In my 7 years in Innsbruck, the first winter that I thought hard and cold, was the one from 2017-18 season. Temperature dropped to -18 Celsius in the city, my car’s battery would stop working almost every day and smoking outside was becoming rather challenging (I am used to it now tho). What also was (and still is) challenging, is taking winter photos.
All this white snow is really disorienting me. However, it forces me to work harder on my composition and cropping approaches. I barely watch tutorials and “master-classes” about photography, so the process always lasts longer. Nevertheless, this is the way I taught myself how to “learn” stuff, so…
One pro Tip I can share with everybody is that the best time to go up a mountain (in winter or summer) is during the week. Of course if you have the luxury of time to do it. Weekends are usually open season and everyone (literally everyone) is doing something outdoors; I live in Tirol, Austria and we’re pretty sporty up here. So unless you want to spend hours of “brushing” out people from your photos on Photoshop or Lightroom (gotta keep it GDPR), go up the mountain on a Wednesday.