Snow Bowl Hut

Drove up to the SnoPark on the south side of the Mt Tahoma Trail Association huts near Ashford. The road was mostly clear to the lower parking area. This was 8 miles round trip with an overall gain of 2,100 ft. I only saw two other people and that was when I was about halfway back down the trail. A very beautiful and serene day.  Photo of the gazebo at Snow Bowl Hut with a view of Mt Rainier.

The first 0.3 miles from the lower SnoPark was fairly free of snow.

After the first 0.3 miles the routes were completely snow covered and I donned my micro spikes. I made sure to stay to the far side of the groomed trail to avoid stepping in the area meant for skiers.

The turn off from the main route to Snow Bowl is 2.5 miles from the lower SnoPark. About 0.25 miles up this road, I put on my snowshoes as I was starting to post hole off on the side of the groomed trail.

View of Snow Bowl Hut near the end of the route.

To the east, I could see the Goat Rocks and Mt Adams in the far distance.

zoom of the Goat Rocks

A little closer to Snow Bowl Hut, there is a good view to the south of Mt Adams and Mt St Helens

zoom of Mt Adams

zoom of Mt St Helens

A short distance beyond Snow Bowl Hut is the gazebo, I sat on the deck outside the gazebo for a lunch break, enjoying the view of Mt Rainer.

slight zoom of Mt Rainier

From the other side of the gazebo, I could see Mt St Helens in the distance beyond the frozen prayer flags and rabbit prints.

To the west, up on the hill is High Hut.

view to the southwest

On leaving the gazebo, I looked back at my deep snowshoe tracks and was glad I brought them today.

View of Mt Rainier, and to the far right High Rock, as seen coming down from Snow Bowl. This is also  the view as seen from inside Snow Bowl Hut.

About 1-1/2 miles before the lower parking area, their is a brief view of Mt Rainier through the trees.

 

Franklin Falls

Drove up to the Asahel Curtis Sno-Park off of I-90 to hike up to Franklin Falls. From the Son-Park it is7 miles round trip with 800 ft of overall gain. I had the trail to the falls to myself and saw 2 people at the falls when I arrived. Later I saw 20 -30 people heading up to the falls. South Fork Snoqualmie River from the closed forest road. The route is 2.5 miles up the closed forest road to the start of the "trail", then another 1 mile to Franklin Falls.

The little red cabin and a small snowman a short distance up along the forest trail.

View looking up the South Fork Snoqualmie River across from the little red cabin.

Further up the trail, in the distance is Denny Camp Falls.

View of Franklin Falls and lots of icicles near the end of the trail.

Closer view of Franklin Falls 

I enjoyed all the icicles near the falls.

South Fork of the Snoqualmie River just below the falls.

The river a little further downstream with the trail to the left

Another view of the river before heading up the trail.

Back at the start of the forest trail and before hiking back down the closed forest road, I walked a very short distance to the road bridge over the South Fork of the Snoqualmie River to take some photos, looking upstream,

and looking downstream from the bridge.

 

Kachess Lake Snowshoe

We drove to the Kachess SnoPark on Kachess Lake Road to hike/snowshoe to the Kachess Campground. The route we took today was 5.8 miles with 350 ft of overall gain. This area is primarily used by snowmobilers, but on this weekday, we didn't see any snowmobiles nor any one besides ourselves. It was very peaceful. The Kachess Lake Road past the SnoPark was well packed down by users over the weekend and we did not use our snowshoes until we reached the Campground 1.8 miles down the road. View along the road.

We saw some icicles on the rocks by the road.

Whimsical snowy trees

View from Kachess Lake looking southward from the southern most camping loop.

We also snowshoed along the camping loop that was the most eastern. This area only had one snowmobile track as was not well packed. To get a view of the lake we snowshoed through a snow covered campsite.

View to the north

Are snowshoe tracks were quite deep were we broke trail.

Views of Kachess Lake from the road as we snowshoed back to the SnoPark

more icicles

View along the road as we left the SnoPark to drive back home. I hope to come back and explore other trails along the lake near the campground.

 

Gold Creek and Heli Ponds Snowshoe

We drove up to the Gold Creek SnoPark across from Hyak off of I-90 this morning for our snowy outing. We were the first ones on the trail we would not see another person until we had almost completed the loop around Gold Creek Pond. Until getting to Heli Pond snowshoes were not needed except for short off route we took on leaving Gold Creek Pond. View of Gold Creek looking upstream from the foot bridge before the pond.

looking downstream along Gold Creek from the foot  bridge

Gold Creek Pond from the south shore

We continued around Gold Creek Pond going clockwise. The west and north shores had some water exposed, making for beautiful reflections.

Along the small peninsula that juts into Gold Creek Pond on the north shore we saw otter prints in the snow.

View from the end of the peninsula with an eagle flying above the pond.

More reflections in the pond as we continued along the north shore.

We only saw one set of tracks in steep snow where I thought we were to head up to the Gold Creek Trail towards Heli Pond, we put on our snowshoes here. We ended up going up a very steep embankment to the trail. (We found the correct connector trail on our way back).

Tall trees along the way with a well defined route until we took the turn off to Heli Pond.

Bridge at Heli Pond, signs at the trailheads say it is closed and not to cross. I think the bridge is damaged under the snow.

Heli Pond views

snow ladened tree by Heli Pond

At Heli Pond looking north

Looking in the opposite direction towards the small bridge at Heli Pond

 A few mountain views as we headed back towards Gold Creek Pond

Back at Gold Creek Pond, looking across to one of the foot bridges we crossed earlier.

Views of Gold Creek

We saw this happy snow mound, it looked as happy as we felt today.