Made summit on Sunday (4/19) as day hike from parking lot on the main trail. I used my ice axe to maintain balance in many places but only used my crampons on one long section. The conditions were snow from 1.5 miles up trail all the way to summit. I used crampons on the climb to the right of the switchbacks to Trail Crest (in the morning while the snow was still firm). In the afternoon (it was very warm) and the snow softened up, so we glissaded down this same section. This was about as steep a section as I would want to glissade down as it took some skill to maintain control. There was also one person who skied down on Sunday. No one was using the switchbacks as it looked icy. Further up towards the summit, although about 1/3 of trail crest was clear of snow, there were numerous snowy sections across the chutes that required considerable care with the footsteps, many folks had their crampons on for the whole stretch on trail crest for this reason. This stretch (4 miles round trip all above 13,500') definitely was slow going because of the altitude as well. The toughest part for me was the couple mile stretch on the way down below Mirror Lake (through the trees) where I postholed too many times to count. Snowshoes would've helped immensely through this stretch but I did not want to carry them to the summit as part of a day climb.
All this said, it was an incredibly beautiful climb with all of the snow capped peaks and the weather was nearly perfect. The climb was harder than I anticipated (especially on the descent) as I did not think there would be as much snow. Remember the ice axe and crampons. I have photos but they are on the disposable camera so I'll try to post by the weekend.
