Now that my Sno Park permit has arrived I’m free to hit the nearby winter recreation areas, particularly Salmon la Sac which is just down the road from my cabin. Today I went on a short ski of the Sasse Mountain Trail (aka Forest Service Development Road 4315) to get a bit more comfortable on skis and evaluate some gear choices. Mostly I’m just happy that I’m getting outside in the winter instead of being stuck indoors waiting around for the spring thaw as I’ve done in the past. After this my plan is to spend the night in the X-Mid 1P in the yard to evaluate my overnight insulation situation and then I’d like to squeeze in an easy overnight before the end of January.
Gear
LighterPack:
https://lighterpack.com/r/sfz3ca
The Altai Hok snowshoe skis were fantastic. I learned that the buckles for the bindings should be toward the outside of the ski so that they don’t collide with the buckles on the other ski as they slide past one another. Uphill speed is more or less snowshoe speed (meaning, not fast) but I was able to “ski” (I’m using the term loosely since this was only my second time on skis) all the way back down to the car with a lot of help from my poles. Unfortunately Gaia crapped out and recorded a trip length of around 20 feet so I don’t have any hard numbers around how much time the skis actually saved.
The star of the show, however, was the SnowClaw backcountry shovel. I found a flat spot just off the road and stomped down a little platform to have lunch on. After that I decided to bust out the SnowClaw and see what it could do by digging out the snow around a small tree. Granted there were only about two feet of snow but I was able to clear the area on one side of the tree down to the ground in just a few seconds. This thing can move serious amounts of snow and it only weighs 174 grams which is nothing as far as shovels are concerned. I did note, however, that the ridge on the back sides of the handles has an acute angle and gets a bit uncomfortable with thin gloves on (I was using my Bandito fingerless gloves) so I might do a couple wraps of Gorilla Tape to round it out.
I also learned that ASAP orange nitrile gloves are touchscreen compatible. Hooray!
Layering wise I dug out an old pair of SmartWool long underwear from the unloved gear box and wore them under my pants. This was a mistake since it was a balmy 36F when I started out and I was overly warm any time I wasn’t standing absolutely still. However, since moisture management is the name of the game in winter (or so I’ve heard) I think wearing the thermals underneath a pair of shorts (for modesty) combined with wind pants when things get chilly might be a nice option.
Finally, you do a lot more bending over while skiing than hiking so I had a problem with snacks falling out of my side pockets. As luck would have it the Kuhl Kontra Air pants have zip pockets on both thighs which allowed me to keep my snacks both easily accessible and non-frozen via my body heat.
Route
Gaia route:
https://www.gaiagps.com/public/4hGs4ZrSbycksgZpm6sCgnHL
With one mile of distance and 454 feet of gain the road had an 8.6% grade which the Hoks were able to handle without any slipping. It’s slightly less steep than challenging local hikes such as Gothic Basin (11.5%) or Mount Si (15%) so I’m curious as to how they’d do there. Time will tell but so far so good!
Photography
SmugMug gallery:
https://turigrinos.smugmug.com/Adventures/2020/Salmon-la-Sac/
Not much to report. Since I only went a mile up the road I was still in thick forest and the occasional views of far-away mountains were tightly framed by trees. I did spot an odd spillway on one of the creeks, however:
I mean, maybe it’s not that odd – this was technically part of the developed Salmon la Sac campground and Sno Park so a little flood control makes sense. It’s just not as scenic as the waterfall I expected when I started following the sound of roaring water through the woods.
In any case I’m hoping that the next trip will be an overnight with some views and a nice sunrise and sunset.