I had hoped to head to Maine this week to work on the 4000 footers there but none of my potential hiking partners in that area were available. Looking to continue conditioning and get some fresh air decided to hike Sawteeth.
There is very little snow on the ground in Keene Valley. Only one other person signed in ahead of me and they were going to Armstrong. The first mile of the Lake road is very icy but after that there is a nice surface of packed powder. Microspikes from car to the start of the Weld trail then switched to snowshoes. A few inches of fresh snow on a reasonably firm base with some drifting in of the trench higher up. Now I would like to say that this meant I flew up the trail in record time but that was not the case. It seems that every trail these days is steeper and longer than I remember. I would like to blame that on the "glacial rebound" that is causing the Adirondacks to increase in height but it is more likely due to being in that post retirement age group. In my defense I will point out that squinting at the high peaks map with a magnifying glass it looks like the trail climbs about 1800 feet in 1.7 miles.
In any event I eventually reached the trail junction at the col. The snow depths had dramatically increased with altitude and are in the 4-5 feet range. Started towards Sawteeth and very quickly had trouble following the trail. Trench was largely filled in and little sign of recent travel. Meandered a bit but with help of GPS managed to get back on trail. Was wondering if the recent thaw would make the problem ledge challenging but little evidence of the thaw up high. Deep snow on the ledge that with vigorous kick steps was easily climbed. Thought I was now home free but now the problems really started. Snow is very deep and trail corridor repeatedly completely obscured with branches that are well overhead in summer at head and neck height along with numerous leaners and duck under blowdowns. Lost the trail numerous times. I had gotten past the steepest terrain and probably was only a tenth of a mile from the summit. Came to a spot where there was a trail marker about 8 inches above the snow with no visible trail in any direction. GPS seemed to indicate traversing left with a little descent but numerous blowdowns covered in snow made that option unappealing. So I tried going up and looping back to the left where trail should be. That proved difficult and unproductive. I hate bushwhacking in general and in deep snow it is even less pleasant. So backtracked back to that last visible marker. Looked ahead at the largely covered blowdown and thought if I try going that way I will likely end up in a spruce trap. And that is what happened almost immediately. After various gymnastic maneuvers and considerable cursing was able to extricate myself.
At this point it was 1:00. Since the only reason to keep trying to go further was to avoid damaging my ego by not summiting it was an easy decision to turn around. Got in plenty of exercise and the low cloud ceiling meant there would not have been any view anyway.
So the good news is that snow conditions are still quite good with virtually no ice. Just be prepared for challenging route finding if on an untracked trail.