Dog Mountain

6.9 miles of hiking • 2750' elevation gain •

After reading Jack's TR with epic amounts of snow on Dog Mtn, I decided it would make a cool trip, or at least a nice adventure. Due to some errands, I got to trailhead very late at 2 pm, packed my headlamp and snowshoes, and headed with the crowds. The cars were parked the entire length of the lot, not less than a hundred of people on the mountain that day. Needless to say, the trail was well-trodden already when I started up.

First spots of snow appeared just 2 switchbacks up, and in less than 1 mile up entire trail was covered in well-packed snow and some icy spots. It was probably knee deep at a 1600' viewpoint meadow, but just a few inches under the trees. I put on snowshoes just after easy/hard trail junction, but took them off 1/3 mile later, past the steep spot. Didn't really need snowshoes at all, but needed something for traction on a slippery trail; microspikes or even crampons would be perfect that day.

Up on Puppy Dog there was some vicious wind that scoured snow off to the ground, but towards the summit the wind died off. The tracks headed off straight up to the summit rather than following the trail. Postholing was almost not an issue on the trail, but make one step off trail and you break through hard crust and sink at least 2 feet.

I just missed the sunset on the way to the summit, but had about 1/2 an hour of dusk to take pictures of summit meadow and of mummified trees. Those snowy sculptures made the summit hard to recognize, it was just beautiful!