars at that time. Along the way we only passed one other pair of hikers so we must have all been spaced out or took different routes.
We got on the trail just after 9:30. We took the lower grade to start and did the whole loop counter clockwise. It was a beautiful sunny day. I don’t think it has snowed up here much at all for about a week to 10 days I would guess. The trail did have patches of snow but we had no problems making it in regular hiking boots. We were glad we brought our trekking poles though. Especially when we hit the switchbacks at the Windy Point crossover trail to the upper grade. It was quite slippery in some spots.
Once we reached the upper grade trail we took the 1/4 mile trip to the Windy Point overlook to take a break for some lunch. The snow was considerably deeper on that short stretch but still passable today due to the snow being packed down by other hikers. As the name states it was quite Windy but the views of Stevens Pass were great. We did not try to go any further but it looked like the passable part of the trail ended at the look out as we did not see the trail continue on through the snow.
After lunch we headed back toward the Windy point crossover junction and continued along the trail on the upper grade. The snow on the ground was mostly consistent from this point for the first couple miles but still not a problem. We passed several streams and a few smaller water falls that were flowing over the large concrete wall that parallels the trail. The snow on the trail dwindled a bit after we passed the Corea crossover trail. We ran into several stretches of trail at that point with little to no snow the rest of the way to the Martin Creek crossover.
We completed the loop and got back to the trail head just before 2:00. There were still several cars in the parking area. I think we got super lucky in mid January to be able to not only have such a beautiful mild sunny day but found the trail to be in such good shape with no trouble hiking over the packed snow. Not sure if others a week from now would be so lucky and may need snowshoes.
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