Hidden Peak

Upon returning home from Hidden Peak, I realized I didn't take any photos from the lower half of the mountain. This was likely because there was basically no new snow below about 7600.' It is very difficult to connect snow patches from Hwy 89 through the bottom 500' of the climb. We removed our skis for a portion of the lower quarter of the peak. Above about 8000' there was 1-2 inches of new snow over a firm base. There was evidence of very shallow wind slab in the upper couple hundred feet but we only observed minor cracking in the shallow new snow. While there was enough new snow to smooth out how the top 1000' looked visually, old tracks and patches of firm crust were still felt while descending.