I rose while it was still dark, so I could jump into the last shower of the weekend, finish packing, and hustle off to breakfast. At 9am, we were supposed to meet Ned and the rest of the group at Motel 6, a little further south and en route to our trailhead at Echo Lake. Despite our excitement, we had slept pretty well, what with DD’s white noise app helping to drown out the sounds of the start-and-stop air conditioner/ heat regulator.
I chose the Holiday Inn Express in part of their free breakfast, which included hot options. So it was convenient for us to sort of roll out of our rooms and to the breakfast bar area without much ado. At 7:30am, it was grey and cloudy, and sputteringly drizzly, but no snow, yet.
The breakfast at the HIE is ok; there are your standard continental breakfast offerings: pastries and bagels and breads with various spreads and jams and butters; some oatmeal (in pre-packaged cups) and yogurt; hard-boiled eggs in the dairy fridge. But they also have some hot options- like biscuits and sausage gravy, bacon, turkey sausage patties, and an omelette offering of sorts: half-moons of scrambled eggs folded over and stuffed with some sad, melted, American cheese. Juices and coffee, of course. Later on DD would comment that a Mountain House Breakfast Skillet meal was better than the breakfast at HIE.
They also had a remarkable pancake machine that we unfortunately did not try.
We had just about loaded up the car when Danny’s phone rang. It was Ned, calling to let us know that he was running around an hour late. We immediately sent messages to the others. When we finally reached Motel 6 close to 10am, everyone else was already also there.
When Ned showed up we had an impromptu lesson in microspikes and crampons, and the conditions during which to use them. Basically microspikes are sufficient if you’re following along a snowy trail in tracks others might have made. However, if you’re looking to break your own path away from the herd, you will want crampons to help you cut and hold deep into the snow. Microspikes are wont to slide off during more difficult conditions, like severe postholing.
After some car shuffling (Motel 6 would not let us leave cars since they were completely sold out for the weekend), we finally left Karley’s and Charles’ vehicles at a shopping center and we were off to the Sno-Park Echo Lake trailhead.
The parking lot was open and roads clear.
At the start, we were excited, relatively clean and dry, and eager to get the show on the road. Ned had handed us our rented gear – for DD and I, it was a tent, shovel, snowshoes, and for me, a whippet. We had been curious as to whether Ned was going to haul all our rented gear on his sled and now our questions were answered.
Ned instructed us on how to strap on our snowshoes, and we soon were heading down to the Echo Lake Docks.
Our fearless leader was on skis and harnessed to a sled bearing community gear – he had a large 5-man tent that we would all cram into the following day. Our 3-man Trango weighed in at 9 lbs. When asked how heavy the 5-man tent was he laughed and said that he didn’t want to know.
Along the route Ned would pause a lot to impart some wisdom. Lots of short, teachable moments.
When we reached our destination Ned instructed us on where to pitch our tents – away from trees that could possibly dump a lot of snow on our tents. It had also started to snow with a fierce, fairly strong wind so we had a first lesson in pitching a tent during the snow. Ned also went around to everyone and assisted each hiker in setting up the shelters properly. A handy tip – dig a deep footwell in the vestibule so we can more easily perch at the edge of our tent and easily put on shoes, or emerge from our shelter.
When he was done, Bob was kind enough to break tracks for us around our tents, for easier wandering around.
As the afternoon waned the storm grew worse. And so, after the tents were fully pitched, and Ned had gone ’round to all of us to make sure we were ok and wanted for nothing, we settled into our tents to make lunch. Yes, cooking in your tent is ok. Just make sure that there is a pot above the flame of your stove before you light it.
The Mountain Hardware Trango 3-man 4-season tent weighed in at a hefty 9 lbs. (compare that to our summer tent, the Zpacks Duplex, which comes in around 1.31 lbs). DD and I split up the weight, with DD schlepping the tent material and I hefting the poles and stakes in addition to our rented Rescue Shovel. However, it did its job admirably over the course of the weekend, not collapsing from the weight of the copious amounts of snow that fell upon us on Saturday night. It was also roomy enough to ensconce all our belongings which we very well couldn’t leave out in the snow. We ate and got cozy, until Ned called some folks out to go fetch water and learn how not to fall in. I unfortunately did not end up going on any of the water excursions over the weekend.
At around sunset, the storm ceased and all of us emerged from our tents to take in the remaining light and peek at a lovely sunset. The wind still blew fiercely with gusts of snow coming off the lake.
Then it was a race against the dying light. We ended up cooking in the dark, with headlamps inside our tents. Mountain House Mac and Cheese mixed with a packet of Albacore Tuna, and Italian beef and peppers with rice made up our shared dinner (we gobbled all of it down). After some desultory attempts at washing out our dishes with water and snow, and a last trip to our latrine area, it was bedtime at hiker midnight around 7:30pm.
We slept pretty soundly – the wind howled around us and made for lovely white noise, occasionally waking us up with a particularly rough shaking. But we were warm and comfortable for the most part, with some mild dampness from the condensation falling off our tent.
Other items of note
