12/27/17 Rattlesnake National Recreation Area

Junction with the trail heading toward Kench Meadow

On the 27th of December, I headed out on my own, back to the Rattlesnake.  Not being in the mood for as long of a ski as I had done on my first day, only five days earlier, I turned up the trail up Spring Gulch, half a mile from the trailhead.  This is a loop I had done a number of times, and I really enjoyed the work of the initial mellow climb in the first two miles and the downhill that followed on the other side of the creek to get back to the main stem trail.  Once again, I had gotten an early start, and I was cutting the most-recent tracks in the fresh snow.  The snow was good, and I was having a blast.

Trail heading back down

I made it to the junction with the trail to Kench Meadow and beyond and decided to head up that trail a little to check the conditions.  I eventually wanted to ski the Wallman Trail and this trail would be the way to end that loop.  I skied up the trail a bit.  The brush, like below me on the trail I had already skied, was heavy with fresh snow and hanging into the trail in spots.  Even some larger trees, like birch and some smaller larch, were hanging over the trail, weighted down by the heavy snow.  I would stop to knock snow off when I could.  After only five minutes or so, I was pleased with the conditions and the trail ahead of me did not look too steep.  I turned around and headed back down to the junction.

Once there, I headed down the east side of Spring Gulch.  That trail was fun, but since no one had tracked out the snow yet, it was a little slow.  As this was my favorite part of the loop, I decided to loop the upper section again, and when I made it down to the outhouse at the one-mile point, I cut across to the trail I had skied up and skied back up to the trail junction again.  The second time down, going over my tracks again, was much better and enjoyable.  I made it back down to the outhouse much more quickly and found that there were now ski tracks on this side of the gulch.  I easily followed the trail back down to the main stem trail and then back to the trailhead.