Pioneer Ridge-Austin Helmers Trail in Palmer

A few years ago I was driving around exploring and found the trailhead for the Pioneer Ridge-Austin Helmers Trail near Palmer, off the Knik River Road. A flyer said it was a 5000 foot climb, which immediately piqued my interest, along with the part that said, "experienced climbers with gear only for the final ascent."  Sounded good and knarly to me, and I've wanted to go back ever since.  A weekend of sports in Palmer (state track and baseball regionals) meant I was in the area, and my daughter was fresh back from Colorado and itching for some uber hikes. The weather for the day we were shoot for said partly cloudy and 50's, which is about as perfect as it's going to get.

View of the Knik River from a few thousand feet up the Pioneer Ridge Trail

In my mind, over the years, the trail has gained mythic porportions--there aren't a lot of trails that are 5000 foot climbs! But really, it was just another typical Alaskan mountain trail. It was a nice single track, with sections that were muddy. A couple of picnic tables marked distinctive alpine meadows with amazing views of the Knik River and Knik Glacier. I made it to about the snow line, which I'm guessing was about 2500 or 3000 feet, judging by the other mountains across the valley.  The grade of the trail was a steady uphill from the very first step, so that was two hours of solid climbing! But it didn't seem too steep and it was never a scramble, and the trail was fairly smooth, making for sure footing.  It only took an hour to get back down to the two up, making for a good three hour mountain workout. 

We were entertained by the simplicity, and unhelpfulness, of the trail map

A few walkway systems helped avoid muddy sections of trail

Before I did this climb I didn't even realize there was a Knik Glacier

Most sections of trail were hard-packed dirt.
Trees were quite leafed out at the bottom but not further up.

I would go back to this trail again if I was in the area, not necessarily with the expectation of making it all the way up. Aurora went an hour further than I did, and got two ridges further up than me to the serious snow that involved post-holing, which isn't fun. From her spot the knife edge of a ridge and the peak were visible, and it was clear why climbing equipment was necessary!

Wolverine Peak Climb

It is the beginning of summer and my travels and adventuring are revving up. I was in Anchorage for a week and got in six 2-4 hour hikes in seven days. Some I've done before and some I didn't take pictures of so you won't see a blog post for all of them. But I have a few new ones worth sharing. 

While leaves have popped out at the trailhead, up the trail no green is showing yet

One of my greatest discoveries is that there are 4 trailheads all accessing the same Chugach National Forest trails on the Hillside area of Anchorage:  Glen Alps/Flattop (the most popular, judging by the extensive, paved parking lot), Huffman, O'Malley and Prospect Heights. I'd only been to the Flattop trailhead before and now feel deprived of years of not knowing about lots of other great trails! The Flattop area starts nearly at or above treeline, so when it is windy, there is no protection. The other areas are more treed and offer protection on blustery days.

What would we do without the wonderful bridges that allow us access to the backcountry?!

I started the Wolverine Peak trail from the Prospect Heights trailhead, taking a left at the Powerline Trail and following it up on a gradual climb on a wide, hard packed trail. It was pleasant walking, till I came to the intersection with Near Point (straight) or Wolverine Peak (a right). I opted to try the peak trail and it began a steeper ascent, resulting in frequent short breaks as I caught my breath on my first climbing hike of the season.

A view of Anchorage (a clear day would also show us Denali in the distance) from the trail up Wolverine Peak

Only one section of snow remained, 50 feet or so, on my climb to the saddle, at which point I decided that for my fresh-to-hiking legs, that would be enough climbing for the day. I can see how it would be a pleasant hike, really not too difficult, once I'm back in hiking shape for the season.

When climbing, I thought Wolverine Peak was to the left after climbing this slope, but when I was driving the Seward Highway later and looking up, I saw that it was to the right up this section, a peak that's about 4200 feet

A Cat Walks By....

As I was thinking it was about time to go to sleep while on my annual retreat at the Holy Spirit Center last week, I glanced out the window and saw a cat walking by.  Hm.  Then I was like, "Whoa, that cat is big!"  As it continued to walk I thought, "That's no housecat! Look at those paws! And tufted ears! That's a lynx!"  It complied by walking slowly, obviously hunting, and allowed me to get a picture and then a video.

A lynx walked by my room

As the lynx walked around the corner of the building, I dashed to the next room, the library, and as I peered down, the lynx paused and then pounced, walking away with something gray hanging from its mouth.  I'd seen a rabbit hopping about the lawn earlier that day so suspect it was rabbit that it nabbed, as it was larger than a mouse.

After that, no amount of peering out of windows got me another view of the lynx. Of course, for the remaining days there, I spent more time than usual looking out the window in hopes of seeing another view of a lynx or other wildlife!

First Local Slush Cup at Ohlson Mountain

Spectators in costume watch as someone pulled a kayaker down the hill through the slush cup

When I first heard there was going to be a slush cup at Ohlson Mountain as a fundraiser for a local boy who has a rare form of cancer and will be in chemo in Seattle for almost the next year, I was like, "What's a slush cup?" But I recalled watching the annual slush cup at Alyeska, and quickly connected that event with Homer's event, though I couldn't quite picture a huge pit of watery, snowy, slush at the bottom of Ohlson Mountain. However, via a many, many hoses run from the nearest house, they made it happen!

This was actually was of the funnest events I've been to in Homer in awhile. It was a beautiful 40ish degree day, with a mix of sunshine and snow. A downhill ski slalom preceded the slush cup, with kids and adults competing for prizes on skis, snowboards and with costumes and style.  A huge turnout made Ohlson Mountain Road look incredibly busy, with cars lined up quite a ways up and down the road. (As an aside, with such nice weather I was afraid we were going to be in the middle of spring breakup and the road would be a mess, but despite warm temperatures the road was mostly still frozen.)

Lots of food, a silent auction, music, many Homer neighbors made it what we call a "so Homer" event.  The slush cup got the spectators seated on the snow in perfect viewing, some around the fire, some on tarps, others in chairs. A teacher from the high school went first and made it across the slush without dunking. Then came a couple of Hoxie's cross-country ski team teammates, also dressed in costumes. It seemed like about 40 folks attempted the slush cup. Most made it over. Some dunked on purpose. Some made it over with help of a couple assistants in the water. The big sled made it, pulled and pushed over the water after crashing a few times down the hill. The kayak made it with assistance as well.  It was all good for lots of laughs and a good hunk of change was made to help out the family with expenses in this coming challenging year.

I joked with someone that we need to do a slush cup every year...we're guessing it would grow, though a good cause helps. Here's to wishing Hoxie well!

Cooper Landing Spring Break with Alyeska Add-on

Last year with so litte snow we decided to do a Cooper Landing Spring break to get some early season hiking in. This year we ended up there by different circumstances.  Our goal was to go to Alyeska Resort and downhill ski/snowboard, but the resort was full when we called a couple weeks before break.  Lots of people stay in Anchorage and drive the 45 minutes to an hour to Girdwood, but we really didn't want to go to Anchorage so we decided to stay at our usual motel in Cooper Landing, the Sunrise Inn, and drive to Alyeska from there--also about an hour drive.  It ended up working out very nicely for timing and enjoyment, and we got to explore some new places as well.

No new snow for weeks made for a firm base, despite 346" of snow so far this year at Alyeska 

Waaaaaay up there is the top of Alyeska's aeriel tram.  On the other side of it is "the bowl".

A little closer view shows the North Face, supposedly the longest continuous double black diamond in North America

Moose Meadows is an outdoor playland at the base of Alyeska:  groomed cross-country ski trails, marked as multi-use for fat-tire bikers, hikers, snowshoers, runners and more.

Moose Meadows in the other directions, with the biking single-track on the left.
Bike trails wove throughout the woods all over.

The Alyeska snowcat trail is also multiuse and made for a fine, fast ski mostly uphill one way, and mostly downhill back!

We decided to let Denver snowboard for the day and we explored the many multi-use trails around Alyeska Resort.  It was almost deserted in the morning, but after noon when the temperatures rose out of the single digits folks came out enforce. Bikers, skiers and walkers populated the trails simultaneously, which only worked  with a dose of patience as sometimes families blocked the trail, dogs jumped on me as I skied or skiers came zipping down  hill as I was about to head up.  

All in all, these newly developed trails add a lot to Girdwood and for us, the value of Alyeska Resort. 

A quick hour back to Cooper Landing after a day on the slopes and trails got us back to our comfy hotel room.  A delicious St. Patrick's Day dessert at the Sunrise Inn Restaurant topped the day off nicely.

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Heading out the next day, we weighed our choices of trails to hike and opted for Fuller Lake. Denver hadn't done it for 10 years since we'd used it as a practice run before backpacking the Chilkoot Trail. Again, no new snow for weeks plus cold temperatures keeping the thaw cycle to a minimum made for almost perfect walking conditions: hard packed, crunchy snow with good traction.  The only non-perfect part was the temperatures, which were -3 when we got up in the morning and were hovering at about 6 above by time we started hiking. Sunshine and 3 miles of uphill hiking got us to a sweat fairly quickly despite the cold temps and both Doug and Denver stripped down to 2 layers of shirt, no jacket.

Snowmachine tracks had helped pack down the trail and widen it

And more trail...

Lower Fuller Lake winter view

View of Skilak Lake from Fuller Lake Trail

Winter gear:  tights, pants and thermal skirt on the bottom; thermal shirt, wicking layer and two jackets on top; balaclava, hat and neckwarmer to start (now tucked in my waistband, adjusting as temperatures changed); multi-layer gloves; sunglasses

Overall, it was an active and outdoorsy quick get-away which we enjoyed despite cold temperatures. Dressing right was important, but having calm and sunny weather was preferable to last year's expedition to Alyeska when it was pouring rain and 32 degrees and windy. That can be miserable to be in and difficult to warm up once chilled. Meanwhile, we're reveling in a "real winter"!  And the greatest revelation for me was that we can go hiking all year round and don't need to wait till the snow is gone. In fact, we've found winter hiking conditions to be better than summer (lack of bugs and bogs), so we may make this our new winter hobby!

A Visit to Nikiski

The Region III 3A basketball tournament was this past weekend in Nikiski. I decided to keep Doug company as he did his supervision duties. The draw for me was that across the parking lot from Nikiski Middle/High School there is a cross-country ski trail.  My kids have moaned for years about how brutal the hills are here as a cross-country running course, but I have never actually been out on the trail here. So this was my golden opportunity!

I was disappointed at first to discover that only half of the trails were groomed; the rest were ungroomed. The first day there I headed out on fishscale (waxless) skis and decided to take the ungroomed trail. It was delightful to explore, and while it took some concentration to maneuver on the steep hills with 90 degree turns at the bottom with ungroomed snow, I only fell once!

The second day I headed out on skate skis and explored all the groomed trails in the morning. Thirty minutes took me over most of them twice.  After watching the Homer girls play, I headed back out for a snowshoe on the ungroomed trails I'd skiied the day before.  It was interesting to note how much more difficult snowshoing is than skiing. Gliding gets me down a hill quickly, but on snowshoes I have to step every single step.

Here is a brief photo gallery of some scenery on the trail.  It is a small little system, but provided me a couple days of skiing and snowshoing with the trails all to myself!

A view of the Nikiski track and stadium from the trail

Moose impressions abounded along the ungroomed trails, along with droppings and hoofprints.

Some strong winds must have blown up sand onto the trail. It was a very small section that was dirty snow.

An oil rig dominates the skyline near the trail.
The thunk thunk of helicopters going to the offshore rigs was nearly constant.

A couple boats off shore.

This was a hill I sweated up. Taking a picture was a great excuse to stop and catch my breath!

Snowshoe tracks, looking down the hill (opposite direction of the last one!)

Moose-y Scenery

The high school ski team had their end-of-season banquet at the Homer Elks Lodge on Monday night.  We were treated to a gorgeous sunset and a wandering moose!

Moose silhouetted above Bishop's Beach with Mt. Douglas in the background

Beautiful view of Kenai Mountains, Kachemak Bay and a moose at sunset.
(And a spruce tree hit by the spruce aphids.)