Rachel, Lila, and the Ramparts

Did I go hiking this weekend? Why, yes! Yes, I did.

 

I had school on Saturday, so the moment I finished my final I was out the door and on my way to the trail. I started up the trail to Rachel Lake at 2:05 pm. Way too late, way too hot. There were lots of people there - the parking lot was full. I passed too many people to count, all of whom were on their way out. I got to Rachel Lake at about 4:00, which is pretty good. I did the first three miles in one hour, and the fourth mile in about an hour. That is one nasty mile of trail! There's still a bit of snow, but nothing difficult to deal with. I sat at the lake for a few minutes, ate an apple, drank some water, and threw the pack back on and headed up to Lila Lake.

 

The slope behind Rachel Lake is snow free, which is deceptive. The moment you reach the ridge, there is snow, and plenty of it. I followed the footprints of others, praying that I would not posthole through it. I didn't have any problems, but there was great potential for injury in a few spots. There were occasional bare patches of ground, but the snow patches got larger and the bare patches got smaller as I approached the lake. Still, I found a nice bare patch of flat rock to set up camp near a couple of the streams of snowmelt. I had a nice relaxing evening, watching the sunset and eating dinner, taking pictures of every little thing. There was only one other occupied camp that I could see, and they were on the other side of the lake. I went to bed around 9:00. It had been a long day.

 

I woke up at 11:00 with a big light shining on my tent. I climbed out to find out who the heck was waking me up. Oh. It was a nearly full moon. It was a very bright moon, with a crystal clear sky. I wandered around in the dark with my bare feet, enjoying the cool night air and the view of the mountains and lake. It was bright enough that I didn't need any artificial light to get around. I love that! It was about 60 degrees, so it was very comfortable. I was expecting it to be cooler with all of that snow.

 

I woke up around 5:00 and got up to have breakfast. I watched the sun rise and broke camp. Instead of leaving, I headed over to the Ramparts. I got to see not only whistling marmots, but whistling marmot babies, a first for me. Other than that, the only wildlife I saw was a few chipmunks and some deer footprints in the snow. There were lots of wildflowers in the bare patches. Again, lots of snow on the trail to the Ramparts but nothing challenging. The Ramparts are a beautiful series of glacier-carved lakes, all connected with little waterfalls and bluffs. I wandered around the lake basin, trying to get good pictures but trying not to walk through the billion or so occupied campsites. It is kinda limiting when you're trying to avoid waking people up or distrubing their breakfast. Eventually I gave up and headed out. On the way out, I passed another billion people on their way up. Because I started out so early, I probably missed a lot of them. I got back to the car at about 11 :15 am and headed home.