Death hike up Avalanche Hill

After we arrived at the Bear Valley Lodge, at 3:30 PM, and checked in, it was too early for dinner and too late to do much else. So, my youngest daughter suggested trying out the snow boots we had both brought as a way to work out the kinks from riding so much in the car.

I thought this was a good idea and even suggested walking up the snow covered roads of Bear Valley Village, something that Marilyn and I had done in a twilight six years ago, without snow boots.

I had some trepidation when she looked off in the distance and said that she would really like to hike to the top of a ridge but it looked too far away. We kept walking the roads, Bear Valley Road, Flood Ridge Road, Avalanche Road, constantly going up until low and behold we were at the base of the very ridge she said she would like to hike. It was actually a ravine that was too steep for any houses and she wanted to walk up it.

We made it, as you can see from these Kodak Gallery Pictures, but it wasn't easy. If she hadn't been breaking trail I probably wouldn't have been able to make it. As it was, I was heavier and frequently broke through her compacted snow to a much lower compaction, more than once burying my leg up to my crotch. There were a couple of times that I didn't even bother trying to step but rather crawled. There were only a couple of those times because after the second time I noticed that I was getting chapped knees.

We did get to see the sun set from the ridge she had set as her target. Then the wind picked up. Neither of us had put on our full winter weather gear and the wind chill on the ridge and the first hundred feet down the slope was truly chilling. We could have easily succumbed to hypothermia had the wind been this cold all the way back.

Going down was modestly easier only because the direction I slid in burying my leg deeper was also the direction I was going. This time we made our way to a driveway that had had recent use and missed at least some of the ravine. When a leg was buried, I still had to lift it exceedingly high to get it out of its hole. But again, the downhill slope didn't require quite the lift that uphill had.

I guess I have a strong heart. If anything would have given me a heart attack, this little hike would have. My daughter is training for the Pacific Crest Trail, PCT, to be hiked this year. While I had planned to start exercising more, I thought it would be a more gradual increase.

After this hike, I'm a little concerned about the skiing tomorrow. This was more than I would have thought to do for a warm up. I didn't think warmups are supposed to leave you stiff. It's too soon for soreness but I'm sure that's coming as well.