What an adventure indeed! Depending on who you are, you're either going to read about my weekend and say "Wow, that sounds GREAT!" or "Are you freaking CRAZY?! That sounds AWEFUL!"
Let me just say, it was one of the best weekends I've had in months!
I woke up on Friday morning with tons of stuff to do - send Logan off to day care, run some errands... and SOLD MY FOCUS! Woo hoo! I'm rich! Well, not really... but my lovely little hatchback is now frolicking somewhere down near Colorado Springs, and I've got a little bit o' cash. ;) I finally got all Loge's stuff together and dropped him off at Tara's for the weekend, trying not to be an overly worried mommy. Tim and I wanted to get to the trailhead by 3:00 but didn't make on the trail until about 4:30 pm.
All that fresh powder beckoning us... Strapped on my brand new snowshoes and hoisted my pack onto my back, as Tim geared up in his "bunny boots" (rubber boots filled with air, so they are SUPER warm) and put HIS pack - probably at least 60 lbs - on his back... and off we went. We went up and down the road by Cheley Camp and soon were in the national forest. Fresh moose tracks were along the trail along the drainage, so I jokingly started my "moose call" - "HEEEEERRRREEEEEE MOOSEY MOOSEY MOOSEY" And what do you know, Tim looks up to our left, and there's a momma moose and her baby hanging out on the slope. It was a great start to our trip, and we weren't too tired or cold and the powder was fresh but not too deep. Perfect!
The sun began to set. The last hints of ANYBODY being on the trail quickly faded away, and soon we were traveling through deep powdery drifts of snow. We'd bet that nobody had been up there in MONTHS, as there was no snowpack of footprints and the powder was unlike anything I've ever seen. The snow had drifted and was so deep that we kept losing the trail on and off. Even when we were ON trail, we could hardly tell that there was a prexisiting route, giving us this liberating feeling of bushwacking into the backcountry, wild and untouched.
This was great for a while, but I don't have snowpants anymore and my new snowshoes kick up snow on my butt more than any other pair ever had, so soon my butt was frozen and the temperature dropped severely. We were both pretty warm for most of the hike in, but once the sun set, the wind picked up, and we both got dehydrated from our water bottles freezing... My butt was so cold it hurt! Yes, I did wonder if you could get frostbite on your heiney, it was THAT cold! But besides that, my hands, feet, face and core were all nice and toasty as we went from Forest Service Land, to Comanche Peaks Wilderness, and finally into Rocky Mountain.
The big problem was once we got fatigued and the temperature and the sun went down, we reached a few points where we had no idea where the trail was, and the snow was deeper than ever. We backtracked and plodded around in bewilderment for a short period of time, trying to find some hint - maybe a cut tree, or a rock wall - of the trail instead of truly meandering off into the middle of nowhere. Somehow we always managed to pick up the trail and kept trudging on, uphill, hoping that we were getting close to warmth!
Tim started running on empty and his heavy pack was taking its toll; I was in front breaking trail and, if you've never done this in deep powder, it tires you out fast. I'd get bogged down, catch my breath, curse loudly and pure stubbornness powered me through some deep snow drifts. Finally we reached a high point in the woods and Tim was certain the cabin was somewhere, and that we somehow lost the trail again. Miraculously again, we roamed around until we found the true trail and reached a sign. The cabin is here!
...But where?! With only the moonlight and our headlamps, we knew it was somewhere close but we just could NOT see it!! Tim dropped his pack and headed along the river, and I was so thankful when he called out that he found it. I had visions of us reaching the cabin, then him dropping the key because his hands were so cold, and being stuck outside! But nothing of the sort happened, and soon we were indoors from the wind... and it was a whopping 8 degrees!! So five hours later, at 9:30 pm, we reached our 5 mile destination... Yep, we averaged ONE mile per HOUR!
Once inside, Tim immediately got to work on lighting the wood stove. That piece of metal was my best friend as it came to life and began warming our cold little 20'x16' cabin and brought some feeling back into my butt! Tim was fantastic about getting us warm and fed, and we feasted on cashews and hot lentil soup at around 11:30 pm. The windows were boarded up so it was completely dark indoors, while the bright moon cast purple shadows in the pines outside. We didn't have the energy or desire to get the propane system up and running, so we just lit some candles and wore our headlamps as we set up our sleeping bags and pads in the loft. Soon it was 40 degrees downstairs, and even warmer in the loft, and we drifted off into a dehydrated, exhausted sleep. I for one can say that I had the most bizarre dreams, each part a creative and strange account of why my back ached, why my butt was so cold, why my hand hurt (in the dark, didn't see that there was a drop off and hit my hand on the stove pipe!)... I slept pretty well but was happy to be done with those dreams and back into reality in the morning!
We were worried because we were supposed to call into ROMO dispatch to let them know we made it; however, the battery for the radio was dead, and we were slightly worried that they would send rangers out to find us, as per backcountry protocol if somebody doesn't check in. Nobody ever mentioned that it was a SOLAR battery, mounted under a few feet of snow on the roof... But we did reach them in the morning before any rescue crew came out to greet us. ;)
The shutters were still closed so we didn't even realize how bright it was outside until we climbed out of the loft and went out the front door for a cold and invigorating "bathroom break" - nothing like baring your bottom on a beautiful winter day! (And we never did find the privy - we were looking for an outhouse building... ends up, it was simply a hole in the ground with some logs behind it! We had passed it so many times, but it was so buried in snow we didn't realize it!) As Tim phrased it, Saturday was a bluebird day without a cloud in the sky! Smoke poured from our chimney as Tim removed the shutters and shed some glorious sunlight into our little home! Soon, bacon was sizzling on the propane stove and Tim cooked up toast and scrambled eggs with mushrooms. It was a great start to the day and the wood stove got our little home up to 68 degrees. Well fed, we relaxed in front of the windows for a while and took our time gearing up for our day hike. We filtered water right from the stream and got rehydrated, and fortunately Tim let me borrow some pants so I wouldn't literally freeze my ass off again! Around 12:30, we finally headed out on the virgin powder trail towards Lost Lake. We decided that, in light of our progress the night before, there was no way we would reach the lake, a 10 mile round trip. We aimed for the Falls instead, which I believe is about 2.5 miles. I think we realized pretty quickly, as we took turns exhausting ourselves breaking trail, that this might not be realistic either.
No matter, for the day was bright, "warm" (we were sweating in 30 degree weather!), and just beautiful. We stopped for a chicken/mushroom/asperagus and cashew lunch at Happily Lost campsite and determined that we really weren't going to make it to the falls, it was so slow going and the snow remained deep. We continued on for a short amount of time to see if we could get a better view of Stormy Peaks, but the trail remained buried in the forest so we turned around about 3 pm. Going back to the cabin went FAST, since we had made a trail and it was downhill. We were back at the cabin by 4:30 and spent the rest of the day in our long underwear, reading magazines and just being lazy, watching the icicles grow longer as the heat from our stove melted the few feet of snow on the roof.
Saturday night was burrito night! Tim packed in a tomato and an avocado, tortillas, veggie meat, cheese and hot sauce and cooked under the light of the propane lamp mounted on the rafter. He even surprised me and brought a bottle of wine, so we ate like kings and called it an early night, I believe around 9 pm? The moon shined in brightly but we slept well in the dark loft.
Sunday morning came and it was time to clean up and prepare for our hike out. We had another big breakfast of eggs and bacon, I filtered water and restocked the wood pile by the cabin as he tended to the fire and took care of other chores. We took our time and both didn't want to leave. It was another gorgeous, warm day and everything was set just before noon. Our last two tasks were to sign the Cabin Register and close up the windows. Nobody had been there since October! It was a nice feeling to think we were the only ones to have set foot and enjoyed the North Fork Cabin all winter. All geared up and ready to go, Tim put in the last 2 bolts to the shutters, we closed the door and locked the bolt and snowshoed away from our weekend retreat. Such a good trip!
The hike out was WARM - maybe 40 degrees - and Tim was down to just a t-shirt. The snow was no longer powdery but was wet and heavy, and we made it out very quickly on our trodden path - 3 hours, compared to the 5 it took to get there. Made it to the trailhead, took showers, and was back at the Rock Inn just after 4 for a cold beer or two or three. Picked up Logan from Tara's, watched Seinfeld at my place, and went to bed... And of course, neither one of us slept as well as we did at the cabin, on thin pads in our sleeping bags. Go figure.
So that is the North Fork Adventure. I hope we do something like that again in the future! Unfortunately, I didn't get many photos - it was so cold, my camera didn't want to work, or my fingers didn't want to bother with it.
And here is yet another "could've been a nice photo, but..." picture of Tim and I. Tate, the guy on the right, had a friend come into town and he posted this photo on his myspace page. I'm waiting for the day that we take a photo that I won't get teased about! But, it is pretty darned funny!
At least I can crop it and almost make it look decent... ;)
