CDMC

Drabble Valley Snowshoe; Sun Apr 04, 2010; snowshoeing; leader: William Wright

The 3 amigo's set out from Km 13 at 9 am, pushing snow southwest towards Ramparts Creek. Estra Day, originally celebrating the spring equinox, showed no signs of fertility upon this frozen and windswept landscape... Winds were gusting to 50 kph taking the windchill below minus 10. At times the weather was quite severe, with limited visibility so, we aborted our original plan to Pearse Lake and settled on coffee at the confluence of the Brown's River & Ramparts Creek, just north of the northwest ridge of Mount Drabble. We tried to stick to gaps and forested clusters for protection from the driving wind & snow (near 700 cms now) although, not always successful. We returned, looping to the east and then, north, towards our vehicle... I was a little wide on my landmarking, in the almost zero visibility and missed our vehicle by 500 metres! I paid dearly for this with the princely sum of a hot chocolate, in the Raven Lodge... It was an effort just to drive up to the lodge although, worth every moment once inside for lunch. Bob brought merit to the club with his kindly gesture to help get someone's 4x4 unstuck... just one of many examples of how brutal the weather was! Despite these conditions and the odd whine from Bob (he's getting soft sitting at his computer), we all much enjoyed the 3 hr, 5 km jaunt, entailing 200 m's of elevation and we were heading home by 1:30 pm.

I don't like my whining being referred to as odd!... they were sincere, full-bodied whines from the cellars of my psyche. B.S.