Scottish Lakes

This weekend, Tim and our friends Gabe, Leslie and Al went up to Scottish Lakes, which is on the other side of Stevens Pass. It is quite the trip, from a logistics point of view, as we had to drive up past Stevens, get picked up at the parking lot by some big trucks and then switch to snowmobiles, which took us up to High Camp (elevation 5,000 ft).

We stayed at this super ("super" being the word of the weekend) cabin, which had 2 sets of twin size bunkbeds, a loft, and a fully furnished kitchen downstairs. There was no running water nor electricity, just a woodburning stove, oil lamps and a bathroom outside, which we shared with all the other guests. There was also a very cool woodfire hottub, where much to our shock, we found four older women bathing in.

Other than that, the weekend reminded me of little house on the prairie, where we had to fetch our own water and firewood (we got it from the lodge, but still it was an arduous and long walk to the lodge in the snow), did dishes in bins, and had to wake up in the middle of the night to go to the outhouse.

On Sat morning we headed up one of the trails to go cross country skiing. Right off the bat Tim and I noticed there was something really wrong with the skis that I had borrowed from a friend: they were totally smooth and it was impossible to go up the slightest hill on them. Tim, being a much better skier than me (who have only been once before that), switched skis with me, and off we went, on our merry way. Merry, that is, for only 1/4 mile.

Between my lack of skills and Tim's smooth skis, we both became very frustrated and trailed behind the rest of the group. We finally managed to regroup on a medow with a much gentler slope that we skiied on for about half an hr. Fearing being shunned by our friends by our lack of skills and slowness, we decided to tell them right then that we would split up and go our separate ways. Tim and I followed the signs back to High Camp via Jirka's trail. That turned out to be quite a disaster.

Much to my shock, we looked down to find that to get home, we would have to ski down a very steep slow dotted by trees along the way. The trail was skinny and the journey disastrous. We came out of our little trip with skis on our backs and very sour faces. But we were alive, nevertheless.

We spent the rest of the afternoon playing Scrabble with Rick, one of the hosts at the lodge. Sat night we had a potluck dinner with the staff and the other guests, followed by a game of gin rummy. There was a group playing guitar and singing songs.

All in all, Scottish Lakes was an amazing place. It sounds cheesy, but I would even venture saying that it was magical: a little village high on a mountain, that sense of community and just a gorgeous view, whereever you looked.