Jeff & Gena Fitness: Elk Meadows July 2010

So I have been slacking in the hike posting category. Many apologies. I have been unsatisfied with the ease of posting pictures one at a time into blogger and have really just been waiting until I could figure out how to load them into Web Albums to get them over quickly.

Let's see if this works!

July 4th and 5th, Gena, Jane, and I loaded up the gear and headed up the mountain.

Originally the plan was to hike from Elk Meadows to Cloud Cap but the weather has not matched the plans we made six months ago. In consideration of the snow level, we decided to hike the Gorge instead. Then everyone canceled and it was down to Gena, Jane and me. We decided to go see if the snow reports were serious or if they were just light snow.

The great thing about not really having a plan is that you can do whatever you want. Now don't let this confuse you: we did call our safety line and let them know we had changed our hike plan and would be hiking around Elk Meadows. Always have a lifeline!!

We started below Mt. Hood Meadows with the intent of climbing to Elk Meadows and up Gnarl Ridge. Then we say the sign for umbrella falls and decided to divert. Hiking to the falls was beautiful and we hardly hit snow until only shortly before Umbrella Falls. The snow was a little dangerous if you didn't watch where you were placing your feet.

We stopped for lunch at the falls.

From there we decided to head up the ski park at Mt. Hood Meadows and try to smear our way up to Timberline Trail #600 and over to Gnarl Ridge. The trail was covered in more snow that we had hoped for, and while we were able to find it, it was really dangerous in places, so we back-tracked out. At one point we realized we were walking all around some serious ice caves caused by creeks running under the snow pack.

The good news is water was easy to find on the trail making filtration less than necessary gear. We also found several sets of car keys, a cell phone, and about $1.78 in pocket change.

We decided it was safest to work our way back to Umbrella Falls and then continue to Elk Meadows.

Life is springing up everywhere. Flowers sticking their pretty heads up, dear bouncing over the trails and Jane wondering what to do about it... It was a beautiful weekend.

The bridge crossing heading up to Elk Meadows...

Elk Meadows was a beautiful thing. When we got there we found several sets of day hikers just gazing at the mountain. We found one campsite right away but decided to walk the perimeter trail. There really aren't a lot of other sites around. There is the hiker's shelter which had been claimed by a pack who had hiked in from the north, but otherwise slim pickins. Fortunately, our site had all the views we needed and water wasn't far away...