Glacier Vista Snowshoe

I drove up to Paradise at Mt Rainier National Park to hike/snowshoe up to Glacier Vista. This was 3 miles round trip with 1,000 ft of gain. Gorgeous day with great views. For about the first mile, I followed the route that heads up to Panorama Point carrying my snowshoes.

Once I turned off the packed trail to head up to Glacier Vista, I was breaking trail in snowshoes, sinking about 6-12".

view of Mt Rainier from where I stopped (going further had a risk of cornice)

View looking back along my tracks to the Tatoosh Range and some volcanic peaks

Looking back towards Mt Rainier after heading a short ways down.

I love heading down into these marvelous mountain views!

zoom of the Goat Rocks

Another look back along my different route down the mountain 

some animal tracks in the snow

Another view of Mt Rainier and my tracks beside the animal tracks

I love taking my time on this short trail, so beautiful!

Mt Adams, the Castle, Pinnacle Peak and Mt Hood

zoom of Mt Adams

zoom of Mt Hood

zoom of Mt St Helens

more views as I continue down towards the parking area:

Hex Mountain

We drove up the Salmon La Sac Road to hike/snowshoe up Hex Mountain and see how far we would get. It was 15F when we started and when we reached the ledge area the wind bursts were strong enough that I didn't feel like continuing up. We donned our snowshoes when we were going up a very steep slope with ice under the snow layer. We were the first ones up and broke trail. We didn't see other hikers until we were going back down the trail. We hiked about 5.2 mile round trip with 1,650 ft of gain. Great day!

We saw a herd of elk when driving up the Salmon La Sac road this morning.

Fresh snow covering up the previous tracks

Some peekaboo views on the closed road portion.

lovely snowy pine trees

View towards Cle Elum Lake, before the start of the "summer" trailhead

We donned our snowshoes about here.

Looking towards Hex Mountain

View towards the west

View to the north, Davis Peak in the middle

zoom of Mt Daniel

Hiking back down along the ledge

Another view of Cle Elum Lake below

 

Hyak Snowshoe

As the ski lifts were closed at Hyak (East Summitt) today, I did a snowshoe, going up almost to the top of Mount Hyak, then over to Union Station and followed some of the groomed Nordic Trails (staying off to the far side) before returning to the base, overall about 5 miles and 1,100 ft of gain. Saw few people and only when I was on the side of the alpine ski runs.

A few years ago, I did the Mt Catherine Loop trail, and I was planning on doing part of this loop in the reverse direction, but the Uphill Route signs took me in a different direction, going up Mount Hyak.

Lovely blue skies this morning, looking across the valley to Kendal Peaks, and peak I don't know the name of and Rampart Ridge.

zoom of the unknown to me peak

View looking a bit further to the northwest

View to the west of Denny Mountain, Snoqualmie Mountain and Guye Peak

zoom of Snoqualmie Mountain and Guye Peak 

Heading toward Union Station, Granite Mountain in the far distance

zoom of Granit Mountain with the fire lookout on top

view of Keechelus Lake to the east

Mt Catherine

Silver Peak in the distance

zoom of Silver Peak

Heading back down along the edge of Creek Run, the easiest run back down for Nordic Skiers (according to the signs), gorgeous views of Kendall peaks etc,

zoom of Kendall Peaks

and a bit further down the trail, nice view of Rampart Ridge

zoom of Rampat Ridge