Snow Climbing Season Starting

Few people here in Arizona think of spring as having anything to do with snow, but the Inner Basin near Flagstaff stays so cold all winter that the snow doesn't consolidate to make good climbing until spring!

So far this is one of the best lines, hardly a wiggle up 1,300ft of snow to the shoulder with a 200ft headwall that goes to about 80-deg before backing off.

Awesome view, the peak is just under 11,700ft with an unobstructed view of the universe ... nice place.


Saturday snowed lightly off and on in dark squalls between sun breaks and cold! Rode and pushed my oldiie 32-16 single speed the first 1.5 miles then snowshoed it from there to the base of Fremont, just above the trees in the photo and to the right of the line, 10,450ft and 4" of fresh snow over not real packed out stuff. I was too late in the day to worry about really climbing it, it was looking like a lot of work so 3-hours to get back to there and I barely made my bike at dark, way past dusk.