"Decided to celebrate Independence Day with a trip in the Alpine Lakes Wilderness. Seeing recent trip reports to Snow Lake, I opted for Lakes and some mountains today, to experience and capture some of the snow and ice conditions and find some amazing blue ice in the lakes. The trail descending the ridge to Snow Lake is about 3/4 covered in snow. The snow is hard-packed, but I would highly recommend poles and advise good spikes. There were many people ascending the ridge, back from the lake mid-morning and it was often difficult to pass. Most people were in sneakers, and I'm surprised people were not slipping and knocking others off the trail. Once you pass the second-day use and lake access area and head towards Gem lake, people were far and few between. Beware of some of the snow bridges and rock wells, as the snow melts, areas are exposed below and can collapse, leading to injury. Once past the junction to the MF Snoqualmie river/trail, the trail is muddy from snowmelt, and there are increasingly more patches of snow. Past the log bridge, and about a half-mile up, the trail becomes completely snow-covered. Poles and spikes will make the trek up to Gem Lake more manage..." — markhadland • Jul 4, 2020