[LittleHikerMom]

Me, Dicey, Yana, and Matt (hubby) decided to go on a snowshoe to Kelema lake via deer creek road. Brr was it cold even at the trailhead! Already a good amount of snow there... maybe a foot. The FS had plowed out a nice little parking area for us. We were dismayed to see another car already there though. We walked up the little hill at the beginning on nicely packed snow due to the sledders that had previously been in the area. And around the gate. Shortly thereafter the sled tracks stopped and we were following the trail of what seemed to be 1-2 skiers and a snowshoer. We passed through some nice little bits of light that shone through the trees illuminating the snow.

'lil cone

Loaded branches

Sunlight

I also took this as an opportunity to take a few shots through the trees above.

A peek through the trees

another peek

We then noticed some funny tracks in the snow that we think are from a deer.

What tracks are these?

At about a mile or less the trail dips down ever so slightly before heading up again for the rest of the trip. Not quite sure where but we started to come out on a bright sunny spot and here was where I took a picture of Long Mountain.

Long Mtn

The sun also lit up the trees so nicely that I had to get a shot of that as well.

sun through trees

? peak and nice blue sky

The sun was so nice and warm... I didn't want to leave it! But back into the shad we went. At some point we stopped for a snack and I noticed this sign.

Private property borders this?

Guess the trail we were on bordered private property... nice to know. While everyone else was starting to move again...

off they go... leaving me to my pictures

I snapped a few more shots

up through the trees

woods

I asked Matt how he was doing... he said "ok". He looked rather tired.

Matt- "how'd I get drug into this? I'm doin this for you..."

We were pretty lucky to have everything so frozen over. We didn't have to cross the creek!

bumps and shapes on creek

The log didn't look like a safe alternative anyway...

cool log

off they go again!

As we went back into the shaded woods again I saw a very frozen stream with all these chunks of ice falling down.

stream with ice chunks!

I thought that was pretty cool. Shortly before lunch we saw this nice tree and Devil's peak.

Devils peak and an old huge tree.

Don't have a shot of it... but Carla made sure to toss her thermos right on top of mine and spill tomato soup on me. Thanks Carla! After lunch we noticed that the tracks of the persons before us dissapeared. They had turned around (or were ghosts) and we figured they must have been from the day before. Time to break trail! Got a good shot of bald as we started.

Bald Mtn

And some other cool stuff.

hoarfrost on snowy downed branch

Carla got tired breaking trail and I took a turn for a little bit. I had taken for granted the nicely plowed path of the people before me... Boy was it some work! I still kept a fairly steady pace... although I had to remove my coat... too hot! At one point we stopped and noticed our buddies had fallen far behind. We stopped to admire some icicles while we waited.

Carla looks at the icicles

icicles

Shortly after this we reached the trailhead and it was turn around time. My thermometer read around 15 degrees! Ouch! We headed down quickly... Carla even more quickly on her skis and was out of sight in seconds...

yay! Downhill!

I decided to risk a shoe shot since i'd forgotten at lunch. I awkwardly balanced with my foot up.

Shoe shot!

Then we got a nice view of... Big 4?

ooo

Miss Yana decided to be a little crazy and try to pull a stunt.

A risky venture

She almost did it!

Luckily she survived! On the way back I took a couple more shots of the late afternoon light.

nearing sunset

clouds on peak

And retired the camera for the evening. We headed down semi quick... semi slow. About 2 1/2 miles from the trailhead we saw a man heading towards us with a huskey. He stopped and we asked if he'd seen a skiier recently. He said he'd seen "someone" about 15 minutes before and wasn't sure what they were wearing. We kinda thought he was crazy. It was around 3:00pm. Hope he made it out ok! When we got to the trailhead... Carla had been there an hour and was huddled near a fire. Overall it was a pretty nice hike with some great views even though we didn't make it to the lake.

[Yana]

Nice pics GG. The company and the weather were both great. Oh, BTW, we did get a nice view of Big Four, but that's not what the photo is of... Um... I'm not sure what that is. It looks like Long Mtn from about 3 miles in. (and I learned an important lesson: trying to walk across a narrow, snow covered log with snowshoes on for no particular reason is a stupid idea)

[silly_traveler]

Glad you guys had a good trip! Hey, we stopped to look at those icicles too!

[Coasty]

Thanks for the TR GLHG. I am heading to the lake tomorrow for an overnight and hopefully some igloo building. Jason

[Sadie's Driver]

You silly wabbit - - - - - those are bunny rabbit tracks! Eh, what's up doc? s.d. (upon consultation with Sadie)

[dacker]

So glad to hear you had a really nice trip but kinda bummed we had to miss it. Nice photos, Rach!

[ActionBetty]

Feel priviledged you actually got a face shot of Dicey.. I usually only see her from behind the whole time..way far in the distance

[LittleHikerMom]

I guess i'm in better shape... i was able to keep up when I wasn't taking pictures of cool stuff... hehe. It wasn't a problem if I stopped and they kept going cus i'd just catch up a few minutes later... hehe..

[ActionBetty]