Started from the Palisades trailhead as roughly the 15th vehicle around 10:00am.
Palisades Trail
The Palisades trail was in good condition as I went up and left at the junction with the White River trail to continue climbing past the waterfalls. Very shallow, intermittent snow started around the creek crossing at the top of the falls (~3300ft), eventually becoming the common trail surface shortly before the second approach to the cliff edge around 3600ft. Note that generally the 30ft nearest the cliff face halve already melted out. I saw probably half a dozen downed trees on this trail and nearly all of them were before this point.
The snow was consistently 2-4 inches deep from this point to the viewpoints just above 4000ft. From here, the snow increased to 6-12inches deep (deepest in the more open stretches of the trail) such that taller boots or gaiters would be recommended to keep snow out of socks until reaching the viewpoint at 4400ft. Again, there was very little snow on the 10ft nearest the cliff edge.
Starting from this point, I began to notice intermittent westbound (opposite my travel) cougar prints from the last 12 hours or so mixed in with the many deer prints and single set of hiker + dog still in front of me. I finally caught up with the hiker who had been breaking trail / route finding at the final viewpoint around 4800ft.
After eating some lunch, I continued on my way and quickly encountered the 2-4ft deep snow the lead hiker had warned me about, so I donned my snowshoes and began my turn at route finding. Using a general plan of finding the wider straight paths through the trees and cross-checking with the map on my handheld GPS, I successfully navigated the switchbacks and initial traverse to the ridgecrest around 5000ft.
From here, there were few, if any, signs of the trail route so I simply followed the ridge-crest through the black stick forest, making a wrong turn here or there to go around the wrong side of a bump on the ridge. I know that I wasn't following the exact trail as I never saw the large sign describing the Palisades trail that was present a couple years ago. From previous trips, I knew that the trail would pass within feet of the old shelter site, so I used that as my next known-good point on the trail, hoping that the snow would be melted again as I started to drop off the ridge.
Ranger Creek Trail
DO NOT FOLLOW MY SNOWSHOE PRINTS in the upper-most switchback basin (4600ft to the saddle). Unfortunately, my hope for less snow on this trail was a pipe dream. In fact, the trail was nearly impossible to locate as the hillside began dropping into the creek drainage. While I started down the trail, the hillside was steep enough that chunks of ice/snow from the size of a fist to the size of a 3-liter water bladder would fall from trees or simply start sliding down the very slushy hillside that was covered in approximate 2 feet of snow. I really should have checked avalanche conditions from NWAC before the trip, and likely turned around here for safety. Rather than crossing and re-crossing the visible flowing creek in the gulley, I instead opted to very carefully directly descend the hillside in my snowshoes, often using a trekking pole as a stop to keep from accidentally skidding down the hill.
As I crisscrossed the trail on my GPS, I descended too low, trying to get around the rock outcropping on the south side of the drainage. Upon reaching the bottom of the visible basin (4450ft), I heard the creek roaring around the corner, so I worked my way slowly back up to a few feet above the rock outcropping, where I finally saw and rejoined the trail at 4600ft.
Thankfully, I could now see the trail cut and boot prints that followed it, improving my pace, but still maintain caution on the extra sloppy snow. Between 4400ft and 4150ft I shed my snowshoes and shortly thereafter my gaiters as the trail was starting to regularly return to dirt in places. In the vicinity of the viewpoint junction around 3900ft I saw yet a couple more cougar prints in the ever thinning snow.
The descent from here to the junction with the White River Trail at 2750ft was a welcome stretch of easy trail. It also appears that someone has already cleared the fallen trees from this section of trail. Thank you!
White River Trail
This trail is generally dry and in good shape with nearly every junction properly signed, and easy walking after the rest of my trip. There were one or two bugs on this section of trail and it was certainly warmer, so spring/summer is clearly on its way down here.
After continuing to take the White River Trail (not the Snoquera loop, or other side trails), I had returned to the junction with the Palisades trail, and descended to the car, arriving around 4:40pm.
All told, approximately 14.4 miles (including roughly 2.5-3mi in snowshoes) in 6:40 made for a tiring day. Additionally, even though the mountain was out on my drive to the trailhead and on my drive home, it was blocked by clouds from every viewpoint I reached.
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