Blanca Lake

First backpacking trip of the year was a huge success!! It's been a warm spring, but there is still a little snow in the mountain and apparently quite a bit at Blanca Lake. We picked this hike because there was still a little snow, but the trail was traversable, so we could make it there at least. It was also a short enough hike that if need be we could have turned it into a day hike. Turns out it was the perfect little overnighter.

The hike says it was 3.5 miles into the lake, but it felt like way more than that! Maybe it was the big packs we were carrying or the snow we had to traverse starting about halfway there, or maybe it was just because it was a 3,300 ft elevation gain! Either way, by the time we got to the lake, I was pretty happy I didn't have to turn around and go back the same day. I was also pretty excited that on the way out to the trail we stopped at the new Chik-Fil-A in Bellevue and had gotten an extra sandwich for lunch...it was amazing to bust it out at the end of the hike!

This was my first time snow camping, and it was a perfect experience. It was actually about 60+ degrees and sunny when we got to the lake despite the lake being partially frozen and there being snow everywhere. We found ourselves an open snowy area to set up camp and proceeded to stomp out a platform for our tent. I'm not entirely sure if we were camping on land or over frozen water or most likely over driftwood at the bank. There was enough snow to keep us up either way.

As it got later more and more day hikers started heading home and we ended up having the lake almost to ourselves. There were about 3 or 4 other campsites set up for the night, but they were far enough away from ours that it felt like we were alone. Since it was a perfectly clear night, we ended up sleeping in the tent without the rain fly on, so it was just a mesh enclosure and we even left the door open, so it was like we were sleeping in the open air. It did get a bit chilly, but I stayed warm enough bundled in my sleeping back. It must have been below freezing because there was a new layer of ice over the lake that was thawed the day before. As soon as the sun started coming up though it warmed right up!

I ended up being so warm as we were packing up that it was shorts and a tank top for the walk back out! It was a great trip and I'm really glad we went when there was still some snow on the ground, it was absolutely beautiful!

Wallace Falls Glamping

We did a quick little overnight trip with some friends this weekend. We took off from work Friday afternoon and headed out about and hour and a half to gold bar, wa to the trail head for Wallace Falls. Right off of the parking lot for the trail is a series of cabins and camping spots. Our friends had reserved a little cabin for us all for Friday night. By cabin, I mean one room with a few beds in it...no bathroom or kitchen or anything, so it was just glamping. They had already gotten the fire going when we got there so we joined right in. Friday night there were a few minutes of rain where we got up and moved to the covered porch, but for the most part we hung out by the fire enjoying dinner, drinks, and s'mores! Saturday morning Ryan and I got up and got breakfast going on the fire.

Breakfast

After breakfast we packed up the cars and headed out on the hike. The first few miles were pretty busy with other groups. A lot of kids too. The way up there are several viewpoints of the Wallace Falls. After each view point the crowds got thinner and thinner and we kept going.



After the top of the falls, we headed over on an old logging road to Wallace Lake for a quick lunch break. It was a lovely view, but we were all starting to get a little chilly, so we didn't stick around too long and headed back down the mountain. Great first long hike of the year, now I'm itching for some overnight backpacking adventures!



Crossfit Open

We've been pretty busy lately without anything big to blog about. Most of our weekend have been consumed with housework and the Crossfit Open. For the last 5 weeks, Crossfit HQ has released a workout every Thursday that thousands of people from all over the world complete and log their scores to see how they stack up against everyone else. Ryan has competed in this once before, but this was the first year that I signed up for it. This was also the first year that they released scaled versions of each workout as well. They did that so that more people could have the ability to participate in the event at all different levels, however, this also meant that the prescribed (non scaled) workout was even tougher than usual. I really wanted to be able to complete all of the workouts as prescribed, mostly to give myself a benchmark to work off of in the future. Surprisingly I was able to do all but one of the workouts at the Rx level! I was pretty excited about that, especially since a couple of them forced me to learn movements I didn't even know I could do (handstand pushups)!

The final workout was rowing and thrusters...this was my first attempt at it...I did it again two days later for a faster time.

In order to do a full handstand pushup I had to learn how to kip (throw my legs up to help push mu body up)

Yay, I can now do handstand pushups! (this was attempt 2 at the work out...I got 3 more handstand pushups than I did the first time...those are a beast!

I certainly didn't have any high hopes of winning anything, but it was really cool to be able to see where I was at amongst my peers and have new goals of getting better and stronger in the future!



Ryan also did awesome...but we already knew he was strong ;)

Winter in the Valley

This weekend we got a long weekend and got to play in the snow! Everywhere on the west coast has been seriously lacking in snow accumulation. Our Whistler trip was the only time we've been snowboarding because the mountains near us are kinda patchy with snow at least on the bottom. Fingers crossed for some spring snow. Anyway, they do have some snow in the Methow Valley which is North East of Seattle. There also happens to be a pretty amazing mountain house that just completed in the area designed by my talented husband. So we made a weekend out of a few snow sports and visiting with the clients and checking out the new house!

Someone thinks he's a lap dog.

We drove out to the Valley Saturday morning getting there just after noon and started out with a snowshoe hike. As soon as we started the hike we saw a pretty large bone (maybe a big deer or a cow) with all the meat eaten off of it. Didn't really think about it too much. Not too much later we saw another leg bone...hoof still in tact, no meat on it. Something on this trail was devouring large mammals...slightly terrifying. We saw a lot of good sized tracks in the snow too. I'm pretty convinced that with the warmer than usual temps lately, the bears were out in full force. I saw several tracks that looked to me like bears! That all made for a bit of a leery hike up the mountain, but we made it out of there alive!

Someone is missing a foot...











Sunday we moved on to our next winter sport...cross-country skiing. I forgot how relaxing cross-country skiing is, and it's an awesome work out. It was a beautiful day out too, so we ended up in t-shirts by the end.











After our skiing adventure we headed over to the house Ryan designed to get a few photos in the daylight. We also came back a few hours later to take some night shots and to have dinner with the clients and the contractor and his wife. It was a ton of fun, and they happen to all be really great people to hang out with.





Monday we checked out of our hotel and picked up some fat bikes for the morning. They're basically mountain bikes with fatter tires to grip better in snow. I had never tried biking in snow before and the trail we went to was so much fun! Just riding up and down hills of snow!









After a few hours of riding we hit the road and headed back to Seattle and back to real life of cleaning up our house and getting ready for work...boooo. Time to plan the next adventure :)