Dave's Cave

Okay, it wasn't a *real* snow like I've gotten in other places that I've lived, or even like we've had here for most years, but it was at least enough to stick on the ground for a few hours.

Last year, we had a full 2 minutes of snow that I noticed, and for most of the winter there was not enough snow to snowshoe up at Paradise on Mount Rainier.

It was also the first real snow that either Max the cat or Sammy the dog have been in. Neither one wanted to walk out from under the patio roof to find out if that white stuff falling in big clumps was dangerous. Sam wanted back in the house pretty much immediately, whale Max wanted to sit there and look up at it falling.

On Friday when we were both feeling rather crappy, it was seeming very unlikely that we were going to be able to make it up to Mt. Rainier this weekend to do some snowshoeing. But as luck would have it, we both woke up feeling well enough to give it a try.

Since we got a late start, we just went up a little past the bridge over the Nisqually river and snowshoed around the scenic bypass loop. Since we are both a bit out of shape, it turns out that it was quite enough.

There was about 2 feet of powder on the ground, some scattered rain showers with ice pellets mixed in, and occasional gusts of wind that were probably around 20 knots. In other words enough weather to know that you are outside, but still nice enough to enjoy being outside.