East Bank Baker Lake — Wednesday, Dec. 21, 2022

TL;DR: road to TH is plowed, lots of snow on the road and trail, few trees down on the trail creating obstacles. Proceed with caution and at your own risk.

It started off as a joke. And then we got to talking and we were serious about it. We figured out a plan and made sure we had all the gear we needed. We kept a careful eye on the weather and made sure we were prepared for the worst. Now, how many people can say they've had fun camping in below 0 temperatures? 

 Now, I do not recommend anybody to try this without the necessary experience and gear to stay safe, comfortable, and warm. I know we made some mistakes and learn some lessons on this adventure, but we were more than prepared to deal with any trouble that came our way.

The snow started as soon as we got onto Baker Lake road. The road was well plowed til just past the dam. In the car, we nearly made it to the trailhead, but had to walk the last 100 yards. We parked, leaving room for the plow to come through, loaded up, and headed out on our first showshoe backpacking adventure!

We were the first folks on the trail since the big snow storm. Breaking trail through that much snow was hard, I'm not going to lie, though finding the trail was not difficult. The whole time I was in complete awe hiking through this winter wonderland.  The snow had fallen so recently that there were barely any animal prints. What I could identify were mostly from birds or squirrels or chipmunks. Making this landscape even more magical where the chickadee's high up in the canopy eating seeds. They would knock snow off the branches, as if fell down onto us it caught the light and glittered. We stopped often to take in the beauty of the forest transformed by the blanket of snow. 

We reached Anderson Point, dropped our packs, and quickly set up camp before the sun disappeared behind the mountain. After exploring the area and taking lots of pictures, I built a roaring fire to keep us warm and dry. Our campsite overlooked the lake and gave us an amazing view of Baker and Shuksan. The clear sky kept temperatures low through the night but was great for stargazing! We made a deal to stay up until at least 7, and I think we ended up going to bed around 8. With enough insulation and little tricks, we all stayed nice and warm in our bags. 

At sunrise we watched the rosey fingered dawn touch on Baker and make the glaciers dance with a wash of color. We packed our bags and I made us another fire to warm our cold fingers. After a breakfast of oatmeal and hot chocolate, we packed out the way we came. When we returned to the car, we found that the plow had come by and cleared the road, and we could get out without much trouble. Though as we were packing up the car, the plow came up behind us! We had to scramble to get everything in the car, and we definitely got some interesting looks on the way out from the PSE and snowplow folks.