Obscure Trail Monkeys: 4th Annual Beard Camp

By Steve and Sam

Left to Right: Sam Jewkes, Jesse Vaughan, Chris Pope, Chuck Vaughan, R. Jeffrey Davis, DJ Loertscher, Cait Morgan, Jake Vaughan, Matt Huff, Steve Huff

February marks the deepest snow of the year.
Anyone who runs or climbs in the mountains can confirm that the winter beauty of the peaks is nothing short of spectacular. Every year the Trail Monkeys organize an expedition up to the tops of the mountains to spend a cold night reveling in their beauty with great friends. Our destination this year: the outlaw cabin in the Lone Peak Wilderness.

What makes the outlaw cabin worthy of a Winter Beard Expedition? Imagine hiking 5.5 miles... with 30-50 lbs of gear on your back... in snow shoes... with a vertical mile between your starting point and destination. Yes, that is an average of an 18% incline in snow, with the first 3 miles averaging over 21% incline!

With packing assignments made and everyone clearly aware of the challenge that was before them, the first group met at 10:00 at the Orson Smith Trailhead in Draper and headed out. With just an hour head start, the second group, led by Sam, headed out with the goal of catching the first group by Enniss Peak.

The groups consisted of the following:

Non-Trail Runners (Led by Steve)

Matt - Steve's brother, who just flew up from Arizona that morning just to show his awesomeness.
Jesse - Steve's brother-in-law. Our wives are sisters, and Jesse and I spend a lot of time talking about running and biking at family get-togethers.
Chuck - A proud grandpa and Jesse's father. We couldn't deter him with the beard blizzard last year, and he was back for more.
Jake - Jesse's youngest brother. A cross country and mile runner in high school, we would push the limits of his quads.

Trail Runners (Led by Sam)
DJ: Endurance runner extraordinaire with some beard to spare for the rest of the group.
Jeff: OTM, newly initiated snow backpacker, and our go to GoPro wiz.
Chris: Faster than the fast, this OTM is not used to standing still in the snow.

Solo late climber:
Cait: Wasatch Mountain Wrangler and queen of backcountry skiing and winter sports.

Up, up, and up we went. With heavy weight on our shoulders, our quads burned as we climbed. Passing a fresh set of mountain lion tracks in "the subway," we pushed onwards and upwards. As Matt pulled ahead at one point, he asked the directions. The response from Steve was, "first you go up, then after you get over that hill there, you go up again." The first 3.5 miles to Ennis Peak are all west facing slopes. With the warm winter and minimal snowfall, the snow was hardly deep enough for snow shoes. As we began to pass below Enniss peak to skirt around to the basin, the clouds rolled in, the visibility dropped, and the snow suddenly became much deeper. The winds picked up as we skirted around Enniss, and then just as we began our slight descent into Cowboy Camp meadow, the clouds broke and Lone Peak the majestic appeared in view.

Jeff coming out of the blowing mists of doom.

Father and his two sons

Lone Peak sheds the clouds to give us a quick peak at its majesty.

The final push stood in front of us. We had to trail blaze through the meadow and make a difficult 300' climb over the pass that now stood between us and the outlaw cabin. After climbing on that last stretch, with some of the group on the brink of exhaustion, we stood victorious on the pass and walked the last quarter mile down to the cabin, arriving exactly as the second group caught up to us, with Chris leading the pack.

Mountain Dew Victory Chug

After a brief burst of snowfall, the sun shone through the trees and the air was still. The basin was indeed as spectacular as we had hoped. However, as is the standard of the beard camp, when you arrive at the destination, the second work must begin. Tents need to be put up, the fire pit needs to be prepared on top of a carefully crafted mound of snow, and the wood for that fire needs to be gathered. With at least 3 feet of snow to stand on, there was plenty of dead, low branches on the trees that were accessible, and with an abundance of large pine trees in this basin, we would have plenty of firewood to warm the souls, soles, and toes of the entire group all night. And many in the group needed it.

Steve and his pocket chainsaw.

Immediately after DJ set up his tent, he grabbed a smaller pack and headed back out with his headlamp to meet Cait, who was braving the mountain by herself. He would end up descending over half of the mountain, only to come back up with her again. When they arrived back at camp three hours later, the beautiful sunset had passed and the moon and stars were out on full display. With a roaring fire waiting for them, they arrived and began to warm themselves as we did our best to try to figure out and set up her 2 man tent in the dark. (hint... put the tent up before the rain fly).

Beautiful bonfire awaited DJ and Cait

This is how Sam gathers firewood

After everyone was exhaustively settled around the fire, the Steve and Sam sideshow came out. We told stories and sang songs of silliness. Back in high school people knew us as the funny guys. Well, funny as in, people would often stare at us with straight faces and unbelief while we made each other laugh. We'd often hear something like: C'mon Steve, be funny. So, in keeping with the tradition of it, we sang songs about Shhhhhaving cream, Fannies, and Eskimos. Sam's recitation of Rindercella was a real winner with this crowd. Of course, when DJ is in the crowd it's just downright hard not to get everyone laughing.

Crawling into the tents in the 20 degree, windless night proved quite chilly for some; while those who had a good sleeping bag and toe warmers sandwiched between two pair of socks had a nice cozy night. But even being nice and warm on the beard camp isn't always enough to guarantee a good night sleep. Many times, you'll find that your body is still aching from the hours of hard labor and getting to sleep can still prove a challenge.

Steveand Sam cooking breakfast

Jesse and Matt eating breakfast

DJ and Cait woke up a little earlier than the rest of us to climb back up to the pass to watch the sunrise, Sam stoked the fire, which by now had melted down through the snow column and down about 18 inches below our feet. We set up a small secondary fire with a couple logs for a base for our aluminum pans, and we started cooking our famous sausage mcbacon sandwiches.

Aluminum pans are not the best to cook bacon in, but when you are backpacking with 3 lbs of bacon for 10 people, you don't have the luxury of a huge frying pan. Maybe if we had brought up some bacon grease to help spread the heat it would have worked better. So, it took over an hour to fully cook all the bacon, but by the end, it was quite tasty. Next year, we will probably pre-cook most of the food and serve breakfast burritos.

Chris's flip off the cabin

With breakfast now cleaned up and tents put away, we did a final cleanup of the campsite, took some photos by the cabin, and headed out. Most of us did a nice luge run down from the pass, which had us laughing. After rounding out Cowboy Camp, we summited Enniss (where Chris lost his sleeping bag somehow, he must have got his knot tying merit badge from Jake Hirschi) and then made our final descent. For the non-trail running group, this descent seemed equally as tough as the ascent. Using the already sore quad muscles to lower yourself and your pack step after step down the steep trail was pretty grueling, and Lone Peak has a nasty way of making you think you are always almost down, as you can see the valley directly below you for the entire descent.

Some final photos at the trailhead, and it was home again where most of us collapsed on the living room floor grinning about the great adventure, and waiting for the exhaustion to pass (except for Chris, who had to lay laminate all day). Yup, it must have been a beard camp. See ya next year!