As I was driving toward the trail, the fuzziness of New Years eve started to wear off. I started to realize that the trail head is around 5000 feet, and the snow level is about 2000 feet and I am driving a Honda Civic...
We got about 10 miles from the trail head when the road became icy. I kept motoring along slowly, knowing now I would never make the trail head, but figuring we might find a nice place to play in the snow...
Soon we began to encounter truckloads and outback loads of kids and parents playing in the snow. However, the only place to play in the snow is right in the middle of the road. I can't think of a worse place to play in the snow... One vehicle, a Suburban, just stopped in the middle of the road, parked and unloaded the kids. I guess it must be their road.. I narrowly avoided hitting them both directions.
We finally realized we would have to turn around. I stopped the car, began to slowly back and turn when I realized I was just sliding down the mountain. I was able to slide the front end around so I was pointing the right way, but stopping was nearly impossible. Somehow, I made it down the hill. We noted that we were the only non 4wd vehicle on the road...
After we were safely back on the main road, we decided to head south. We drove for 45 minutes or so, and came upon Duckabush rec area. I was unfamiliar with this area, so we went for a look.
The sign said 5 miles to trail head. I wondered if I would make it...
About 2 miles up, the roads were getting icy again. Suddenly B shouted and I looked to my left and there was a herd of Elk in someones front yard. There must have been 40 Elk in this herd. I was just talking to some friends last week about how I had never seen a wild Elk.
We arrived at a trail head. There was a 1 mile trail which went to a place called "Ranger Hole". We still had a couple of hours of daylight left, so we headed out on the trail. It was an easy trail, no elevation gains, but the snow and ice on the trail did make it harder than normal.
Arriving at Ranger Hole, we came to find it was a place on the Duckabush River where it runs though a bunch of big rocks. the waters where churning and thrashing around the rocks. It was loud. We cautiously walked close enough to the edge to take pictures.
On the way home, the Elk were in the same yard.
