I had no Wednesday classes or meetings this semester, so I made it my default winter hike/snowshoe/fitness day if the weather and homework load cooperated. On this Wednesday, I decided to snowshoe up to Sky Pond. Up until now, I'd only hiked to Sky Pond in the summer, en route to climbing the Petit Grepon or the Saber. But Sky Pond also makes for a great winter destination. The alpine lake is in a cirque basin, surrounded for 270° by sheer cliffs. A unique part about being up here in the winter is that you can walk out into the middle of the frozen surface.

It had snowed about 6 inches in the mountains on Tuesday, making it decidedly a snowshoe. The NOAA forecast for Wednesday read: "Sunny, high of 13°F. Wind chill values as low as -21°F. Windy, with gusts as high as 34 mph." Seemed reasonable. It was a great half-day of exercise and snowy mountain views. No one was ahead of me (in fact I never saw anyone in the entire stretch above Loch Vale), so I cut the steps through the fresh powder the whole way. It was pretty special to have the entire Sky Pond cirque to myself. My round trip car-to-car was 4 hours and 45 minutes from the Glacier Gorge trailhead (could have been a bit faster if I had used the "winter route" rather than sticking on the summer trail). Back to Boulder by 2pm, rejuvenated for an evening of studying and tutoring.

Below is a sampling of photos from my day out. 

With the springlike weather, I was beginning to get the alpine itch. Perhaps something like the The Petit Grepon or the The Saber would be climbable. I decided to hike up to Sky Pond to find out.

Although it was snowy the entire way, this time it only took me 3 hours and 15 minutes (at a pretty relaxed pace I thought) car-to-car from the Glacier Gorge Trailhead. The trail was packed down by foot-travel and no snowshoes were needed, which made travel quite quick.

Below is a sampling of photos from my day out. Indeed, looks climbable.....

My 72-year-old parents were visiting from British Columbia, Canada. I took them on a hike to Sky Pond. They loved it. I had a blast showing them the area and pointing out the climbs I had done on the Petit Grepon and The Saber. I was impressed with their stamina too, especially at 11,000 feet, about 11,000 feet higher than the sea level they live at in British Columbia. What a great day with my two favorite people in the world! 

It was a cold stretch of weather in Colorado, with a high of about 1°F and wind chills up to -20°F in Estes Park, and even colder up high. The tire pressure light on my car had gone on. A couple of feet of new snow had fallen. The sun was out again and I didn't have much work for the day, so between morning meetings and afternoon system checks I decided to bundle up and enjoy the fresh powder. It was windy, so staying in the trees sounded like a good plan. I had initially planned on heading up the Fern Lake trail, but the road had not yet been plowed, so I drove up to the Glacier Gorge trailhead instead with no real plan (maybe Lake Haiyaha, maybe The Loch, maybe Mills Lake, .....). The snow was deep and the only fresh tracks led up towards The Loch and I was feeling lazy, so that's the way I went. I caught up with the trail-breaking party just below The Loch and offered to break trail the rest of the way, feeling a bit chagrined (and a tad jealous) that they had expended so much more effort on the approach while I ambled up their tracks listening to an audiobook. It was a bit of a wallowfest with a crusty layer over powder, but we made it. It was incredibly windy at The Loch (as usual in the winter), but I snowshoed across the entire lake and took some photos of the windblown snow. I found a place out of the wind to enjoy a hot drink and was pleasantly surprised to be joined by a stellar jay. Then I hiked back out and got back to work for a couple of hours. My round trip time was 3 hours and 15 minutes, which included a 15 minute break at The Loch. 

On this day I enjoyed a nice loop adventure of three peaks on the Continental Divide: Otis Peak - Hallett Peak - Flattop Peak. My original plan for the day, however, had been a quick morning hike up to Sky Pond just to get some exercise and scope out the conditions (since the weather forecast for the day was rather abysmal). But the weather ended up much better than expected and my short morning trip to Sky Pond became a small part of the overall day's adventures. Photos from my morning visit to Sky Pond are below.

On Fridays, if I can squeeze it in, I like to go on a midday hike. I hadn't been up to Sky Pond in awhile, so I decided to go there. The ice on the lakes had thickened enough to walk on, so I enjoyed walking across three alpine lakes (The Loch, Lake of Glass, and Sky Pond).

My round trip time from Glacier Gorge Trailhead to Sky Pond and back was 3 hours. 

A short spring weather system had dumped a few inches of fresh snow in the mountains. The rock was too snowy to climb, and unable to find a partner for something more technical, I decided to go on a snowshoe up to Sky Pond. I broke trail after The Loch. I enjoyed listening to my audiobook and getting in my daily quota of exercise outside.

My round trip time from Glacier Gorge Trailhead to Sky Pond and back was just under 4 hours.