It’s winter! And there are all kinds of ways to enjoy the snow up in the mountains, but snowshoeing is one of the simplest.
“Snowshoeing is the most peaceful thing that you can do,” says Norther Emily of Wild Solitude Guiding. ”It's just like you and your little crunchy sounds, and maybe there's like three birds.”
Emily has offered up a list of the best snowshoeing trails for every level — if you’re ready to try it out for the first time or you’re looking for a new challenge.
Easy
It’s a relatively flat trail but incredibly scenic — “one of the most heavily photographed destinations on Mount Hood,” says Emily. “You have a beautiful view of the mountain if the mountain is out. If the mountain is not out, you still have a beautiful lake, and then you just do a little loop around the lake.”’
Plus, accessing it when there’s snow isn’t difficult because it’s right off a highway that’s maintained by ODOT in the winter.
“It's really chill and flat,” says Emily. You can also make it a longer adventure. “You can go for a long ways up there, and there's a lot to explore [including] some neat little pine forests on the edge of the river.”
Medium
Snowshoeing up to Mirror Lake is pretty easy, but you can add on a challenge. “If you want to make it hard, you can keep going up the hill to the top of this mountain,” says Emily. “That's a little bit more of an adventurous push, and there's definitely more elevation gain with that.”
Challenge
It’s “a little trickier,” says Emily. “You have to know how to drive in snow. You have to know how to read maps and figure things out. [But] you can hike up into all kinds of areas that people don't usually visit in the winter and explore around and see what it's like.”
Close-In
“Did you know you can go snowshoeing in Multnomah County?” says Emily. “You don't even have to go to Mt. Hood. Larch Mountain is right there in the Gorge. You drive through Corbett; you go up the hill until you hit the gate or you hit snow. Then you can snowshoe around in the Gorge high country, which is really cool."
Emily also has tips for staying warm.
Where do you like to snowshoe? Send your tips.
