This weeks snowshoe adventure started at the Barlow Pass snow park, on highway 35.
From there we headed out the Pacific Crest trail, a popular trail any time of the year.
Now, the trekking snowshoer’s are sharing the trail with cross country skiers. This specific area is a little more popular which means a few more people, and the snow isn’t always as fresh as we would like, but it is still quiet and pretty. For a small portion of the trail, it was wide enough to include separate hiking/skiing paths. We try to stay out of the ski treks where we can, but much of this portion was not wide enough to do that. It hasn’t snowed much the last 2 days, as a result the surface was a little icy and crunchy. This requires a little more caution when traversing narrow areas of the trail with steep downhill slopes, or around the tree wells. We take care to steer clear of the tree wells, as we do not want to fall in them now that the snow is getting much deeper. We both carry ropes for such an occasion. The sun came out on this clear day, which warmed the snow high in the trees, causing a sporadic bombardment of snow upon us as we hiked under the trees. Really more of a nuisance than a danger, but, snow down the back is never a lot of fun. Anyway, after hiking out the Pacific Crest Trail, we veered off in a northerly direction, out onto Ghost Ridge. There really isnt a trail out there, as it is just mostly overgrown during the summer. It isn’t marked but Honey had been out there before, so off we were into the unmarked snow country. It is not as wild an idea as it first sounds since we were on a ridge, and as long as we stayed up on top without dropping down the rather steep slopes too far we could reverse direction at anytime. So we went in search of a nice view point of Mt. Hood for a lunch stop, prior to heading back.