In May when Catherine and I were in Portland she brought up the idea of maybe doing some backpacking again but trying to go ultralight instead of dealing with the heavy gear we had before.  We went to REI down there and it just so happened they were having a huge sale the next day and there is no sales tax in OR so we jumped in and bought gear.   Finally yesterday we got a chance to use it for real aside from setting up the tent in the backyard and lighting the stove just to be sure we could do it.

Our Gear

First off, the gear list.  We did some research and went back and forth on a few items in the day or so before the sale started so we actually went in fairly well informed.  Here’s the list we ended up with:

Osprey Exos 58 Packs – these are really a transition pack, not a true ultralight pack since they have a suspension instead of just being a bag with straps on it.  We really debated a ZimmerBuilt pack vs these and decided that the suspension would be nice and the fact that there is air at your back would be great.   Weight 2 lbs. 10 oz.

Sleeping Bags – I got the REI Ingeo and Catherine got the Joule which is the same bag for women.   Expensive but they pack down to nothing, are rated for 30 degrees and weight only 1 lb. 15 oz.

Big Agnes Copper Spur UL2 Tent – This thing rocks.  It weighs only 3 lbs in full mode but can also be packed just as the fly and footprint in 2 lbs. It is just big enough for the two of us, super easy to set up and has cool features like pockets for your phone with headphone slots and an integrated LED lighting system.

Big Agnes Q-Core SL Sleeping Pads – So much lighter than our old Thermorest pads, these just need to be blown up which was a bit much after hiking 9 miles but they were pretty comfy to sleep on.   Total weight 23 oz.

Snow Peak LiteMax Titanium Stove – This is a powerful little stove that only weighs 1.9 oz yet will boil a liter of water in 4 mins.

Snow Peak Trek 900 Titanium Cookware – Again, super light at 6.2 oz and perfect for two people since it holds 30 oz.

Tableware – all Snow Peak too, all in titanium to keep the weight down.  Ti-Single 450 cups at 1.4 oz, Trek Titanium Bowl at 1.6 oz and a Titanium Spork at 0.6 oz.

MSR HyperFlow Water Filter – This was the lightest filter I could find at 7.4 oz and it works as well as its bigger brothers which I’ve had before.  We got an MSR Ultralight Dromedary bag too so we could just pump water once a day into that and then cook and re-fill our bottles.

That is it for the bulk of the gear we had.   That comes out to a whopping 9.25 lbs for our combined gear.  OK, I threw in a first aid kit, some headlamps, a fuel canister, … and that brought the weight up to just over 10 lbs.  Then we added clothing, minimal toiletries,  food and 2 L of water each (4.4 extra pounds each, argh).  I also added a tenkara rod.  Packs loaded up and ready to go were just shy of 20 lbs each.   Trying to figure out if we can cut the weight just a bit more.

Our trip

We decided to visit an old favorite spot – Mirror Lake on the PCT but instead of parking at Windy Pass and doing the 3.5 mile hike it we parked at Snoqualmie Pass for the longer 9 mile walk in.  OK, I thought this was going to be around 7.5 but I missed a segment of trail when adding it all up but we survived.   From my watch the hike in was about 2100′ of gain, 1000′ of loss and the hike out was reversed.   Definitely easier today coming out but our packs were lighter due to less food and we were each carrying only 1L of water (2.2 lbs less just there).

We got a late start, arriving at the trailhead around 12:40 in the afternoon which meant slogging up the ski slope in the open sun at about the hottest part of the day.  We quickly made our way up the hill under the lifts and into the woods where our first cool little spot was Beaver Lake about a mile in.   We then continued on about 2.5 miles to Lodge Lake where we sat down and took a nice break, got some water and a snack and were ready to hit the trail again.

 

The trail continued climbing after Lodge Lake, a few open areas of talus slopes with great views of Granite Mountain in the background.  This continued down to Rockdale Creek and then we began a stretch of old logging/power access roads that was now the PCT.  This part was ill marked but I kept a lookout for trail markers and we didn’t get lost.   Somewhere back on the actual trail we hit a sign showing my error, we had 1 mile to hit Olallie Meadows and Mirror Lake was still 5 miles off while the Pass was 4 miles in back of us.  That was the first we realized we were in for an extra 1.5 miles each day.

Olallie Meadows was beautiful, the first time we’d even been there and we vowed to come back.   So close to Windy Pass but we’d never gone north from there, only south to Mirror Lake or Silver Star Peak.  A mile or so past the Meadows we hit Windy Pass and were ready for a break again.  Luckily there is a nice campsite just up the trail so we stopped there to get more water and a bit of food to keep us going, we still had 3.5 miles of trail to cover to get to the lake.

 

Now we were on familiar ground, we’d done the hike to Mirror Lake so many times but hadn’t been back since we got caught in a ton of snow and blowdowns a few years ago there and amazingly didn’t get lost.   We continued onward and hit the connector for the Twin Lakes trail and knew we were close to the end.  We quickly dropped 300′ down and were at the top of the lake.  Another 1/4 mile or so along the shore and we were at the outlet stream and scored the primo campground on the shore.

We quickly got to work since we were hungry by then.  We set up the tent,  pumped water, got a rope set up to hold our food supply and then settled down to cook dinner.   We took along some Paleo Meals To Go dehydrated dinners to try.  I had the Mountain Beef Stew and Catherine did the Summit Savory Chicken.  These were so quick to prepare and were amazingly good, we were pleasantly surprised.   Along with this we had tea, a few of our Paleo donuts and some chocolate.

We took a little walk after dinner down the trail a bit further because there was a big meadow down below and a few people said there had been elk in the area so we wanted to check it out.   On returning we stayed up a bit longer then decided to get to bed early.  The tent was definitely cozy, about the size of the VW’s lower bed total but it worked.

 

 

We woke up around 5:30 am to birds singing and it was still COLD.  I really did not want to crawl out of the sleeping bag but really had to pee.   We took a walk back to the meadow only to find a huge bank of fog below us rolling down towards I-90, still no elk.  Breakfast was essential, we got water going for tea and had a cold breakfast with Paleo donuts I’d made, a banana and some Epic Bites, I had bacon, Catherine had chicken.  We tore down camp pretty efficiently and were ready to hit the trail by 8:00.

We climbed up out of the lake basin then had to decide – do we stay on the PCT or do we head down to Mirror Lake and do a little loop instead.  We knew the trail down was a steep bugger and would require another climb back up to the PCT so we opted to just backtrack on the PCT,  figuring we’d stop for lunch at Ollalie Meadows.  We had some amazing views along the trail, more fog banks off in the distance near Snoqualmie Pass.

We took a break about every hour and realized we weren’t ready for lunch when we reached the Meadows so continued onward to Lodge Lake which was further than it seemed like it should have been.  By the time we got there I was hungry and ready to eat.   We had a simple lunch of canned smoked kippers, the last of the donuts and an Epic bar.  It was now only 2.5 miles back to the car where a hopefully cold kombucha was waiting in the cooler.   I did stop to get the Lodge Lake geocache though.

 

 

After the lake and lunch we were energized and just ready to get back to the car. We made good time coming out of the woods and onto the ski slope.  All easy downhill but again in the heat of the mid-day sun.  I got down to the car first, jettisoned my pack, took off my Altra Superiors and put on my Lunas so my feet could breath.  I got back to the trailhead just as Catherine was exiting, almost exactly 24 hours and 20 miles after we started the adventure.

Our first backpack in a long time and it was a total success.  We were already planning our next trip while in the car coming home.   We hope to get in another overnighter in two weeks and then do the Chinook Pass/Ohanepecosh Loop of the 2015 Ultrapedestrian Wilderness Challenge in July.   Many of my friends have run this 50k route in the last week, we’ll win the slowpoke award doing it in 3 days instead of 8-9 hours.