We got some more snow this weekend in Flagstaff so I decided to make another attempt at Fremont Saddle on the snowshoes. It was seven degrees Fahrenheit when I left my apartment at 6am and was undoubtedly several degrees colder when I parked at Freidlein Prairie road and started hiking through the woods towards Fremont Peak. Every time I removed my gloves to take a photograph my fingers immediately began to go numb.
Agassiz Peak, Kachina Peaks Wilderness, December 2011
There is a big aspen grove on the lower end of Freidlein Prairie and I stopped there to take some pictures of the light working its way down the face of Agassiz Peak. There must've been some decent wind blowing up high as you could see snow drifting from the top of the mountain into the Inner Basin. I'm sure the eastern face of Agassiz is getting pretty wind loaded. I hope the backcountry skiers take it easy over there, as the crusty ice from the previous couple of storms will now be a base layer for the snow we received this weekend.
Agassiz Peak, Kachina Peaks Wilderness, December 2011
I didn't make it to Fremont Saddle as I'd planned. I ended up turning back around 10,800 feet when the series of clearings I'd been following abruptly ended at a dense wall of bristlecone pines. Looking at Google Earth tonight it looks to have only been a couple hundred feet through until the next series of openings, but my legs were getting pretty tired by that point. I ate my lunch while listening to Mountain Chickadees and Clark's Nutcrackers and enjoyed the fantastic view of Flagstaff and parts south. I'm glad I turned around where I did, as I was totally beat when I finally got back to my truck parked at snowbowl road some 3,000 vertical feet below. This was my first "real" outing on the shoes for the season so I'm not too suprised that I didn't reach the saddle.
Agassiz Peak from Fremont Peak, Kachina Peaks Wilderness, December 2011
The above picture was taken a few hundred feet below my turnaround point. The ridge I was ascending on Fremont is heavily treed so it was difficult to get an unobstructed view of Agassiz. I was hoping to get a clear photo of the Monte Vista avalanche chute where a snowboarder was killed back in 1995, but the trees kept getting in the way. You can just make out the slide path beyond the large dead tree on the right side of the photo. I suspect that the only way to get a good view of the chute is from far away (boring), directly underneath it (scary) or from the west summit of Fremont (slightly less scary). Both of the later two options seem risky for a solo snowshoer so that could be one picture I may never get.
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