The trail humps in the fist part, but then it undulates up and down. Within 45 minutes we were treated to a raging thunderstorm at over 9,000′. Sweeping winds pelting us with hard, packed snow and soaking us within seconds. We tried to take cover under an alpine fir (lololol) to get our shells on and our pack covers, and then we continued hiking, one of us exclaiming every few seconds “OW!” “Jesus! Fuck that hurts!” as the hammering went on. It soon turned to rain, and after about 4 miles it stopped and the sun came out Ah, thank you. The trail was so full of granite I swore that my boots had a quarter cup in them.
We were about 1 mile from our planned lake, and around 4:45 or so. We happened upon a strange sight: It looked like a struggling old man with his much younger son, slowly making their way on the trail. As the older gentleman didn’t make way, I finally managed an “Hey there. How you doin?” As the figure turned slowly, I about dropped to see it was a slight 12 year old boy, with an old external frame pack, badly loaded and almost as big as he. Turns out the ‘son’ was actually an older teen, a leader on a Boy Scout excursion. A bit of small talk with the older leader, while the young boy remained silent and wistful. I felt a pang but soon upon rounding the corner, we encountered more of the straggly group, this time a gang of 5, one of which was hastily trying to hide his tears. Again, I saw young boys, with old, heavy equipment and distraught eyes. A stouter looking young boy started grilling Scott and I, and asked when we’d started. When I told him 2:30, his eyes just about popped out of his head and he exclaimed “WOW. You guys are ROCKIN!” Scott and I exchanged glances and I laughed and said “Well, it gets easier the more you do it.” I gently inquired about their loads, their fueling, all the while glancing at the poor young boy holding back shudders. I finally turned to him, and his eyes became pools of hurt and fatigue and tears welled up that wouldn’t be easy to hold in. He asked if they were close to their destination (about 1.5 miles away) so I smiled at him and told him it would be ok, to change socks when their feet started to hurt, and next time bring powdered Gatorade and that they would be there before they knew it. I reminded them to eat frequently, and take breaks when they needed them. The chatty one’s face cleared and said “Oh yeah! Socks! Good idea!” Scott and I reluctantly left them, neither of us with a good feeling. Shortly after we came upon the two leaders, neither of whom looked fit enough to be leading a 50 miler, but rather fit perfectly with such a motley crew. A bit of small talk in which the leader expressed wishes to continue on to Wilson Lake but that they may just camp at the creek crossing up ahead instead. We met the rest of the boys at the creek and I proceeded to slip gracefully (ok, that might be pushing it) on a rock to a chorus of gasps from the boys. I managed to right myself with a decent scrape of my leg and brush off any pain until we were out of sight, then there may or may not have been a “fuck that hurt!” uttered. We decided, since the storm had slowed us down a tad and the Boy Scout encounters too, that we would camp at Welcome Lake. Indeed, this was an excellent choice. We hoped the Scouts were ok and they weighed on our mind that night.
It was cold, it was late, but I had boiled the water immediately upon reaching camp so while we set up the tent, etc, homemade spicy chicken sausage spaghetti was rehydrating nicely in my expensive, fancy cozy made from a Fed Ex bubble envelope (it was AWESOME). I made us hot tea with whiskey while we waited for the rest of the time and we hit the sack to a chilly night, but snug in our little REI Quarterdome 2 tent, since my Big Agnes, that we had been excited to try, wasn’t going to be ready until Sept. We slept soundly and awoke to a clear morning, and decided to dayhike the 14 mile RT to Reflection Lake. It is long switchbacks up a steep ridge and down, and then farther south, through very pretty alpine meadows. I’d packed us a pasta salad for lunch, and the day was a perfect one. Before we left, I explored the lake meadow a bit and found this super cool tree that had almost decomposed perfectly in it’s shape. Yeah, I’m a geek. So sue me.
On the way to Reflection Lake:
The Frank Church has burned many times. Some really interesting snags, and some extremely large ones. The camera just doesn’t do them justice.
On the way home, we sat atop the ridge for a few and watched some gathering clouds. When the lightning started in, we dropped back down to camp.
It was a hot dusty hike, we decided to go for a swim. Well, one of us dunked herself and ran back out, the other one actually swam.
We’d met a young family coming down the ridge as we were going up, they camped directly across from us. Glad I’d brought bikini bottoms, since our usual skinny dipping wasn’t going to work this time. We awoke early to kids screaming and yelling, and a little crying. Sigh. I have kids. Yeah. But c’mon people. This is the wilderness. This is why they make duct tape. Our plan for the day was to dayhike to Heart and Terrace Lakes, Heart was our original destination for camp and probably would’ve afforded the solitude we wanted, but it was a little hump up another ridge, and one we would’ve had to make extra to dayhike from there. The trails are faint in a lot of the Church, so we ended up cross country-ing it, thanks to Scott and his fancy satellite communicator, up this unstable talus slope. Let’s suffice it to say there was discussion about this.
Anyhoo, Heart lake was gorgeous. Gorgeous. I’d brought a love Rock (did I get the name right, Kristin?) for my friend’s precious daughter who was killed in a car accident almost two years ago. They are special rocks with their name, and what could be more perfect than Heart Lake? We left it on a soft, beautiful bed of moss with a few wildflowers, the bluest blue ever, Gentians, right at the bottom of where the heart comes together. After a small moment of silence where we contemplated the unfairness of life, the gravity, and the enormity of love, we continued up, briefly discussing whether we wanted to move camp up here.
The trail up to the ridge at 9900′ was a bit sketchy, mostly a mountain goat path. The tricky part was it was so damn sandy it was easy to slip.
The view from the top was windy and spectacular. To the west, lay Terrace lakes and the remnants of the Clear Creek Fire in 2000. Wish I could’ve seen it before it burned. This is especially striking in such a bad fire year now. We had a snack and I took a picture with a GIANT white bark pine, I don’t even want to contemplate how old it must be to be that big at that elevation. At least 500 years old, I’m sure.
Went back to camp and broke it, heading on up to Wilson and Harbor. We hadn’t seen the Scouts since the first night, were wondering if they’d be up there. Met a couple of nice guys down at the creek crossing, they were from Florida and the elevation was killing them. Um, yeah I bet. Wasn’t really a factor for Scott and I, neither one of us noticed it, but then, we don’t live at sea level either. The trail to Wilson is short, but straight up and very rocky. Of course we didn’t get pics of the worst parts, because we were too busy trying to hold on to our asses that it kept handing us.
A selfie, just in case you know, I got lost and someone needed to look for me. *cough cough*
(The above is just the start after the creek). We met an older couple coming out. By ‘older’ I mean, white-haired, in their 70’s. Fuck YES. I love meeting these rockstars. The subject of the Scouts came up, the gentleman felt that being hard was good for them. I wonder if he thinks kids today are too spoiled. And I wonder if they are. But hard to me, would be while being exhausted, sweaty, just ready to be DONE, but also be being ready and being able to conquer the trail in to Wilson in a day. Not necessarily overloaded with badly fitting equipment, and lack of leadership. He hadn’t seen the kids, but he could be right. Anyhow, they were on their way out. Wilson was GORGEOUS. We stepped a bit farther up the trail to check out Harbor, but the granite face of Wilson was too hard to resist. It was right under FishFin Ridge, and we had a perfect spot to camp, with big rock benches on the shoreline, from which to jump in the lake.
Wilson Lake was magical. No one there, all to ourselves. We played in the lake (FREAKING COLD), and enjoyed this small bench at almost 10,000′ that was unreasonably but much appreciatively warm (meaning, usually you don’t describe a night at almost 10,000′ anywere in North America as warm) and calm. That night, we lay in the tent, heads out the doors, and watched an incredible Perseid Meteor shower. For once, Scott tired before me, but something ran across my hair– bug, mouse, who knows, but I suddenly felt tired too. Hee. Next morning we got up and decided to dayhike to Gentian Lake, Crater Lake and Big Clear Lake. Wilson was gorgeous in the morning.
At the top of the ridge we saw a trail heading pretty much straight down a steep rock slide and there was a bit of confusion, but we saw the switchback trail to the right. Going down the ‘shortcut’ didn’t look like a good risk, so we took the safer option.
The “shortcut”:
Along the way to the lakes, we met another group of older men who, after some small talk, mentioned that the White Clouds just had received official designation as a Wilderness that Monday. I immediately thought “Great. In the news, now people will come this weekend since the forecast is so good”. We moved on down to Gentian Lake, where I had considered leaving another love rock for my young friend Josh, an amazing Marine who was killed in an Osprey accident in Hawaii in May. The lakeshore was indeed covered in gentians, but I didn’t feel moved by the setting. We decided to continue on, hoping for a better place.
Up up up to another saddle at 10,000, with Crater Lake and Big Clear Lake on the north side, and Mirror lake and several more on the south. In all, you could see 7 lakes from the saddle.
Crater Lake was breathtaking. I spotted some smoke up on the ridge, and apparently a fire was just starting. Of course, DH was all about watching it. A plane flew by, and we hoped they reported it.
We continued on for awhile, but decided that it would be hard access to get down to Crater lake, as you have to continue on to Big Clear and then go back and over the small ridge and that the saddle, at 10k feet, overlooking all those lakes would be a much more awesome place to put Josh’s rock. Crater Lake, if you look close you’ll see why it’s named that:
So, no, I’m not making gang signs. My two fingers are pointing at the faint trails we took to get in there from Wilson lake. That steep rocky gully is the one we didn’t go down, and Wilson is over that ridge, out of sight. Just thought it was a cool perspective.
More trail, on the way back we met some horsepackers, and decided to take the shortcut up the ridge.
Got back, and although we’d already hiked 7 on the GPS, decided we didn’t want to have to make the drive out after hiking 8 miles out tomorrow, so we packed up and headed out.
We’d had great weather, had missed all the storms since the first day, but the sky was threatening as we hit FishFin Ridge. Of course! We hustled it out, starting about 3:30 and hit the TH at about 6:30, pretty done in. Some off and on thundershowers with mixed rain and sleet, so we were on and off with our shells, irritatingly enough. I only had a tank top on so when the wind was blowing it was chilly, believe me.
As we stumbled to the Jeep, thankful to be done and drenched with sweat, our magical host Jeff comes out and suddenly, as if in a dream, asks if we want a hot shower. A WHAT?! WHAT DID YOU SAY? Turns out they have a shower rigged up with tarps, wood pallets for a floor, and an instant on propane heater. Holy cow heaven, I couldn’t believe it. Then, the lovely Chris, his wife, appears with a FLUFFY GIANT TOWEL. And soap! (Scott even appeared at the end of my shower with his disposable razor and little shave cream bottle from the Jeep…this, my friends, is why we have stayed married for so long!) Scott and I were so beside ourselves. The shower really was hot. And good water pressure. Unbelievable. We just couldn’t get over their kindness. I don’t know that they offer it to very many people, but hey. REI has a way of opening doors, and they just could not emphasize enough what a great company I worked for, they were even wearing REI clothing. I think it helped too, that he thought we were well-prepared backpackers, as he’d said as much when we started in, something along the lines of “Well, I don’t have to worry about you”, as he had watched us rearrange our packs and get ready. He inquired about the Scout troop, and we relayed our contact but said we hadn’t seen them again, and they hadn’t come out yet. Poor kids. Sure hope it picked up for them. After this fantastic dream episode, we went to the small campground, in a spot Chris recommended, and enjoyed a fantastic chicken peanut satay dinner that was as good as any restaurant. Scott couldn’t believe it was a dehydrated dinner I’d made. It was pretty good, even though anything probably would’ve been after that day. The campspot was isolated, and very pretty. We thought about a whiskey drink, but were too tired. GPS showed about 45 miles, we later found it lost a whole section, so I’m thinking we did about 50, maybe a bit more. We started Monday afternoon and came out Thursday afternoon. We slept well that night. A picture of our lovely hosts:
Actually, we slept great every night. The tent was cozy but perfectly perfect for two people, great ventilation. I love my pad and my bag, and there is nothing like a hard sweaty day to induce a great night’s sleep. We did feel slightly guilty about not spending any of this time off with the kids, and thought we might try to sneak in a trip to Montana, which is why we cut our time short in the Church. In the morning, Chris told me there was a huge storm system moving in, and two backpackers had headed in after being warned that it could be extremely dangerous. She shrugged her shoulders and said, “Well, we told them. They can’t say they don’t know”. I gave her and Jeff a hug, Scott helped a FS Ranger load up some picnic tables, we got their email address and we set out with a wave. Love those two!
After the drive out, once we got to Challis, I checked the weather, sure enough, the White Clouds were forecast as part of the system. We decided we’d been there, done that before, so we hit this little dive drive-in that I’d spotted (much to Scott’s dismay, he was unsure of the looks of it and not enthused at all). AND OH WAS HE WRONG. Fantastic food! I was ordering this giant burger, onion rings and fries and the man looks at me and says “Wait. Have you ever been here? Do you know how big our onion rings are?” Scott, in true husband fashion, immediately responds “Oh, she can eat it. Believe me” Harrumph. The beef was the best I’d ever tasted. The onion rings? Well yeah. Ok, they were HUGE. And delicious, but as big as my hand. I may have left some food on the tray. But I tried, believe me, I tried.
He tipped us off to a B&B and Scott called, and got us the ‘honeymoon cottage’. It was for our anniversary trip, so yeah. We took it. Showered again, (because we could) and went into ‘downtown’ Challis to get a coffee. Here was the sky at 4pm:
Glad we stayed out. In a humorous turn, we were crossing the street, which mostly consists of bars, an old building that says “First Forest Service Office”, a coffee bar/restaurant, and more bars. Two clearly drunk men were sprawled on the sidewalk in front of one of the bars, staring at me. One of them yells out “Hey there! What’s yer name?” And my quick husband yells back “Scott! What’s yours?” It was all I could do not to burst out laughing, which didn’t seem like the best idea. Poor Scott, neither man replied, but they didn’t go any further with the small talk.
Picture of the cottage, and a video I shot of the approaching storm out front:
It was a pretty interesting place, the man told me it had been a Montgomery Ward house, built in the late 30’s. When he bought it and started to renovate, the walls were nothing but cheesecloth that was stapled to the floor and ceiling beams, and then wallpapered over. WTF! He said no studs, no insulation. Wow. What people did because they had to back in the day.
Turns out, the kids didn’t want to go to Montana, but Scott’s phone was sure blowing up about the fires back home. We figured we’d go into the White Clouds the next day, Saturday, and play it by ear. After a nice night’s rest, we were treated to a fabulous breakfast by the owner, homemade bread and ham and cheese omelettes. A BLM ranger was also with us, and he scoffed at my worry that the White Clouds would see more traffic than normal this weekend. In fact, he tried to look over my head and give Scott ‘the eye wink’ which, as you can imagine, did not sit well with me. In Part II, we shall see who was in the correct corner. We set out to see if we could replenish some lunch stuff. Turns out, good thing I made as much as I did, because the lone grocery store didn’t even sell pepperoni sticks. Huh. If you’ve made it this far, congratulations, I love you, and the White Clouds will come in Part II. Thanks for reading.