Winter Solstice Celebrated Snowshoeing at Silver Crest
 Mimi's birthday yesterday gave way to a gorgeous day for a snowshoe on the winter solstice under bright blue sunny skies, with a bit of wind. It was perfect for her first day trying a new sport. Mimi brought along her sister-in-law from Whitefish, who joined June and Katie for a trek through some deep powdery, fluffy white stuff. We left Great Falls at 8:30 a.m. and were on trail by 10:15. The powder was pretty but kept us busy breaking trail, a bit of chore; we all took turns, so it wasn't too bad overall. One bad thing was that no one had been on the trail yet this year, so the base wasn't set up; occasionally we hit a tree or rock udner the powder, which tried to buck us off our snowshoes; luckily, we mostly stayed upright. We followed the new Chaser trail, going the two-mile loop with a stop for a snack at the Silver Dyke warming hut, followed by a bit of confusion finding the trail from that point on. We arrived back at the cars in less than two hours, so we felt pretty good about our time with breaking trail and it being the first time out this year for everyone. After this jaunt, we decided to hike to Memorial Falls, always pretty in winter. We had noticed on the way in that the turnout was actually plowed this year so we didn't have to hike the highway. The falls was nicely iced over, but we could faintly see and hear the falls behind the crystallized water, which formed what looked like stalactites from the rocks above. After a few pictures of this fairyland-type creek-carved canyon, we climbed in the car for our trip home. We forewent a stop at Bob's to head back early, arriving at 4Bs by 2:30. Who went: Mimi, June, Trish, Katie |
RSS Feed