Hike: Rattesnake Ridge (the whole thing!).
Route: One group started at the old Snoqualmie Winery trailhead, the other at the Rattlesnake lake trailhead. The plan was for the two groups to meet up somewhere along the hike and exchange keys, then meet again back at Eastgate.
Attendees: Group #1: Matt, Mark, Laura, Dan (not S.). Group #2: Matt (not K.), Anastasia, Don and Dan S.
Comments:
Group #1 (Lake -> Winery) Quickly make the ledges and found the snow line... unfortunately the snow also covered the trail so they were unable to locate and follow the trail down the backside (dealing with 18" of snow didn't help matters).
Group #2 (Winery -> Lake) Immediately found a fresh logging operation where the trees had been felled but not harvested - making for quite the obstacle course for about 500 yards. Once past that challenge a moderate slog up logging roads led into the woods which proved to have extensive winter storm damage... providing obstacle course #2. After 2 hours of climbing, bending, ducking and occasionally hiking found the snowline about 1/4 mile from the radio towers.
Matt's hike summary:
We set off with optimistic hopes of running the full length of Rattlesnake ridge last night. Don came equipped with maps of the logging roads at the south end, so he got to lead that group of 4, and I took the other group to the usual Rattlesnake Lake location. We had a quick jaunt up to the ledges (goes faster when you're not carrying a BBQ grill!) and continued up from there. The first indicator that this would be less easy than expected was a nice little sign just past the ledges showing a map of the trail which gave a distance of 9.7 (more) miles to the Old Snoqualmie Winery and an elevation gain of another 1100 ft. I had been thinking that it was 9ish miles total, but looks more like 11.3 We carried on wondering when we'd encounter the snow line. We didn't wonder long; small patches around 2500 ft, full trail coverage a few hundred feet higher, and by the time we were on the ridge (around 3100 I think according to the rough topo) we were on 1-2 ft of old base with 4-6" of NEW SNOW on top of that!! We were not prepared for serious snow trudging (error......) but much more of the problem was that the tracks we were following quit around this time leaving us to do some trail/route finding. The trail is not marked. The trail is not obvious. the trail is not easy to stay on. I'm pretty sure we didn't ;) (stay on the trail). At this point we conferred with Dan on the other end of the ridge who reported that the trail there had taken a lot of damage both from logging and winter storm damage. They had battled their way up to the ridge through all the downed trees, but also were not equipped for snow. So, still a good 6 miles apart we turned back. I don't know about the other group, but we had a *spectacular* rainbow - very bright, partial double, and it just hung out for about 10 minutes. Very cool. Anyway next week: Mt. Si be prepared for snow! This means good boots and gaiters!! If the snow line is still really low, we might even consider the new trail. after that.... I'm not sure Maybe Dirty Harry's would be good in the snow - less bugs that way