Objective: Backcountry camp somewhere in the vicinity.
Partners: Deez.
Stats: 3.4 mile round trip with >200ft elevation gain.
Links: Strava.
Way back in 2013 I decided to take Deez on her first overnight hike from the Grandjean Trail head in April. Ever since then, this has become a sentimental "right of passage" so to speak, to sneak out for a quick over nighter. After all these years, this was actually only the second time we were not able to drive to the trail head.
Late winter snow was lingering and the forecast was not great. However I'll take just about any chance I can get to go "off the grid" so there was no question that this was going down. Starting from Hwy 21 we hiked out on the Grandjean road. The conditions were comparable to the last snow year, which surprisingly was not 2017 aka Snowpocalypse.
We had a fairly good idea of where we were heading. The downside was that I was a short walk. The upside was that if/when it rained, it would be a short walk back to the car.
We found a suitable camp site right along the South Fork of the Payette River after only 45 minutes of walking. The tent went up and a nap soon followed. I was woken up a bit after 3pm to a rumble of thunder. A light but steady rain soon followed and lasted about an hour.
The rest of the evening was off again - on again showers and thunder. At one point we sought refugein the tent during a rather intense shower with some impressive thunder and lightning. It was almost enough to make us question our life choices.
Funny how a few thin pieces of nylon are all that separates us from the storm.
Eventually we were able to emerge from the tent for a while. Even though the storm broke for a good long while, we never did see any stars.
The night was a bit warmer than we had planned on and my zero degree bag proved to be overkill.
The morning sun rose the next day and I enjoyed a strong mug of Joe before we packed up and returned to "on the grid" status.
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