The trail starts out with substantial amounts of ice covering it which were quite slippery. I debated bringing my spikes and regretted not bringing them for most of the trail. The trail improves until the turn off to Granite Mountain where more sheets of ice cover the trail which are quite tricky to navigate (I fell rather hard on the way down here).
From there on the trail can be done easily with spikes on your feet- not enough snow to warrant the use of snowshoes but extra traction is highly advised as it is compact and slippery. Some small trees are poking their branches across the trail- so watch out for your eyes.
Once you reach the meadow, you will want snowshoes but a determined person can make it without them (not happily I will add). Once you reach the spine, there are parts that are rocky and hard to navigate with snowshoes and others that the snowshoes help a ton on. The snow is still only about 2ft deep and most of the old beargrass stems are poking through. If you decide to go along the summer route- there is a lot more snow there and not many tracks to follow.
Overall it was a beautiful place to spend the changeover to the New Year and I barely slept as I was having too much fun taking photos!
