P
Paul M
Guest
We went up the Greeley Ponds Trail starting at 9:30am, with blue skies, sun, no wind, and a temp of 20 degrees at the base, 10 at the summit. The first 1.3 miles of the route is flat, and was rock hard frozen snow, with occasional ice. Microspikes were perfect for this section, and the trail was very fast. River crossings were no problem. The section from the G.P. junction to the base of the Osceola steeps (just beyond the overhead cliffs, which were really nice in the sunlight), had more ice than the flats, but we continued with the microspikes without any problem. Once we hit the steeps, we switched to crampons, which turned out the be a really good choice, as the trail soon became equal parts steep ice, ice covered rocks, and 8" deep snow. The crampons worked great, but one member of our group with only microspikes had a real struggle both ascending and descending. Beautiful views from the slide and outlooks near the top. All the way back to the car the trail was hard snow, and there was never any chance of postholing. Snowshoes would have been useless with these conditions, and dangerous on the steeps.
