shadowcat
New member
First I want to thank all of you who prayed for snow, tried the "vision board" or did your version of the snow storm boogie (mine is dancing wildly to 70's music in my VSC onesies) ha!
It worked!
We hit the trail at our usual 1:00 pm and at 1st we had snowshoes on but there was not much ground cover and they were definitely overkill. I switched to crampons, my partner barebooted - but we carried the snowshoes just in case & good thing we did because it wasn't long before we saw one of the Daks natorious rangers who will threaten great bodily harm to anyone who doesn't carry snowshoes from about November to May! Actually tho this gal was really nice & I think she appreciated the fact we took the time to carry them. As we proceeded up to Wright the snow began to come down & continued to lightly fall for the rest of the day. The ground cover became deeper and traction was needed the rest of the way up. Crampons weren't necessary, stablizers, microspikes actaully would have been better for the conditions. It was getting pretty windy as we approached Wright so we pulled out the golite parkas & dumped our bags to ck out the summit. You couldn't see anything and it was frigid so we made a hasty retreat. By the time we headed down it was getting dark and there was maybe another 3-5" of accumulation since coming up. The snow was sparkling against our headlamps - I love hiking at night in the winter it is just beautiful. So other then a few steep spots that were icy and a bit treacherous it was a great hike. Since it was still snowing as we pulled out, if it keeps up like this the trail conditions are going to be awesome by next weekend. Don't forget the Mountaineer is having it's Winter Festival - kind of fun to ck out and try new gear and play around on the ice climbing wall.
A question I will post on another section of the forum: What do you do to keep your water from freezing in the tube & mouthpiece of your water bladder?
It worked!
We hit the trail at our usual 1:00 pm and at 1st we had snowshoes on but there was not much ground cover and they were definitely overkill. I switched to crampons, my partner barebooted - but we carried the snowshoes just in case & good thing we did because it wasn't long before we saw one of the Daks natorious rangers who will threaten great bodily harm to anyone who doesn't carry snowshoes from about November to May! Actually tho this gal was really nice & I think she appreciated the fact we took the time to carry them. As we proceeded up to Wright the snow began to come down & continued to lightly fall for the rest of the day. The ground cover became deeper and traction was needed the rest of the way up. Crampons weren't necessary, stablizers, microspikes actaully would have been better for the conditions. It was getting pretty windy as we approached Wright so we pulled out the golite parkas & dumped our bags to ck out the summit. You couldn't see anything and it was frigid so we made a hasty retreat. By the time we headed down it was getting dark and there was maybe another 3-5" of accumulation since coming up. The snow was sparkling against our headlamps - I love hiking at night in the winter it is just beautiful. So other then a few steep spots that were icy and a bit treacherous it was a great hike. Since it was still snowing as we pulled out, if it keeps up like this the trail conditions are going to be awesome by next weekend. Don't forget the Mountaineer is having it's Winter Festival - kind of fun to ck out and try new gear and play around on the ice climbing wall.
A question I will post on another section of the forum: What do you do to keep your water from freezing in the tube & mouthpiece of your water bladder?
