A couple times a year we love to spend a few days staying at a yurt in the mountains. For this trip we went when it was extremely snowy and cold (read on to see just how cold it was!) but we had SO much fun!

January 9th, 2021

DAY 1

Hike #3 of 2021

We started our trip by driving to the mountains for a hike before heading to our yurt. This particular hike is one of our favorite winter trails. Besides having lots of trees, a lake and great mountain views, the trail itself is usually fairly compacted so the dogs have no trouble hiking in the snow.

We arrived at the trailhead just after 8am with a brisk temperature as 0°F. Though we were hesitant to get out the car, we knew we would warm up quickly since the trail to the lake is mostly uphill, so we put all our warm gear on, including the dogs’ shoes, and got out there. The dogs didn’t seem to mind how cold it was, but that’s not a surprise considering how much they love the cold. Their beards sure did freeze up quickly though!

Just to put into perspective of just how cold it actually was, surrounding us were lots of ice crystals. There's a phenomenon called “diamond dust” where any precipitation in the air turns into tiny crystals, making the whole area glisten. Unfortunately the photos I got at the lake don’t show it very well but it was mesmerizing!

If you look closely between the two trees on the very left you can see the diamond dust I was talking about

After stopping at the lake for a few minutes, we continued to follow some old ski tracks to make our way around the lake.

The boys enjoyed running through the trees here!

You can really see their breath in these pictures!

View from the other side of the lake.

After taking more photos on the other side of the lake we hiked our way back to the car. Though I don’t have the exact mileage that we did because my watch died in the cold, we did around 3 miles with about 530 feet of elevation gain. We then drove to our home for the next couple days.

One of the reasons we absolutely love this specific yurt is because of the mountain views. In the winter you are unable to drive up to the yurt itself, therefore we had a short walk in. We brought along our sled to bring all our stuff on so that we we didn’t need to do multiple trips with carrying our duffel bags. As Scott pulled the sled in, I held onto Maxi and Zeus and had the task of making sure nothing fell off the sled.

Here Scott is starting our fire! This is our source of heat and also how we get our water. In the winter we use snowmelt for water which is what you see on the top of the fire.

Funnily enough, we actually got so hot this night that we had to open the door to let cold air in! Once the fire started to burn itself out a bit we were able to have a good nights sleep.

January 10th, 2021

DAY 2

We woke up to a very beautiful, cold morning. We watched the sunrise as Scott got the fire going and slowly got ready for the day.

Hike #4 of 2021

I had a couple different hikes in mind for this day but ultimately opted to drive a few minutes down the nearby dirt road to an area we haven’t explored in the winter before. It follows a forest service road for most of the way until it branches off into other trails.

It was 3°F at 9:30am when we began our hike.

See the pictures below to see the trees covered with ice crystals.

We had been following some old ski tracks most of the way but at a certain point they veered off down one of the hillsides. We continued breaking trail for a mile or so more before we reached a good turn around point. We didn’t really have a destination for this hike, we just kept walking until we felt like heading back. We’ll hopefully visit this area in the summer when the wildflowers are out so it will be interesting to see how different it looks!

Behind the dogs’ heads you can see a trail that I made. I went to see if there was a better vantage point behind the trees but the snow ended up getting too deep for me so I turned back.

We hiked 8 miles with just under 1000ft of elevation gain. Once we got back to the yurt the dogs were understandably tired and napped for a few hours.

Something that I love doing when we come up to the yurts is to take star pictures. We try to plan our trips around the new moon so I can better capture the Milky Way. Despite the cold, it’s much easier to accomplish in the winter since the sun sets earlier and don’t have to wait too long for the Milky Way to become visible.

While I was taking the star pictures I had a red fox scampering around right in front of me!

Can you spot the galaxy and shooting star?

January 11th, 2021

DAY 3

On our final morning at the yurt, we woke up slightly earlier than yesterday to take some early morning pictures of the dogs with the mountains in the back. Back at home I love to merge a star picture with a picture of the dogs. This is quite challenging and does require some photoshop skills, but it’s fun to do! I used one of the pictures shown below as the foreground image and then the star picture above as the sky. Maxi and Zeus were both simultaneously watching a raven fly overhead which made for a perfect foreground shot!

After a short photography session that morning we packed everything up and headed back to the car. We knew it was supposed to be colder on this morning compared to the others, but little did we know that it would be -13°F when we got to the car! If this was at 8:30am, you can only imagine how cold it must have been when we were shooting those star pictures! There was ice and frost built up both on the outside of my car and little ice crystals on the inside as well. This is officially the coldest we’ve ever been in, but it gets to the point that cold is cold and it all just feels the same. Both dogs and humans were wrapped up and not adversely effected by the cold, my car on the other hand was a little slow starting and warming up, though we were on our way to our next trailhead in no time.

Hike #5 of 2021

We arrived at the trailhead around 9am, and now that the sun had risen over the mountains it was slightly warmer, though it was still 0°F.

The trail was mostly compacted the majority of the way up, though just before reaching the mountain pass we began post-holing up to our hips in some areas and decided we wouldn’t try to make it up the whole way. We still had some great views from the point we were at so we snapped some photos and headed back down.