At the time, (September, 2008) it seemed like a good idea. We were going to backpack into the Cloud Peak Wilderness in Wyoming, over Labor Day weekend.
We drove out to Rapid City and stayed overnight. The following morning, we got up and headed out, planning to make a stop at Devil’s Tower. We walked around the tower under cloudy skies. From there we headed to Buffalo, Wyoming.
From Buffalo, we started heading into the mountains. The higher we got, the more snow was falling. Big heavy, wet flakes. We made it to the campground that we were planning on using as our jumping off spot and there was already several inches of snow on the ground. Not good.
We pitched a tent and tried to start a fire. That was easier said than done. Mike and I have been camping and building fires our whole lives but we really struggled with that fire. The snow was so heavy and wet that every time we thought we had it we would lose it. We did finally get a fire going and were able to cook dinner. After that we went to bed.
In the middle of the night we had to get up and brush snow off the tent to prevent a collapse. It snowed most of the night.
By morning, it had stopped snowing. The surrounding trees we beautiful. But we knew that we weren’t going to backpack into the Wilderness. There was too much snow and the risk of additional snow made it too risky. Instead, we decided to do a day hike in with minimal gear.
We hiked in a couple miles and agreed that conditions would not have been good backpacking. Once into the back country we stopped by a couple lakes and tried to catch a fish or two but failed. The scenery was great and despite not being able to back pack in we still had a good time.
From there, we went to the Black Hills of South Dakota and spent a couple days hiking around.
