I had exactly 6 hours and 27 minutes between the end of my 7am dentist appointment and the start of my 2pm class. It was one of those glorious winter days without a cloud in the sky. Could I drive from Boulder to the Longs Peak trailhead, snowshoe about 4 miles and 3900 feet to the top of Mt. Lady Washington, gaze a few minutes at the ice-encrusted sheer granite walls of the Diamond, and then snowshoe back down and be back at my desk sitting down to lecture at 2pm? Yeah, I think I can just fit it in!

Below is a small sampling of photos from the day out in the snow. I did not take trailhead timestamps, but given my time constraints and an hour drive on either side, it must have taken me under 4.5 hours car to car.

It was a nice winter Sunday, and Nate and I were torn between another day of rock climbing or a day of playing in the snow. Given we had climbed (at Palisade Mountain) the day before, we decided on the latter. Mt. Lady Washington sounded like a good choice. The conditions were a bit less snowy than the previous March, so no snowshoes were needed.

Below is a small sampling of photos from the day out in the snow. It took us 5 hours and 45 minutes car to car, taking our time and enjoying the spectacular winter day in the mountains. (It was a bit humbling to recognize that I didn't think I could achieve my sub-4.5-hour time I had achieved in March. I was now noticing the altitude more. I had had Covid-19 between my March 2021 and December 2022 ascents, so this could have have something to do with it....).

I'd been studying hard for an upcoming thermodynamics final exam, so I decided to take a morning study break. I left the Longs Peak trailhead in the morning darkness, hiked to and over the frozen Chasm Lake, cramponned up Camel Gully, tagged the summit of Mt. Lady Washington, scrambled along the ridge to Chasm View to get up-close views of the vertical walls of the Diamond, descended into the Boulderfield, and hiked out. This loop adventure took me just under 7 hours car to car. It was a pleasant day with hardly any wind.