After warming up for a night in the woods by moving a 200 pound elliptical exercise machine Les and I had a tasty dinner with the girls and Amy and Janelle. At 7:30pm Dan and Tony arrived. By 8pm we were in the Hyak parking lot leaving the car. The sky was overcast, but not raining or snowing. Almost a first for a night trip this year.
I decided to set my own pace rather than trying to keep pace with everyone else. Surprisingly, I wasn't that much slower so I felt the four times I'd been to the gym in the last two weeks wasn't a terrible waste of time. As we climbed the steep slope we spread out in a line. The night skiing lights lit up the sky enough that we didn't need headlamps so we were just four dark figures making our way up the hill.
Where the steep slope joins one of the lower nordic trails we were surprised to see two feet of fresh, ungroomed snow. The three previous times (1 2 3) I'd been up from Hyak this section of the trail was groomed and easy to walk on, but now we had to break trail through loose powder. Dan was "selected" as the sucker to do the work, but the task was shared for the short trip.
We emerged onto groomed trails a little while further and made good time to Hyak Lake. On previous trips we had stopped on the shore of Hyak Lake, but this time we bypassed the short off-trail trip to the edge of the lake and continued on the road. Shortly we came to the Grand Junction and the warming hut there. Looking at the map posted by the trail and the ones in my pocket we chose the right road and continued to climb.
The GPS showed we needed to abandon the groomed trail and follow up the easement below the powerlines, but a huge gate, covered with snow, blocked the way. A fairly unambiguous sign warned us of dire consequences if we continued. So, being good and cowardly little boys we turned and continued up the road. We might still be able to get to Divide Lake even if we had failed to get to Surveyors Lake.
"This look familiar, Les?" I asked when we saw the trail heading up the hill. It was the trail he and I had taken when we came up from Summit Central. The trail was slightly broken, but we pushed Dan into the lead again. We passed close enough to Divide Lake to see it among the trees and check it off the punchlist. We wound up on the same high point Les and I had found when we were last up, but with a far greater view.
We briefly considered making a stab at Surveyors Lake over the hill to the northwest, but it was far too daunting through heavy snow so we contented ourselves with a few drinks, some pictures, and a fall into a tree well. (Yes, that was me that fell.)
The way back was pretty uneventful until we returned to the steep slope leading down to Hyak. I had brought "snow slicks" that were like rollable, light weight sleds. I sat one one and instantly took off. I was on a very mellow slope, but was out of control in no time.
Dan averted disaster as he rocketed toward the edge of the run and some rather unforgiving trees by rolling off. I tried to distance myself from the slick by rolling over and clawing at the snow. I came to rest in a cloud of loose powder. You'd think I'd have learned to simply roll up the slicks and be done with them, but that would just show you don't know me.
On one of my subsequent runs (all of which pretty much ended the same way) my left snowshoe (yes, still wearing the snowshoes) caught the snow and jerked painfully to the side. 12 hours later and now I've got a limp and a sweet lump on the outside of my ankle. Putting on shoes for work (flip flops might be a tad too casual even for my office) will be tons of fun.
Total distance was about 4.75 miles with 1,337 feet of gain in just under four hours.
