5/30/05 Hiking and camping out

This past weekend Cecelia and I got together for a hiking and camping trip to Symphony Lake. The trailhead is just a mile or so past Cecelia’s house, and goes up the valley for 6 miles.

Cecelia is hiking the Chilkoot trail next month, which is a historic gold rush trail into Alaska that takes 5 days of hiking over a mountain pass, and she wanted to do a “shake-down” hike to get her gear ready.

No problem, says I, should be a piece of cake. Well, after lugging a 35 lb. pack up hill and down dale, crossing a boulder field and camping out in a tent with on and off showers, I gotta admit I’m pretty pooped!

I haven’t hiked that far and camped out in a tent since I was a Boy Scout back in grade school, and hiking 12 miles in two days, carrying a pack, was a lot harder now then it was back then! It took us about 4 ½ hours to hike one way; we were taking it easy and the trail was a bit muddy in places. And then there was that boulder field, which sure slowed us down.

We had a good time, though, and got to see some fantastic scenery and a couple of new birds and critters.

The main attraction for me for the hike was that Symphony Lake has grayling in it, so I packed my fly rod in. I could see ‘em rising, but unfortunately they were out about 20 feet further out than I can cast, and I couldn’t entice ‘em closer.

On the hike in, we spotted a Dall sheep ram way up on the mountainside. As we walked, we noticed that he was coming down the mountain, and closer to us. He got closer, and continued down till he was only a few hundred yards from us. He was a fine looking animal, with horns that were between ½ and ¾ curl, but I was wondering why he was taking so much interest in us.

We moved on, and the ram followed us a ways up the mountain. We’d stop, and he’d stop. This was getting freaky. He followed us for about 3 miles, even crossing the river and coming up into the boulder field, and at times whistling with a sound like I make to call in Aurora, Cecelia’s dog. Then it hit us. He thought Aurora, who’s got a white coat, was a female sheep! He was in love! Fortunately, we lost him in the boulder field.

We got past Eagle Lake; a glacier fed lake, and made it into Symphony Lake to make our campsite. Mountains all around, and we managed to get the tent set up between the rain sprinkles. We had packaged dehydrated food for supper (actually, not too shabby, they’ve come a long way since I was a Boy Scout!) and chilled our wine in a nearby convenient snow bank on the shore of the lake.

I got up early to 26° temps and overcast sky’s, and got frustrated again trying to get those grayling. We broke camp and headed out on a trail that I’m sure was twice as long as the one we hiked in.

We also saw a bunch of other wild life on our trip. Eagles were flying overhead as we hiked, and in the morning we say beaver in the lake, along with a Harlequin duck and a pacific loon (looks like the loons in Maine, but has a silver/gray head). There were also willow ptarmigan all over the place, and Aurora had a great time chasing them around. We saw a pair of hoary marmots on the way out, too. Kinda like a large groundhog.

All in all, a good time was had. I’m starting to get over my aches and pains, and Cecelia is making notes on what worked and what didn’t for her hike later this month.

Some photos of the trip follow. You’ll notice the yellow can hanging off my pack. It’s bear spray, which we carried close at hand, just in case. If I look a bit fat in some of the photos, it’s cause I was also carrying my other bear deterrent, a .44 magnum, under my shirt.