THE YURT IS HURT

It's an ugly morning in Seattle. It's 5:00 A.M. The wind is whipping the rain more-or-less horizontally down the alley in back of our house. Perhaps more disheartening is seeing the lights on at our neighbor's house meaning the weekend ski trip to the yurt is apparently a go.

Over the years, the concept of doing some form of a backcountry trip in winter has devolved into one of those inane circular "tastes great, less filling" arguments between my husband and me. If it were just the two of us, I'd steadfastly refuse to set out in such conditions, we'd have a huge fight then forget about it and go back to bed all in a matter of minutes. With six other people involved I keep most of my concerns to myself. I acknowledge the weather in a low-key way when we get to our neighbor's house. They acknowledge the possibility doing a day trip instead.

"It's my first time using skins. They don't glide like cross-country skis so I shuffle along the gentle uphill grade..."

We head south and collect the other two couples in Pacific, then caravan to Ashford to sign-in at the Mount Tahoma Trails Association office. There we're told that no one's actually made it back to the yurt we'd reserved for the weekend for some time. I say nothing. I'm committed to this trip now.

We're able to put our skis on pretty much at the trailhead. The rain has turned to wet snow at the 2100-foot level. The sign reads 6-miles to the yurt. It's my first time using skins. They don't glide like cross-country skis so I shuffle along the gentle uphill grade.

We're low enough in the trees to be sheltered from the wind here. The deep powdery snow is beautiful -- better than another day of rain in Seattle. This section of trail has seen some sort of grooming recently. Although with the nearly nonstop snowfall this week, we still have to break trail through it.

After what feels like a couple of miles we come to a junction and head left towards "Snow Bowl Hut." We round a corner and are slapped by the wind and blowing snow. Here the trail narrows and steepens. We pause to put on ski goggles just beyond a snow groomer lying crippled in a deep drift. That piece of machinery will likely remain there until spring. Now the going is slow; breaking trail in knee-deep snow, the grade considerably steeper than before. There are more breaks in the trees on this section and the wind howls at us whenever it can.

Eventually the trail levels off and reaches the turn-off for the hut. It's taken us 3-1/2 hours to cover a little over 4 miles. There's no sign of the other 2 couples. The trail starts a bit of a descent and the four of us decide to ski down into a less exposed area and wait for the others. My skins are somewhat sticky and I lurch down the trail looking, I imagine, like Frankenstein's monster on skis. I'm still glad to get a break from the relentless uphill in the deep snow. Aside from being tiring, my rental boots are too big and I've rubbed raw spots on both my heels.

"We dig down several feet to find the door. Three of the guys venture in to find the yurt itself collapsed under the weight of the excessive snow. The only structure holding it up is a bunk bed..."

The others appear about 20 minutes later. Three of the four are on light touring skis that appear to be no match for the conditions today. The final 1.5-miles to the yurt consists of more gradual downhill followed by a final push uphill and across an exposed ridge that's just getting blasted by the wind. The sign marking the turn-off to the yurt is buried under snow and we nearly miss it. We arrive to find the uppermost portion of a peaked roof sticking out of the snow. Another 2-to-3-feet of snow is piled up on top of the roof, which covers the entry room to the yurt. We dig down several feet to find the door. Three of the guys venture in to find the yurt itself collapsed under the weight of the excessive snow. The only structure holding it up is a bunk bed.

Staying there overnight is not an option. All we can do now is head back to the Snow Bowl Hut and hope that the people who had reserved it for the night had the good sense to stay home this weekend. It's 3:30 and we should be able to backtrack the mile-and-a-half to the hut by last light.

All but one of our party have headlamps. Our neighbors sprint ahead to the hut to warn whoever's there of the additional company and to mark the trail. My husband and I stay back to make sure the people on the touring skis are okay. We ski ahead and stop and wait, ski ahead and stop and wait again... We continue on this way until we're about a half-mile from the hut. Then the binding on my right ski breaks.

We try without success to duct tape the ski to my foot. My husband, a far more expert skier than I, offers to let me have his right ski and shuffle along with my broken one. By now it's dark and everyone has passed by us. We're torturously slow and awkward in our mismatched and broken skis. The wind has picked up to the point where it's obscuring the tracks to the hut. I can barely make out the route with my headlamp. It turns left onto an exposed ridge. I can just make out in the blowing snow a couple of wands someone has thoughtfully placed.

"After a restless night filled with worries over carbon monoxide poisoning, and wind and snoring noises that earplugs couldn't drown out..."

It is here that the wind picks up to at least 60 miles-per-hour. I can no longer stand upright on the ridge and squat low to avoid being blown over. My husband grabs me from behind to stabilize me and we creep along towards the first wand in this manner. After the second wand the trail drops behind the ridge and out of the wind. Some people from the hut have come out to meet us with a pair of snowshoes.

Inside the hut the misadventures continue. A party of six had been having trouble with a carbon monoxide detector. It kept going off so they moved it to the anteroom of the hut so it wouldn't bother them. We brought it back inside, opened some windows and the "malfunctioning" CO2 detector fell quiet.

After a restless night filled with worries over carbon monoxide poisoning, wind and snoring noises that earplugs couldn't drown out, I head back to the car on a pair of snowshoes that we found stored with a snowmobile in a nearby shed, another vehicle that won't be leaving the area anytime soon.

The wind overnight had blown the snow into frozen whitecaps that curled above the trail in places. The effect completely changed the appearance of the area from 24 hours earlier. The deep powder is great for skiing but is tiring to trudge through on snowshoes. It would have been impossible on foot. The snowshoes were a godsend.P The Mount Tahoma Trails people were sorry to learn about their yurt. We got a call at home that night from someone at DNR inquiring after it. He says it was destroyed once before by a 120-mile-per-hour wind. It had also just recently been moved to its present location in the South district. DNR tells us they'll probably replace the yurt with something more substantial. Possibly some type of A-frame structure.

Meanwhile, the rain in Seattle is looking better to me, for now.

— Val Stouffer, Mountain Zone Pubster