We started up the Fourth of July Creek Trail Sunday in shirtsleeves, and I kind of wished I’d been wearing shorts rather than long pants. My friends and I guessed that the temperature must have been close to 70 and we were LOVING the warmth...but it was not to last because the path was steep and in a matter of just a few hours we gained nearly five thousand feet in elevation and found ourselves in deep snow.
We were on Icicle Ridge in Central Washington at an elevation of about seven thousand feet, and my two hiking companions and I agreed that the place was appropriately named because it was cold-cold-COLD up there; and, as it seems has been the case on most of our hikes for the past 10 months, we were back in the land of Winter.
No Hawaiian shirts or lazing around on beach towels up on Icicle Ridge, baby. It was time once again to pull down jackets and stocking caps out of our packs. Eat lunch fast, then head back down to where it is warm.
Not that my friends and I mind snow, you understand, but I found myself thinking: "Next weekend, if someone in the group suggests a hike with “Icicle” in its name, we need to come up with another plan.”
