We headed back to Crystal Mountain for some snowshoeing. Our destination was Henskin Lake. Henskin Lake is not part of the Crystal Mountain snowshoe trail system however we have been there in the summer many times and knew approximately where to go. This trail is not doable without navigation right now and even with that we got off course a couple of times.
We started at the resort and headed up the TNT Trail. From the top of the TNT Trail we made a right to the end of the Blue Bell Loop. This put us at the edge of the Gold Hills chair lift. We crossed over and, with our navigation and a bit of looking, found the trail. We crossed the little bridge by the old mine, the waterfall is barely visible, and followed some faded old tracks for as far as they went. After the tracks faded completely it was breaking trail through some pretty deep snow. We made it to the split to Henskin Lake and moved about a bit trying to get on the designated navigation trail. We skirted along it mostly but made it to the lake just fine. This trail is mostly tree covered with just a couple of peekaboo views but the lake is open and, though completely snow covered, it was a welcomed place for lunch, rest and to soak up the sunshine. Very peaceful. As we left the lake we tried following an older but visible trail for a bit. We thought it was the main trail from a previous skiier or snowshoer but it started veering away from the main trail on our navigation so we caught back up with the trail we made coming in.
We made it back to the resort fairly quickly. We opted to walk down the Gold Hills lift as it was not running and caught the shuttle back to C lot. We were wiped. It's a pretty fun adventure if you are confident on snow shoes and with navigation. Watch the avalanche forecast and I'd also pack a shovel and be prepared should you have an emergency as you are out of bounds of the resort. If you go in the next few days you should be able to follow our tracks pretty easily.
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