Snow Camping

Although Sarah is the primary poster on our family blog I do manage to make my own little contributions now and again. As the father and husband in the family I rarely have pictures or things to talk about on a blog, but this past week I have had no work. My brother Matt and I decided awhile ago that this week we were going to go on a snow camping trip. Snow camping is not for the faint of heart and was just the thing to fuel our need for adventure and to make sure we didn't get too soft. We went up to Lassen Volcanic National Park in Northern California. Here are pictures and captions from our adventure.

I made these snow shoes out of long plum branches from my parents backyard. They took several hours to bend into shape. I just made up the weaving as I went along. The bottom cloth is Matthew's old crib sheet wrapped around the frame and screwed into place. Sarah's favorite part of theses snowshoes was their price tag (free). To keep them on I tied them to my boots, which worked better than I thought.

tied on and ready to go. Walking without the snowshoes was impossible. We tried and immediately sunk up to our crotch in snow. The snow was well over 7 feet deep up at Lassen Volcanic National park. There was a storm when we got there and several more inches fell while we were there.

 

The main entrance to the park. You can get an idea of how deep the snow is from the roof. Most of the snow visible on the roof is new snow that fell in the past week. The park entrance and visitors center are at about 6700 feet.

The visitors center is buried back there somewhere. It is open year round from 9-5 regardless of the conditions. The roads were well plowed up to the parking lot although we still put on chains because we were in our mini van without 4-wheel drive. There was a lot of snow coming down when we got there.

We hiked for about a mile and found a good spot to build a snow cave, near a beautiful snow covered meadow.

The meadow we camped next to. There was a stream on the far side somewhere.

Our tracks to the campsite. Even with snowshoes the going was slow.  When we got there we started to build our snow cave. Time is of the essence when snow camping. You don't want to be caught outside in sub-zero temperatures when night falls.

I packed way more than I was ever going to need in my pack and it ended up being way too heavy. If we had been going further or staying longer I would have packed lighter, but I erred on the side of being prepared.

 

working on the cave. Building a good snow cave takes a long time. We spent almost the whole day on it finishing in the early evening around 5pm. By then the temperatures started to drop dramatically and we crawled inside for the night.

Inside the cave. It was actually pretty warm, especially compared to outside. We ate dinner and went to bed pretty early. I should have brought a generator and the Wii to keep us entertained.

 

The cave ended up being a decent size, although there ended up being a stump in the middle of it. We both slept warmer than most tent camping trips. Despite being warm we slept fitfully at best because of worry that the cave would collapse on us. We later discovered that our worry was not necessary as we tried to collapse the cave in the morning and couldn't, even when jumping on it. This picture is taken from inside the cave when morning came. Daylight was a welcome sight.

The meadow the next morning.

It snowed several inches during the night and was very windy. Lots of snow fell off the trees.

We got up in the morning and proceeded to collapse our cave. This is good snow camping etiquette. Leaving a cave can be dangerous to skiers and other hikers especially when the snow starts to melt.

Here you can get an idea of the size of the cave. The entrance tunnel was about 5 feet long and the main cavern slept the two of us comfortably with our packs as well. You could sit up or kneel in the cave without issue. It wasn't as tall as other caves I've made. The first cave I ever made slept 5 people across and I could stand up in it.

Hiking out the next morning.

The next morning the storm had blown over and we had blue skies. It was really a beautiful landscape. If it wasn't so cumbersome to get around we would have been more inclined to explore. Just hiking the mile or so back up to our car was exhausting and hot. We were both really sore the next day.