Ass kicking (received) on Sneffels

Stayed at Blue Lakes hut from Dec 18-20. We skinned into the hut and made a summit attempt next day. We were planning on attempting the Snake Couloir route if avy danger didn't look to bad. We never got the chance to use all of the heavy gear we hauled with us. Upon passing the registry at the trailhead it was aparent that nobody had been up on that side of sneffels in over a month. There was about 1-2 feet of snow on the approach trail which we were breaking as we headed up towards Blaine Basin. We gave it a valiant effort but after about 4 hours of breaking trail and only covering about 2 miles we realized that we were never going to make it. So we dumped the gear and went to check out the large frozen waterfall and play around on the ice. Never made it up to Blaine Basin. We were pretty dissapointed on the result of our efforts, but we are already planning our next visit for when the approach becomes more doable. This is infinitely harder than the approach to Long's Peak in the winter which usually has a packed trail to Chasm Lake. We went back to Ouray the next day and climbed in the park which was already nice and fat. It almost made me feel better about the ass kicking we had receieved the day before.