This was back in November. We'd seen some snow high in the hills, but nothing like what we should have seen. So of course, I decided I needed to go see if the high country was still accessible. TL;DR: sort of.

The road became impassable about a mile and a half short of the trailhead. I mean, I could have pushed it and tried to drive. But that's been attempted before and it rarely works out well. Instead, I parked and started the bonus walk along the road.

There were no tracks so I was breaking trail the entire way. The snow was never that deep (except that one spot, you know who you are) and we made it to Lake Lillian with minimal wallowing.

The lake itself was ice-free. Kind of a bummer. I'd hoped to try walking across to get to the Gully of Doom on the other side. Probably for the best. Since our adventure was cut short we wandered down to Lake Laura and found it was almost frozen. It had an ice/slush covering that was certainly not going to hold us, but it's a good start.

Back at the trailhead I resigned myself to an uninteresting walk back to the car, but the pika called out to me. Tink and I fought through some fairly thick brush to get to a talus field where we spotted a pair of pika chilling out.

Halfway through December, the road is completely snowed in. Although I've made the long slog up there in winter before, I don't think it's on the schedule for this year. The lake can can sleep tight without any interruptions from us.

📍On the lands of the Wenatchi people.