WL 5.5 : Are You Afraid of the Dark?

With a sunny Sunday upon us, we decided to trek up to the mountain and pick up the Wonderland trail where we left off. We arrived at Longmire at about 2:00pm and were on the trail at 2:15. We began by heading up Rampart Ridge, to see all that we missed in the foggy hike we took last time - and how much we missed! To begin with, we found where the mountain actually sat in perspective from the ridge, which was opposite from where we thought it was last time. We were in awe the moment we came around the corner and beheld the mountain glimmering in the sun. Karina actually fell to her knees when we saw it. And we hadn't even hit the Wonderland trail yet. After a photo op, we continued forward to the junction between Rampart Ridge and the Wonderland trail.

We intended to hike to Mirror Lakes, which we estimated to be about 5-7 miles up the trail from the junction, however without it marked on the sign, we had no idea exactly how far it was. We hiked on anyway, and hiked, and hiked some more. Once we left the junction we walked through several different layers of mountain land. We crossed three forks of Kautz Creek and saw some
spectacular views of the mountain, hiking over narrow log bridges and through the sandy shores of the water. Then we reentered the common forest - the one that everyone pictures when you think of a forest in the mountains - towering pine trees, shadows on the ground. However, the next layer we entered was something like we've never seen. It was this space that existed in limbo between life and death. Almost half the trees were fallen, and ashen gray. The other half were lively and green. It was bizarre, but carried with it its own beauty. At this point the forest morphed back into what I have been calling the 'common' forest and we continued to hike, upwards once more. We'd been hiking for a good 4 hours at this point, and realized we needed to turn around soon. Unfortunately we hadn't reached another backcountry camp, or anything to confirm what mileage we had achieved, but we were racing against the daylight and had to turn back.


As fast as we hiked, and though we turned back to avoid hiking in the dark, we still weren't fast enough and ended up doing the last two miles down from Rampart Ridge in the dark. This meant that we caught a spectacular sunset, but hiking in the dark is far from ideal. After plenty of stumbling and some miraculous luck we ended up at Longmire without any injuries or anything. Lesson learned - don't hike without flashlights, and try your best to avoid hiking in the dark.
Mileage on the Wonderland trail - 3.5 miles. Total mileage - 13.

- Loren

the setting sun view from Rampart Ridge