What a great day for a hike!!! Perfect weather and no hangover made this a great way to start off the new year. The trail is completely snow-covered. I brought snowshoes, but I never had to use them!! The snow was so icy and crusty I hiked the entire trail in my crampons. Route finding was easy, as the trail is firmly compacted. This years snow pack is looking pretty weak thus far. Before climbing up to the lake, beware the tricky snow bridge that spans the creek. The pucker factor is extreme as you tip-toe nimbly (and quickly) over the not-so-safe looking structure. A fall into the creek could leave you wet up to the knees. Had I been thinking straight, I would have crossed elsewhere. The lake was quite a site to see. Besides the outlet, the lake is totally snow covered. I arrived just as the sun was setting over the nearby mtns. It was gorgeous. The only people I saw all day were a group of three coming down while I was going up. Took me an honest 2.5 hours up and 1.5 hours down. Beave

The three (me, Laura, and Paul) decided to head up to Surprise Lake for a nice snowshoe trip since the weather was so nice on Sunday. Our plan was to hit the trailhead at 9am so we would have plenty of time to make it up to Suprise Lake and maybe even on to Glacier Lake. We got started a little late but the good news is that the weather couldn't have been better. It was a little windy but the sky was all sunny and blue. I was suprised (pardon the pun) that the trail appeared to get so much traffic. The trail was clearly visible and well trampled all the way to the lake. We had our snowshoes on but we might have been able to make it to the lake without them. We took our time getting up to the lake (we wanted to practice our map and compass skills) but finally got to the lake about 1pm. We sat down for lunch in the middle of the blazing sun but as we we getting ready to leavy a front had moved in. We never did make it to Glacier Lake. I'll save it for next time.

Round Trip Distance: 8 ½ miles Elevation Gain: 2,300 ft High Point: 4,508 ft It was a very cold day for the Puget Sound region. Temperatures in the mountains were in the teens with sub-zero wind chills in exposed places. We met at the Bothell park and ride at 7:30AM. Everyone (Matt, John, Debbie, Alexandra, and myself) and their gear fit into my car. Our original plan was to go to Blanca Lake to the north of US2 near Index. As soon as we started on our drive, there were some snow flurries. When we turned north off of US2 on the Index-Galena road, the road was covered with a thin layer of snow. It looked easily drive-able. However, not too far down the road, my car skidded a little. I responded to the skid, which caused the car to fishtail. I didn't take this as seriously as I should have, because I've always been able to get out of such a fishtail. After several skids back and forth, I sat there in disbelief as the car slowly and quietly did a complete 360 and we skidded into a small ditch beside the road. No one was in danger of getting hurt, and there was nothing for the car to really hit. However, if I had been farther down the road where there was a turn, things might not have ended so pleasantly. A couple of pushes got us back on the road. The road was covered with ice underneath the thin snow layer. You could ice-skate with your boots on it. It was a good wake-up call to the dangers of winter driving. We went down the road a little bit before deciding to turn around and try another hike. As we drove east on US2, we saw a bunch of cars (including a 4-wheel drive vehicle) that had slid off the road. We decided to try to make it to Spark Plug Lake, which is near Surprise Lake. You turn south off of US2 at a service area for the train. This is near to where the train goes into the tunnel to cross the Cascades. The parking area was just south of the train tracks. It was here that we met Pete. Not long into the hike (and fortunately for this), Pete suffered a severe equipment failure. Due to the cold, his Koflache plastic mountaineering boot shattered and started to disintegrate, leaving fluorescent pink shards along the trail. It was an old pair of boots, but this is still not the type of thing that should happen. However, this did not stop Pete! He went back to his truck, at which point his other boot was falling apart too, and wrapped his boots in duct tape before cinching them into his snowshoes. He successfully completed the entire hike like this. The beginning of the trail was well packed and could be hiked without snowshoes. Parts were a little icy. There were a bunch of small streams to cross, but they didn't present much of a problem. We took our time on the way up. There was a fresh layer of powder all around. The high mountain walls of this V-shaped valley shielded us from wind. Although it was cloudy, there were good views to the nearby mountains. We saw evidence of one small avalanche. However, the avalanche danger of this hike appeared to be small under most conditions. We eventually gave up on Spark Plug Lake as we realized the steepness of the necessary climb, and headed to Surprise Lake. The hike got steep as we reached the end of the valley. There was nearly a foot of new dry powder on top of an icy layer at the upper elevations. Snowshoes were a necessity to make any reasonable progress. As we reached the hanging valley of Surprise Lake, we were greeted with a bitterly cold wind. I was sweating after the climb and the sweat froze onto my hair. It was very pretty up there. The lake was completely frozen. The basin was filled with deep dry powder. Thei ice at the lake's outlet was very thin and looked as if it had just frozen recently. Because of our slow pace on this hike we had to finish the last half of return trip using headlamps. We saw two other parties of hikers on this trip: a pair that turned back before they made it to Surprise Lake, and a group of three that were doing an over-nighter, that we saw at dusk. Afterwards, we stopped for dinner in Monroe and were back at the park and ride by 8:30. Altogether, this was a very nice trip. other reports and pictures at: http://www.geocities.com/Yosemite/Gorge/4424/hikes.html