3.5 miles of hiking • 500' elevation gain • 1 night
After spending a night up here just before Christmas, I thought it would be fun to go back with some friends. We picked a Sunday night to avoid crowds and lots of snowmobilers since the trail we took was a snowmobile trail. It's about 1.7 miles along this beautiful groomed trail to the campground. I used my brand new snow pulk and my friends made makeshift pulks out of plastic sleds.
We started late, probably around 11a and took our time on our snowshoes and getting used to pulling the weight of our pulks. We had a bunch of dry firewood, plus a few luxury items since we had the space! Upon arrival to the campground, we found a site to our liking that would allow shelter from the winds of the lake, as well as trees for hanging my hammock. It was also close to the pit toilets which were open. We made quick work of getting ourselves situated with tents being pitched, hammock being hung, fire pit being dug out, and setting up a covered eating area. Once we got everything set it was close to dinner time. I put a pork tenderloin wrapped in foil on the fire, and cooked up some coconut ginger chicken soup with rice. We also had fresh bread and fruit salad. Everything was washed down with hot apple cider mixed with apricot brandy. Super delicious!
I spent the night in my Hennessy hammock with a 20 degree underquilt and 15 degree sleeping bag for a top quilt . It was pretty cold but I stayed fairly warm. At one point I woke up to a cold butt and realized my underquilt had come out from underneath me. I hadn't been happy with my technique hanging my hammock this time and I think that had something to do with my issue with the underquilt. I put it back in place and slept soundly until waking around 8a. The wind and snow picked up around 2a and we woke to about 6 inches of fresh powder.
Breakfast was quickly cooked...chicken apple sausages over the morning fire and cheesy garlic grits with coffee to wash it all down. We broke up camp and headed back to our cars and stopped at Dairy Queen on our way back for celebratory ice cream. It was my third snow camping trip of the season and for everyone else it was their first time. A good time was had by all!
