Wind River snowpack?

mekon · Joined: 25 Feb 2007 Posts: 1155 Location: vancouver, b.c.

Anyone here been in the Winds lately? Planning an pack trip/backpacking trip there and wondering if it might be one of those summers where you can get up high early--say even by mid July.

Anyone with first-hand info? The USDA reports and forest service reports indicate a lower than average pack, but I've no idea how this translates into travel up high.

We'll likely go in out of Lander. Cannot WAIT for this trip.

Rebob · Joined: 07 Dec 2004 Posts: 2435 Location: Whistler, BC

mekon, for the area you're looking at, I found these guys were an excellent source of accurate information.

If you really like the area west of Lander, you might also appreciate the area accessed out of Dubois, further north. Some high level access there as well.

Rebob · Joined: 07 Dec 2004 Posts: 2435 Location: Whistler, BC

They now have this online planning resource as well.

mekon · Joined: 25 Feb 2007 Posts: 1155 Location: vancouver, b.c.

Thanks Rebob. I actually met one of the guys who runs the shop last time I was in Lander. Should have thought of them...

Someone else pm'd me and told me snow was low. So that's good for our needs.

wwy · Joined: 12 Jul 2007 Posts: 81 Location: Pinedale,WY

Mekon,
If things continue as they have been, it will be a very early year in the Winds. However, it has been fairly cold for a bit and the snow this morning made everything look white up there. I think in mid July fires will be a bigger issue than snow. It was a very poor snow year and the lower snowpack went very quick.

walrus · Joined: 10 Nov 2005 Posts: 1442 Location: Missoula, MT

based on trips that friends have made in recent years, rain on high elevation scree renders the rocks nearly as slick as ice...on one such trip, they were foiled from reaching the summit of Gannett Peak.
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climate is what you expect... weather is what you get...

mekon · Joined: 25 Feb 2007 Posts: 1155 Location: vancouver, b.c.

wwy-thanks. fires. maybe we'll have a wet spring...so the rocks will be slippery...

walrus - i dragged my then 5 year old within maybe 500 feet of the summit of wind river peak in similar conditions before weather terror turned us back. this year's trip will probably include minimal peak bagging for my seven year old doesn't have the same legs as the older one, though she'll probably surprise us.

just llamas, dry ice, steaks, wine, home-made fudge, trout fishing and...

Rebob · Joined: 07 Dec 2004 Posts: 2435 Location: Whistler, BC

...sheep. Yep, lots of them, running all over and eating all the flowers but the yellow ones. Sheep...

mekon · Joined: 25 Feb 2007 Posts: 1155 Location: vancouver, b.c.

This is a downside of the Winds, which I love only second to the Adirondacks, because unfortunately I am afraid of sheep.

2 summers ago I was doing a high hike outside of Innsbruck, doing a "schnitzel and hefeweizen sampling tour" of some huts, and got surrounded by a pack - not a herd, but a vicious, snarling, blood-thirsty pack - of sheep, all painted red. Terrifying. I actually ran into a scree field to escape them, and they all stopped at the bottom of the field, bleating at me malevolently. I was so shaken that I almost fell on a snowfield that I had to traverse to get out of the scree field. Fortunately, it was only about 15 degrees, and the consequences would have been minimal.

I will bring a rifle, which I think I can now buy in Canada without having it registered on any federal registry.

In any case, thanks for the Winds info. And in case anyone is reading, let me plug the Squaw Creek Ranch in Lander as a great place to rent a cottage pretty reasonably if you need one in Lander. On a llama farm on the outskirts of town. Good people.

Hacksaw · Joined: 07 Dec 2004 Posts: 3482 Location: Golden CO

http://www.pinedaleonline.com/webcam/pinedalewebcam.htm
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mekon · Joined: 25 Feb 2007 Posts: 1155 Location: vancouver, b.c.

If you zoom in, you can see the sheep...

hiplainsdrifter · Joined: 26 Jan 2007 Posts: 2237 Location: Wyoming

Snow = Low.

http://www.wrds.uwyo.edu/wrds/nrcs/snowpercent/snowpercent.html

I can confirm that this is the case on the ground.
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let 'er buck

stevesliva · Joined: 11 Dec 2004 Posts: 10121 Location: SEA

I was in the Cirque of the Towers in early July three years ago and the mosquitos were terrible. About nine years ago I was in the Cirque (and a lot of other places in the Winds) in August and it was fantastic.

Perhaps things will dry earlier this year, like wwy says. I'd just worry about it being skeeter season.

Rebob · Joined: 07 Dec 2004 Posts: 2435 Location: Whistler, BC

stevesliva, mekon is from Coastal BC. There is no such thing as terrible mosquito hordes south of the 49th. Here, they fly off with small children and at night are required to fly with red and white lights. Our land managers mount mossie sound machines outside 7-11's and schools to scare away our youth. He will be fine with Wind River mossies.

mekon. The sheep threat is real and dire. They seriously can clean out a meadow in under two hours, as there can be thousands of them in a herd...and don't get me started about when they're being run on the local backcountry roads...great swarms of sheep, sticky tacky sheep sh:t, and then there is the incessant bleating, bleating, bleating...

stevesliva · Joined: 11 Dec 2004 Posts: 10121 Location: SEA

It's hard to describe how terrible they were... my two dogs waited at the door of the tent to escape them. But yeah, it sounds just like I've heard Alaska described, so my real point is that a few weeks later in summer might be more enjoyable in a typical year. However this dry year, perhaps July is the perfect time.