UHT in June

[JohnSkoolie]

Howdy,
I read through old posts about UHT during seasons with snow. I'm looking to do it in June. It's been a heavy snow winter so I'm assuming there will be still be snow on trail and passes. I was reading about Dead Horse Pass and crampons/axe - I'm trying to see if there is something anyone could compare it to that I've done so I can get an idea. I'm trying to go with a group of people and I don't want to bring them on something they might not be ready for.

Ive done the following with snow on them: rainier, whitney, shasta, elbert

Are there other passes that would be too dangerous to do with a decent amount of snow?

Hope you don't mind helping me out with this!

Thanks a bunch,
John

Quote Reply

 

[LarryBoy]

You've got snow travel experience. You'll need it. I'd expect all the passes to be completely snow-covered, as well as much of the basins. You going westbound I assume?

Personally I'm way more comfortable climbing steep snow than descending, so the crux spots for me would be the descents of Anderson/Porky/Red Knob. The summer trail for all those passes does a significant amount of sidehilling thru steep terrain, whereas you'll have to go right down the fall line.

The North side of Dead Horse and the east side of Rocky Sea will also be snowbound of course, but at least they're straightforward snow climbs, not descents.

The Head of Rock Creek trail is always a better choice than the official UHT thru Rock Creek Basin, but in particular for you, since the creek on the official UHT may be raging.

 

[JohnSkoolie]

You've got snow travel experience. You'll need it. I'd expect all the passes to be completely snow-covered, as well as much of the basins. You going westbound I assume?

Personally I'm way more comfortable climbing steep snow than descending, so the crux spots for me would be the descents of Anderson/Porky/Red Knob. The summer trail for all those passes does a significant amount of sidehilling thru steep terrain, whereas you'll have to go right down the fall line.

The North side of Dead Horse and the east side of Rocky Sea will also be snowbound of course, but at least they're straightforward snow climbs, not descents.

The Head of Rock Creek trail is always a better choice than the official UHT thru Rock Creek Basin, but in particular for you, since the creek on the official UHT may be raging.

Would you be able to estimate the max slope of ascents/descents?

Thank you so much for the help!

 

[LarryBoy]

Would you be able to estimate the max slope of ascents/descents?

Thank you so much for the help!

Check them out using Caltopo's slope angle shading tool.

 

[JohnSkoolie]

Sweet thanks!