Basic Snowshoe - Surveyors Lake

Starting from the Silver Fir Lodge (note: plan to get there earlier than 8:45 on weekends and Monday holidays), we headed up generally following the blue diamond marked Nordic Pass Trail as far as our first lake: Hyak.  From there, we headed up to Grand Junction, then worked our way under the power lines, and tagged our second lake: Rockdale, and called it first lunch.  From Rockdale, we attempted to make our way directly through the forest, but the former clear cut in places had so many smaller tighter trees that travel was difficult.  So we worked our way back to parallel along a cross country ski trail.  Heading up towards Surveyors Lake, we started to follow the power line service road, but took the opportunity to head off through a (luckily) more mature forest where the trees were nicely spaced.  We quickly arrived at Surveyors Lake, and used our probes to measure a snow depth there about 170cm.  
As we still had some collective energy left, we elected to continue and find our fourth lake, Divide.  The way started relatively easily, but we then transitioned into a former clear cut where the smaller trees and sneaky tree wells caught us sometimes and made for circuitous travel.  But we prevailed and eventually got to Divide Lake and enjoyed a well-earned second lunch.  From Divide, we worked our way first back to Grand Junction, and from there back to Hyak Lake, and down the Silver Fir.