It's been a long, weary winter.  Badly needed to get out in the woods, so yesterday, I took the fam and the dog up over the summit between the Payette River and the Salmon River watershed to stay at a lodge I know there.

Not really too far off the beaten track, since most of the back country is still socked in, but far enough in that I could see some empty country from there. 

Did I mention that it's been a long winter?

The trip in was uneventful.  Still a couple feet of snow at the lodge, but the lake is near ice-out, with some bare patches showing. 

The folks who own the place are nice.  I've known them since they bought the lodge about five years ago.  Food's great.  No water right now, since they don't start using the well until April, but that's okay.  We were the only people up there, which was nice.

The couple who run the place have an Australian Shepherd and a three-month-old Lab pup.  Our hound, Penny, had a great time running crazy in the snow with them. 

Didn't hear the wolf pack that runs in that area last night, but they're around.  Apparently they were howling somewhere across the lake a couple nights ago.

This morning, we woke up to about four inches of new snow.  Not so bad, except that to get back out, we needed to go over a 7000 foot pass.  No other way out.

We'd planned on coming back later in the day.  After talking it over, we decided it would probably be best to go out early, when the mail truck comes in, following the snow plow.  Turned out to be a good choice. 

Still snowing up there as far as I know.  Let's see:

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Yep.  And that's 2000 feet below the pass.

Guess I pushed the season a little, eh?   

Well, all's well that...aw, you know.

Best,

George

Sounds like fun George.

Ya gotta push once in a while

Glad your all safe and sound

Iddy

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That just screams child abuse Kevin.   LOL

Sounds like a nice get-away, even with the snow!