Photos from this trip can be found here.
A lot more snow compared to last year. Snowshoes were very much essential the minute I got into the Snow Lake side of the pass. I had hoped to make it up on Christmas Day, but the weather was less than ideal then. Instead, the pups and I went to Surprise Lake, one of my favorite lake hikes.
The extra snow made getting up the summit block much easier. Once upon the summit, I poked around to make sure there were no holes underneath that I could potentially punch through. Virtually no wind on top, which made taking photos that much more enjoyable.