Paul, The areas just south and west of the cattle gaurd on the Bowen Ranch Rd had snow depths off the roads around 20 inches, and deeper in many places. That would make for quite a difficult hike to go any distance. The areas I was in were lower in elevation than the Bowen Ranch and I would imagine that the snow would have been somewhat deeper up at the Ranch. The parking area for the Bradford Ridge trail is similiar in elevation to the Bowen Ranch parking area and would have had alot of deep snow, even if you could get there. The hike from that direction is two and a half miles to the springs and goes across quite a bit of higher country before the trail drops into the Deep Creek Canyon. I wouldn't consider coming up HWY 173 if there was deep snow on it since it has very steep hillsides over the edge of the road, and slipping in your vehicle, on that road, would present a serious danger. Also after these kinds of storms there is melting once the sun comes out which turns to ice in the evenings, HWY 173 would probably be very icy after today's melting. Coming in to the Bradford Ridge parking area from the Arrowhead Lake direction would probably, presently, not be possible since they don't grade the road that far down. The best bet for getting to DCHS will most likely mean getting all the way up the Bowen Ranch road once some significant melting occurs up there. I wish I could have got up to DCHS Monday, I'm sure it was a fantastic scene with that amount of snow :-)
