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Princeton winter ascent; 8hrs |
According to strava...
Elevation Gain: 5,189
Mileage: 13.8
Time RT: 8hrs
7:30am - TH
The access road (closed now to cars) was fairly dry for the first 2 miles. As soon as my trail runners began to slip on ice I pulled out my microspikes.
9am - Tower (mi 3.2)
I met a sweet elderly man named Fan at the towers who spent time helping me figure out how to fix my loose microspikes and also drew me a map in the snow to help me find my way to the summit. He was nervous that I was alone and attempting to summit Princeton with all the fresh snow. What a kind soul! Just as he had explained, I followed 4 large switchbacks and then found the built up stairs on the right side of the road, about 1.5 miles up from the radio tower.
10am - Stairs (mi 4.8)
And then the party started. For the first 0.5 miles or so the snow wasn't so bad. I met a nice couple who had camped at the radio tower. I was impressed they had gotten that far without traction. And then... post hole mania that seemed to go on forEVER. The couple turned around, but I could see the summit wasn't that far and strava told me I only had about a mile left to go (does anyone know why strava seems to add mileage?). Slogging through knee-high snow and trying to dodge hidden sharp boulders seriously wiped me out. To top it off, I lost the foot prints I was following and had to trail blaze what I thought was the path of least resistance. I ended up hiking straight uphill to the ridge line because it seemed there was less snow up there. Apologies if anyone tries to follow those prints this week, definitely a thigh burner.
12:30pm - Summit (mi 6.9)
Coming down the snow covered rocks was challenging to say the least. I tried to follow my footprints, but I either couldn't find them or the wind filled them in with snow so I ended up post-holing all over again and nearly twisted my ankle a number of times.
3:30pm - car
Lessons: bring snowshoes? But really, does anyone know how to avoid post-holing in soft snow?
Thumbnails for uploaded photos (click to open slideshow):
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