Hiking anywhere today would have been spectacular; Zoa Peak was no exception. Great views all around, and amazingly we had it to ourselves. We met two skiers and that was it, despite the half-dozen cars at the trailhead.
Routefinding was straightforward. We found the turnoff from the pipeline with no problem (lots of flagging), but picking up the right trail after that required following a bearing and the terrain until we met up with some ski tracks near the tree line. From there it was easy going following the ridge upwards.
Snow conditions were highly variable though stable in this simple terrain: loose slush at low elevations early in the day (which made the initial ascent through the trees challenging); refrozen at mid elevations turning slushy; a layer of unconsolidated powder above about 1600 m which became sticky in the sun. By the end of the day an icy crust had formed on sun-exposed snow at almost all elevations. A couple of small whoompfs in hollows (probably a result of wind loading) but nothing dangerous.
Note that the road to the summer parking lot is still blocked by snow. This adds about 2 km to the length of the trip.
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