Snow Shoe-ing

Well, Scott and I tried to have an adventure to tell the day after Christmas. We rented this yurt for the weekend. It sounded like fun. Snowshoe in a few miles and get nice and cozy with a wood burning stove and a deck of cards to pass the time. We were so excited, so we packed our bags up nice and tight. We even brought our new ultra deluxe Adam and Eve sleeping bag to sleep in to stay nice and warm.

One week before our adventure, I called up the Forest Ranger and had a little chat. It went something like this...

Me: 'Hi, we have a reservation for the Grizzly Ridge Yurt next weekend. I was just wondering, is it easy to find? Is the trail visibly marked? Or would you recommend bringing a GPS?'

Ranger lady: 'It's very easy, just follow the blue diamonds from the trailhead all the way up to the yurt. You won't need a GPS.'

Me: 'Great! And firewood will be provided for the wood burning stove?'

Ranger lady: 'Yes, we even provide lighter fluid and paper to start the fire.'

Me: 'Wonderful! Thanks so much for your help!'

Call ended.

As December 26th rolled around, Scott and I were both feeling a little sick. He was about one day behind me. I had been taking my sudafed, trying to get over it, but it just wasn't happening. I still felt like I had to prove myself, so when Scott asked if I was feeling up to it, I said of course. I had packed 9 miles in one day before. Three miles would be a piece of cake! Yeah right, not when snow shoeing AND sick. We made it about 1/4 mile and I was out of breath. So we stopped to take this picture.

We made it maybe another 1/4 mile and I needed another break. Snow shoeing while sick is not an easy task. But we got a couple of fun pictures.



We kept going, and going, and going. We had been hiking for about three hours, and I was getting tired. This was my view....


Yup. The backside of Scott. He was so patient with me, but I was getting so tired! I could not handle it! We had been following that blue diamonds for who knows how long, and we still had not reached the yurt. So we kept trudging along, following those blue diamonds.

Another couple of hours pass and what do we see?!?! The yurt?? Nope. The road. We were so bummed! What had happened? We followed the blue diamonds and never saw the yurt. Did we miss it? Did we follow the wrong trail? We were so confused, had no idea what had happened, only that somewhere along the way, I was so exhausted and thought I was going to die that I broke down and cried. We made it back to the car and found the trail head map. Sure enough, the map states to follow the blue diamonds to the yurt. But there were not one, not two, but THREE sets of blue diamonds. They all start as one, but then split off at different times along the path. Instead of the 3 mile hike to the comfortable yurt, we had hiked about 6 miles, back to society.

By this time, we were so exhausted, and even more sick, that we headed home...never reaching our yurt. So, we attempted to have a fun, relaxing adventure. Ended up having a long, tiring adventure instead. And oh what an adventure it was! I'm just lucky I had Scott with me to keep me going the whole way.