We awoke to racing clouds. It looked like our luck had finally run out and the weather had changed. I was ready to bail out, not looking forward to a 1500 ft climb up to an alpine snowstorm. But Cynthia, bless her heart, patiently cajoled me to go through with it desipte some very vocal grumbling. This gamble paid off handsomely as the weather began clearing once we reached the lower Enchantments.

We hiked all the way to Aasgard Pass, 7800 ft. The otherworldly aspect of this place redoubled every 500 vertical feet. The surreal terrain flattened out near the pass, such that we were no longer climbing a mountain but walking on the flat surface of another planet. At the pass, the world had only four constituent elements: granite, sky, water, and snow (which replaced larch tree). The wind howled through the pass with enough force to lean against, though I didn't trust its gusty nature. A summit climber yelled out to his friend somewhere on Dragontail Peak, but his friend wasn't answering. Isolation Lake glowed, an isolate blue-green jewel lodged in the granite below us.

Unfortunately the camera battery gave out long before the pass, despite my attempts to resuscitate it by warming it against my legs. The closest picture I got is Inspiration Lake, still 500 feet below the pass. I have to give major props to the engineers at Canon who designed my camera (the Powershot G1). It failed very gracefully, eventually shutting down the LCD to conserve the last bit of power while allowing a few more pictures using the viewfinder alone.

You can see another good travelogue at the Northwest Outdoors Guide web site. Coincidently, this trip occured seven days after ours ended; note that they hiked a loop up the "back way" and came over Aasguard Pass and down through the Enchantments. The upper lakes are frozen and there is a lot more snow than when we were there. Evidently the weather did turn after we left. We timed our trip perfectly, although this was an accident.