Snowing

If I showed you the following photo from our outing today, would you have believed it was May 8th and not January 8th?

On top of Shrine Pass with heavy snow falling all around us and an intense
wind blowing into our faces. May 8th, really? Woo Hoo

The day started innocent enough; but you could sense the changing conditions...

Looks innocent enough as we have shadows as we start our outing.
But, notice the wind blowing the tails to the right and the unsettled sky about to overtake the sun.

The wind really started blowing and snow started dumping within about 20 minutes from the start of our outing. It was snowing so hard that the GoPro lens kept getting saturated with water spots and I'd have to wipe it clear to keep seeing Max & Zorro. Here is about the longest clip I could find where the camera was somewhat clear of water spots and you can see the winter weather all around us in May:

[watch on youtube if no video loads below]

Then, about 30 minutes later and the storm blew by and we found ourselves laying fresh tracks in about an inch of fresh snow. Yes, an inch fell in about a half hour!

Laying fresh tracks in an inch of fresh snow that was not here just 30 minutes ago!

A quick pause to adjust my equipment when I sensed the oncoming storm and here's what my partners had to say:

"Quick, roll a snow angel to cool off while the human fiddles with his pack" says Zorro.
"How long are the two of you going to be?" asks happy Max forgetting that he is normally
the one who we wait for to roll snow angels :-)

A blustery day atop Vail Pass with sun, wind, snow and fresh tracks all in the same 8.1 mile outing with 950 feet of elevation climbed and a top speed of 19 MPH.

2013/2014 Season to Date: 144 days on the trails covering 1252.2 miles with 143,400 feet of elevation climbed.