Opening pic..
Some fresh snow in the hills last week gave us hope that there might actually be enough on the ground at Government Camp to make the Tom Dick & Harry loop worth snow shoeing.
We set off from the Ski Bowl parking area and walked down the road to the Mirror Lake trailhead. Not the most fun mile of hiking but going down hill as the first mile of the hike it's over with pretty quickly.
It was a snowy wonderland in the trees but so many people had hiked the trail the day before that there was no need for snow shoes.
It didn't take us long to reach Mirror Lake, we did the required loop around before continuing on up the trail.
Chizuru & Chiyoko testing the ice!
Onwards & upwards we went, looking back to see if Hood was going to pop out the clouds but the mountain remained hidden all day.
There was one person in front of us packing his skis up, but apart from him we seemed to have the trail to ourselves. The beaten path though was still good enough that snow shoes were still not needed!
Last few steps to the top!
Looking back down on the lake & along Tom Dick & Harry.
After a bite to eat we set off along the top of DT&H in the Direction of Ski Bowl, there were only 2 sets of snow shoe prints & a lone set of ski tracks from this point on & so our snow shoes were finally needed.
If we call the West bump were the trail ends Tom then this bump in the middle would be Dick!
Then it's down hill a bit...
Until you climb up to the highest point, Harry!
Looking back the way we came.
From here it was an easy walk along the ridge on the ski road to the top of the Ski Bowl lift. Last year when we hiked this loop we dropped off the ridge into the Ski Bowl Back Country & soon discovered that snow shoes are not the best option for travel on double black diamond ski runs
.. With still vivid memories of Gunsite Notch in our minds, this year we stayed on the ski road & took the leisurely long way down.
Though the lower lifts were running we were surprised to find that the upper lift was still closed, so with the exception of a handful of skiers who hiked up we had the top of Ski Bowl Mountain to ourselves.
Ski Bowl Mountain looking over to Multorpor Mountain.
We followed the winding road down to the 1936 Warming Hut
Looking back up the mountain we could see that the cloud layer was dropping.
From here we walked the last half mile or so back down to the parking lot. We had 7.8 miles & 1830' of EG on the clock.
Here are a few more of the photos we took accompanied with a story about a Tom, Dick & Harry
http://youtu.be/KBwrZEWnfj0
The map below shows this years route in Red & last years in Blue.
