Roosevelt National Forest, Pierson Park, CO
Last week I stumbled across a few great deals in the local flea-market store. First was a pair of snow shoes for a mere $10. They were worn and beaten, but snow shoes have been on my ‘list’ since Conor and I did our last snow hike and came out of it cold and wet from our thighs down. Another was a North Face backpacking pack for $35 (boyah!). This pack is much larger than my current ‘day-hike’ pack, capable of holding supplies for multiple days on the trail. Lastly, Big-5 had zero-degree backpacking sleeping bags on sale for $30. All these purchases prompted a quickly put-together over-night snow hike-n-camp to test out the gear and mindset of winter camping.
Though my original plan was a simple hike back into the Homestead Meadows via Lion’s Gulch trail, Conor convinced me to attack the meadows from the opposite side we normally do. This would be uncharted territory for us which is both a negative and a plus. I like the idea of a fresh trail, but we were going down a trail we knew nothing about with snow on the ground… making it that much easier to lose the trail.
We packed both our packs for a single night out and we did just that; hiking a few miles out from our parking location, until we could no longer make out a trail, and setting up camp before sunset. A small fire gave us warmth and good dinner before we _tried_ to sleep through the night. I did not feel cold thanks to the new bag, but once again I was just unable to get any sleep while in a tent. That is 4 times now that I have attempted to sleep in a tent and all 4 turn out to be a full night of laying there wishing for some sleep… all night. When Conor announced our 6am alarm I realized I must have slept some as it only felt like I laid there for 4-5 hours, not the 9 we were in the tent.
Over a oatmeal breakfast Conor and I both decided the trip a success. We wanted to test out the snow-shoes, which we did with 1-foot of snow on the ground most of the trail. We wanted to test the new sleeping bags, which we did with a 20-degree night and no hypothermia (whew). I wanted to test the new backpack and it worked perfectly carrying all my gear comfortably.
I’m ready for 2012 where I plan to do many more back-country backpacking trips with overnight stays outside the “civilized” camping areas.
