Granite Mountain, Granite Mountain - Winter — Wednesday, Dec. 14, 2005

Snoqualmie Region > Snoqualmie Pass

Two of us enjoyed a beautiful day in complete solitude on this trail off of Exit 47/I-90. Beware: lack of recent new snow has turned the existing snowpack into a rock-hard surface in a lot of areas. Granite Mountain trail currently is more suitable for crampons/ice axe than snowshoes. Even the parking lot is a sheet of ice. Avalanche danger is pretty much non-existant, but be cautious out there. Some of the snow in the wide draws on Granite is so hard that a boot can barely leave a mark, and these areas can be exposed from time to time. I remarked to my climbing partner that some under-equipped hiker is going to head out in this nice weather spell, have a slip on hard snow, and get banged up really badly. Make sure that's not you.