Wind River Range, early September—how to prepare for weather

[Ryan P]

I am planning a trip in the Wind River range at the beginning of September (from 9/2 – 9/6).  I keep hearing people say that this time of year can be the best for the Winds as long as you are prepared for the weather.  My question is, what exactly do I need to do to be “prepared for the weather”?  I have backpacked a fair amount, but never in the snow (although I have day-hiked in the snow many times).  I will try to have a flexible enough route that we can be delayed a day for weather and still make it back out on time, but other than that, I don’t really know what special precautions I should be taking.  As such, I have the following questions:
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<div>1.  Does anyone have any recommended tips for checking the weather in the Winds?  Any best websites or locations to enter?  Any tips for how far in advance the forecast there is reliable?  I will probably be in the Titcomb basin area, but maybe I’ll hit the Cirque area instead.  In general, should I plan for minimum temps of 25 degrees or so?</div>
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<div>2.  I will be hiking with my brother and we will have the two shelters shown in the attached photo.  The tarp is a Bearpaw Lair (similar to the zpacks hexamid).  Will these shelters be adequate?  I have no idea what would happen if it snows a bunch on these.</div>
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<div>3.  I’m assuming I don’t need to bring microspikes, gaiters, or anything else specifically to deal with snow?</div>
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<div>4.  This is not actually a weather-related question, but if you’ve read this far, you must know the Winds, so… Do I need bear spray?</div>
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<div>Thanks in advance for any feedback!</div>
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<div>(photo of my shelters attached—if it would be foolish to bring either of these to the Winds in September, please let me know!)</div>

[Ryan Tucker]

I haven’t hiked the Winds but have been in Yellowstone, the Beartooths, etc…IMO September is the best time of year. I will be in Yellowstone in a few weeks.

Snow is possible at the high elevations, but it likely won’t be much that early in September. Afternoon Thunderstorms are still possible but not as bad as August. Historically for me the biggest issue is huge swings in temperature. At night it might be 20 degrees and it will be 80 by early afternoon.

Again, I know people go to the woods for many reasons but in my mind the mountain west is best experience in September.

IMO…

Bear Spray is a must for each member of any group.

Those shelters are fine. At high elevation choose campsites wisely. I use a duo mid and nest out west. Though I have rarely camped above treeline because I love to fish moving water in the evening. Any shelter is doable assuming you choose sites carefully. Wind can be an issue. It will probably be a bigger issue than snow or rain.

I use this link. You can click on the exact campsite you plan to stay at and get weather forecast specific to the area. I use it often whether backpacking or day hiking/fishing. I find it to be extremely reliable back east. Out west, the mountains sometimes make the weather so don’t assume anything. But it should be helpful. If you have a inreach device you can also check weather on it and I believe it is using the same info as the link below.

http://www.weather.gov

[Leap Frog]

I was in the Winds last September, nearly identical dates, in fact. Fantastic, fantastic trip. In case you haven’t already found it, my trip report is here: https://backpackinglight.com/forums/topic/wind-river-range-sept-2016/

We had a mixture of sleet and rain during the first afternoon. We just hunkered down for 40 minutes under some trees and enjoyed hearing the thunder echo off of the granite.

There was snow the first night. One weather-related recommendation I received (and followed) was to not cross the Continental Divide to sleep.  A nighttime snow storm could dump a decent amount of snow overnight and make it difficult to get back over the pass the next day.

My trail running shoes were more than sufficient traction for the 1.5-4 inches of snow we encountered.

The low temperature on the hike was 24 degrees one morning near Island Lake.

Regarding shelters, I got of bunch of heavy snow on my duplex, and just shook it off when I awoke around 1am.

Enjoy your trip!

[John Klinepeter]

I have accumulated quite a bit of temperature data on my Wind River backpacks.  Here are some minimum temperature numbers from the last two years:

Year 2016,  Big Sandy area

September 8, 28 degrees F

September 9, 23 degrees

September 10, 25 degrees

 

Year 2015, Green River Lakes area

August 26, 50 degrees

August 27, 43 degrees

August 28, 32 degrees

August 29, 39 degrees

These were recorded at elevations of 10,000 +/- feet inside my tent or shelter near ground level in a corner.  Outside temps determined by a sensor exposed to the sky are not too meaningful IMO and are confusing.

No matter the overnight low temperature it is almost always pleasant by about 9 or 10am.

Microspikes are not needed by most hikers; climbers who bag the higher peaks my require them but that is outside my experience.  Same goes for gaiters, at least for me.

Just about any waterproof shelter will work as long as you camp below treeline.

Bear spray is optional.  Most people do not carry it.  It took me about 15 years of walking in the Winds before I saw any sign of bear presence, a pile of excrement near Green River Lakes two years ago.  I gave up carrying the spray several years ago.

[Ben C]

I was in the Winds last year about the same time.  We were primarily along the(a) high route.  We had lows below freezing most nights and I’m not sure it ever got above 70 during the day.  On Labor Day, we had a blizzard during a night in the exposed Alpine Lakes.  We had steady strong snow with howling winds.  It was a blizzard.  We struggled to keep our Duomid down during the night.  A main stake pulled out a few times due to the high winds.  Snow blew in the tent pretty steadily.  The next day was mostly hopping along snow covered talus.

We took no bear spray and saw no need for it.  We didn’t takes spikes; I would have liked them for the glacier crossing we did, but I think that’s really the only time I would have used them.  I wouldn’t take them unless I was crossing a glacier.

I think weather issues will be elevation related.  I know when we went lower, the snow was gone and you could only see it up higher.  I suspect the high winds were related to altitude as well.

And I agree with Leapfrog, it’s a beautiful place.

[Ryan P]

Wow, thanks all for the quick and informative replies!  It sounds like I’ll need to bring an extra layer of clothes than normal, choose my campsite carefully (hopefully below treeline), and plan a flexible schedule to accommodate possible delays, and otherwise I’ll just treat this as a typical summer Colorado trip.

John—That looks like quite the fluctuation in temperature between one year and the other!  Did you find the weather forecast before the trips very indicative of the actual temperatures?

Ryan—Thanks for the tip about clicking on the map on weather.gov; I’ve always used that site for my weather forecasts, but didn’t realize you could click on the map.  I typically just type the nearest location that returns results.

Leap Frog—Nice trip report!  I’m planning a similar loop but will hopefully include Wall Lake/Indian Basin (but probably not Fremont peak)

Sounds like I got mixed input on the bear spray, which is kind of what I was expecting… any other opinions on the matter?

 

 

[Ben C]

If you use caltopo, you can also right click on the map and it takes you to the weather.gov forecast for that location on the map.

[John Vance]

I have been there every fall for the past 25 years except the year I floated from Lee’s ferry to Lake Mead through Marble and the Grand Canyon….but I digress.  That first week of Sept can be warm and sunny with mild nights and/or cold and snowy/wet, just depends.  Based on recent weeks I don’t think this Labor Day week will be at either extreme.  I have not taken long pants, except for wind pants, on any of those trips in the past 25 years.  With the exception of a couple of years, my puffy has just been a vest and I take no other insulation layer, just my long sleeve shirt.

For me, as a heavy sweater, I find that when on the move I don’t need much, particularly on my legs which tend to be bare, even in sub freezing temps.  Have I been uncomfortably cold on occasion?  Yes, but never in trouble.  I carry long base layers for camp and sleeping that can be worn during the day if necessary, but that has only happened a couple of times in more than 40 years of backpacking.

Just check the forecast before you go and plan according for your needs.  I noticed last night that the NOAA site doesn’t allow you to select a targeted location any more.  For the Winds it selects all of the west slope or all of the east slope.  Not too helpful as the weather can be quite different from north to south to say nothing of altitude differences.  Perhaps it is just a glitch and not a permanent change.

Enjoy your trip.  I will be up there from Sept 1st through the 10th but haven’t yet decided where exactly and may not until I am on the way up or get a view of the range in Marbleton.  I don’t plan like I used to.  I just load up 10 days of food and head out allowing for a great deal of spontaneous travel.  When I travel with my hiking partner we don’t have much of an itinerary.  The Winds have become much more popular and even off trail you seem to run into someone nearly every day.  We try to avoid that as much as possible hence the loose plan.

[John Klinepeter]

I have not paid much attention to the correlation between predicted weather and actual weather.  The predictions seem to be reasonable at least for a few days but a brief snow flurry or hail storm can pop up at any time.

Last year the weather was great, no precip that I recall.  The previous year a hail and rain storm hit as I was setting up camp.  Hail accumulated to about one inch depth.  This was one of my rare camps above tree line.  To my dismay I discovered that my shelter was no longer water proof (very heavy misting) and I had no place to hide.  For protection I placed the polycryo ground sheet on top of my sleeping bag.  Luckily the storm ended after a few hours.  I have since recoated the shelter with the silicone recipe and all is well.

There was a thread about one month ago which talked about tent stakes.  My conclusion was that you should carry at least a few substantial “grabby” stakes and don’t rely on dinky hook stakes even if you camp in the trees.

I’m packing right now, need to figure out food. Will be on the trail Friday morning or perhaps Thursday evening.  Yippeee!

Have a great time!

[Roger Caffin]

my shelter was no longer water proof (very heavy misting)
A common myth, but rarely true unless the original coating was really shot.

In this case I suspect that the ground was a bit wet and warm, so there was some evaporation going on. Then the hail hit, chilled the shelter fabric, and created lots of condensation on the inside surface of the shelter. Then the impact of the hail or rain on the fabric knocked the condensation off as a fine spray. It happens.

Cheers

[John Klinepeter]

I thought the idea of DIY application of a silicone slurry was to increase the hydrostatic head?  It wouldn’t be the first time I misunderstood a topic:)

If not that begs the question of why one would do it in the first place.  Maybe it decreases UV degradation of the fabric?  Or increases resistance to abrasion?

My apologies for going off topic.

[Roger Caffin]

I thought the idea of DIY application of a silicone slurry was to increase the hydrostatic head?
If not that begs the question of why one would do it in the first place. Maybe it decreases UV degradation of the fabric? Or increases resistance to abrasion?

You are right, but that does not ask whether it was necessary in the first place. BPL has seen many discussions of ‘misting’ over the years. There is general agreement that what is seen is actually condensation being knocked off.

Yes, recoating would help with both UV resistance and abrasion, but the two BIG problems with coat-it-yourself are
* getting the new layer to really bond with the existing surface – it often just peels off
* getting the new layer thin enough to be acceptable in weight terms.

I find a dose of silicone spray every year or two is adequate to keep water running off – and a LOT lighter. I have not found any problems with UV or abrasion in many years, but ymmv.

Imho, a far more useful trick for wild weather is having a few 10″ tubular stakes for the most critical guys. Those tiny 6″ ones are almost useless in bad weather in the mountains.

Cheers

[Lester Moore]

Those tiny 6″ ones are almost useless in bad weather in the mountains

Shoulder season in the mountains, especially above treeline – I wouldn’t trust any stake by itself. Pile rocks on those stakes to keep them in place. This is always good practice for the mountains regardless of what stakes you use. If it’s hard to pick up and move, the rock is probably heavy enough. If not, then stack multiple rocks per stake. And as Ryan T. said, choose your campsites wisely – lower sites in the trees away from wind channels are most protected, but any kind of protection is better than none (boulders, small hill or depression, krummholz, etc).

[Arthur]

Be very careful in the trees in the WRR.  The pine bark beetles have wrecked havoc on many tree stands.  Lots of standing dead trees waiting for the next wind to come down.  Look up before settling down.

Concerning the weather.  I find almost no correlation between the predictions in the area and the actual weather. Recently returned from a week there where it rained and hailed during long parts of the days and nights on multiple days.  No mention of anything but sunshine in the Pinedale or Lander reports.

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