Solo climb of Mt. Wire this morning. Those were some tough miles. I started out just before 6:00 am. It was warmer than usual, but there was a pretty good breeze, so I wore my hat and fleece vest. The lower trail was melted out, so I ran all the way to just before the ridge, and from there the snow just got deeper and sloppier the higher I went. When I made it to the first saddle I knew I was in trouble when I sank to my knee. I was following some tracks, and that helped a bit, but it was much slower than normal.
When I reached the second saddle the foot tracks were gone and the only thing left were some snow shoe tracks that were better than nothing, but I was still post-holing the entire way up. It seemed like it took forever to slog up to the summit ridge. I was sinking to my knees with almost every step. It got old fast, but I was so close to the top, so I kept going up. I reached the top in a slow 1:14, which is the slowest climb of the year on Wire.
The descent was just as bad and slow and I was sinking even more as it had warmed up a lot since I started. I couldn't run much until I got past the last saddle. From there I ran the rest of the way in. My total time was 1:55. 2200 ft. vert. | 