giggy
New member
Had a a decent amount of interest in this hike all week. Chip, Jessbee and myself camped at cherry mountain road friday night (about 2 inches of snow on the ground). Of course, we had to have a blazing fire going while ate supper and drank beer. A while later Jessbee showed up and set her stuff up and we all talked (I had never met jessbee before) and just got to know one another a bit prior to the hike. Not long after we all got in the bags -- ChrisB showed up and then just said he would sleep in his car. 3:30am came quick and since it was jessbees's frist time doing winter type stuff - we had to go the xtra mile and melt snow for water - even tho we had plenty of water- - just for the laugh. so we ate, got coffee'd up and then headed to the ammo trailhead - where not long after woody and and his brother showed up.
so it was - , chip,jessbee,chrisb,woody and brother and myself started about 5:30am via headlamp from the ammo trailhead.
There had been some (not much tho) traffic in the prevoius week - trail was easy to follow to the the cog junction. and then there were a few good blowdowns to get over. not that big of deal, more of a pain in the butt type of thing for about 20 feet. Before we knew it, we were at the gem pool and it was starting to get light out. We waited for the rest of the crew and jessbee showed up and said that Woody's brother wasn't feeling all that great (sick), so they had to turn back - Too bad becuase inthe brief time I chatted with them, they both seemd like great guys. So now we were down to 4 and having been on this trail before a few times, I knew that after the gem pool it gets little steep with rocks and water and ice, etc.. so I decided to put crampons on at the gem pool -
nice trip up the ammo - the traffic from the prevoius week didn't seem to make it to far above the gem pool, so had to break trail from here to hut - not that bad at all really. (maybe the deepest was a foot in places, but not enough to even think about putting the snowshoes on IMO). The view get better and better into the ravine and ridge as you go higher and before we knew it, we were at the hut and the wind started cranking.
So we took some shelter in front of the hut and geared up for the trek up monroe, plumes of snow were being blow of the summit - so out came the balaclavas, etc....
Chrisb decided to stay at lakes so chip,jessbee, and myself went to monore - got up it pretty quick - and the wind was going at about 40-50mph I would say, so got back down to lakes pretty quick.
I like to take advantage of these nice sunny days, so I asked the group if they didn't mind exploring a bit and not following cairns, but following the best route thru the snow and they all said -sounds great (we did only go where there was enough snowcover so no plants were stomped over - (there is lot of snow up there right now) so I zig zagged thru that area and chrisb decided he was going to head down the ammmo so we waved and went up some snowfeilds on the washington cone. (about 300 yards to the left of tuck ravine trail) - really nice snow - didn't touch a rock all the way to the summit. Jessbee and Chip really dug this. wind was blowing pretty good at summit and it was damn cold - not much time for eating and drinking - few pix were taken (I think) and then we started over to clay - wind died down a bit and then trail was completly unbroken to clay. pretty much follwed the gulfside to clay loop - some sections of deep powder - but not too bad and they are few and far between. backtracked to jewell trail (actually just went down from the col and hooked up with jewell here) for the trip down back to car - as you get lower on the jewell - tedious rock hopping and spruce traps and pretty slow going - easy to twist an ankle here, when trail gets into the trees it gets nice an packed for trip down (we passed some people coming up) - but now it was getting hot and we made decent time to car for a after hike beer. ate dinner at common man on the kanc.
It was jessbee's first time "winter" hiking -(I know its NOV - but above 4000ft - its winter) - and she did phenomenal not a bad trip for a first go!!
I think chip and jessbee are going post pix. (of course I don't have any!!)
There is one blowdown on the bridge right near the parking lot on jewell trail -be careful getting over this or you will end up in the river!!
all and all - fun day and we all had fun and a few good laughs. Nice hiking with you all.
so it was - , chip,jessbee,chrisb,woody and brother and myself started about 5:30am via headlamp from the ammo trailhead.
There had been some (not much tho) traffic in the prevoius week - trail was easy to follow to the the cog junction. and then there were a few good blowdowns to get over. not that big of deal, more of a pain in the butt type of thing for about 20 feet. Before we knew it, we were at the gem pool and it was starting to get light out. We waited for the rest of the crew and jessbee showed up and said that Woody's brother wasn't feeling all that great (sick), so they had to turn back - Too bad becuase inthe brief time I chatted with them, they both seemd like great guys. So now we were down to 4 and having been on this trail before a few times, I knew that after the gem pool it gets little steep with rocks and water and ice, etc.. so I decided to put crampons on at the gem pool -
nice trip up the ammo - the traffic from the prevoius week didn't seem to make it to far above the gem pool, so had to break trail from here to hut - not that bad at all really. (maybe the deepest was a foot in places, but not enough to even think about putting the snowshoes on IMO). The view get better and better into the ravine and ridge as you go higher and before we knew it, we were at the hut and the wind started cranking.
So we took some shelter in front of the hut and geared up for the trek up monroe, plumes of snow were being blow of the summit - so out came the balaclavas, etc....Chrisb decided to stay at lakes so chip,jessbee, and myself went to monore - got up it pretty quick - and the wind was going at about 40-50mph I would say, so got back down to lakes pretty quick.
I like to take advantage of these nice sunny days, so I asked the group if they didn't mind exploring a bit and not following cairns, but following the best route thru the snow and they all said -sounds great (we did only go where there was enough snowcover so no plants were stomped over - (there is lot of snow up there right now) so I zig zagged thru that area and chrisb decided he was going to head down the ammmo so we waved and went up some snowfeilds on the washington cone. (about 300 yards to the left of tuck ravine trail) - really nice snow - didn't touch a rock all the way to the summit. Jessbee and Chip really dug this. wind was blowing pretty good at summit and it was damn cold - not much time for eating and drinking - few pix were taken (I think) and then we started over to clay - wind died down a bit and then trail was completly unbroken to clay. pretty much follwed the gulfside to clay loop - some sections of deep powder - but not too bad and they are few and far between. backtracked to jewell trail (actually just went down from the col and hooked up with jewell here) for the trip down back to car - as you get lower on the jewell - tedious rock hopping and spruce traps and pretty slow going - easy to twist an ankle here, when trail gets into the trees it gets nice an packed for trip down (we passed some people coming up) - but now it was getting hot and we made decent time to car for a after hike beer. ate dinner at common man on the kanc.
It was jessbee's first time "winter" hiking -(I know its NOV - but above 4000ft - its winter) - and she did phenomenal
not a bad trip for a first go!!I think chip and jessbee are going post pix. (of course I don't have any!!)
There is one blowdown on the bridge right near the parking lot on jewell trail -be careful getting over this or you will end up in the river!!
all and all - fun day and we all had fun and a few good laughs. Nice hiking with you all.
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