Semester Break Day (the halfway point in the school year - our district has it off), so I headed to Bumping Lake for some snowshoe action.
Drove up Highway 410, 28 miles past the 410/12 Y is the road to Bumping Lake (Forest Road 1800). Snow-covered but plowed - I drove my Subaru 30-35mph and felt very confident. Trailhead 10.9 miles from Hwy 410 - you can't go any farther. Nice large plowed area, outhouse (with toilet paper!), trail map.
I tried to do as big a loop as possible, following the groomed trails. A great downloadable/printable map of the trails found here:
https://parks.state.wa.us/DocumentCenter/View/10733/Bumping-Lake?bidId=
The numbers: I left Yakima at 6:30am, reached the trailhead around 8:00am. Hiked 3.5 miles. Stopped for 30 minutes at the Warming Hut - tried to start a small fire in the stove, filled the hut with smoke instead (Bear Grylls I am not). Had to warm up with the door open, oh well. Back to the car by 11:00am, just in time to see the plow turn around and head back toward the highway.
The weather/trails: Temperature stayed around 32 degrees the whole time. Snowing lightly at first, then patches of blue sky later. Trails were groomed with a wide trough through most of it, also groomed for skis for about half of it. Several inches of new snow on top of a hard crust, made for an easy snowshoe.
Other details: I didn't see a single person, the solitude was nice. No animals, just a lot of snow and trees. Warming Hut is lots of fun. Trail is a nice variety - through the campground, along the lakeshore, meandering through the woods. All in all, a wonderful day outside.
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