A hike to Ollalie Lake Pratt Lake best described as “character building.” This hike’s photos were taken with a disposable camera and are pretty dark and grainy; see photos of Pratt lake from somebody else’s much nicer hike here.
We planned to leave at 3:00 p.m. Traffic and slow packing boys thwarted that effort, so we left the city at 4:00 and arrived at the trailhead at about 5:00. In the Pacific Northwest that means it is dark, and with cloud cover – really dark. We turned on our headlamps and started hiking. Our group was five boys (the oldest, age 13; the youngest, barely 12), and four adults. (I was still the oldest for this trip; I don’t know how young the youngest was.) We hiked and hiked and hiked. Ollalie Lake is at about 3500 feet, the trail head is at about 2500 feet. We realized we missed the turn to Ollalie Lake when we reached the saddle between two mountains and the trail started to go downhill.
We thought Pratt Lake would be a better choice at that point and continued on. Our four mile hike in the dark turned into a six mile hike. On the way to Pratt Lake the trail began to be wet — really wet — bog wet — running water wet. We reached the lake, it was high — really high. There wasn’t room for our five tents; we could only set up four. The ground was mushy but at least it wasn’t muddy. We cooked hot meals and got ready to sleep.It was now 11:08 p.m. The ground sloped and we tended to roll into each other in the tents. We were soaked from sweat on the inside of our coats.
At least it wasn’t raining!
About 3:00 a.m. it started to rain. We did not care; we slept. (Well, I was able to sleep. Apparently two of the other, younger, adults couldn’t.) We woke up about 9:00 a.m. and then cooked hot breakfast, broke camp and started to hike out. We left camp about 10:45 a.m. It rained, and rained, and rained. We didn’t care; we knew that if we kept going, we would make it to cars, heat, and home. We reached the trailhead at about 2:00 p.m.
The great thing about this trip was that everybody was prepared for rain and cold. Even with the missed trail we were able to successfully complete a longer than expected hike, camp overnight in adverse conditions, and everybody was safe the entire time. We had the equipment and attitudes we needed. Sometimes trips are more character building than fun. This hike and campout will make us all appreciate the trips next summer when we will be able to see the scenery and enjoy the weather.
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hike,
scout outings
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on Thursday, November 22nd, 2007 at 1:19 pm and is filed under ivory bits, scouts.
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