We know this gets confusing, but yes, we’ll be camping at Three Creeks Lake the first night of our Three Sisters Three Rivers trip. Not ones to avoid a chance to jump the gun a bit, we headed up there for some early season camping. Sure enough, there was still snow rimming the lakes at 6,500′ and one quick look up into the country we planned to hike made us realize it was going to be a different kind of hike. We may have gotten way below our normal snowfall this year, but there was still plenty of deep snow blanketing the Tam Mcarthur Rim.
We got up late, bushwhacked into the Three Sisters Wilderness, scrambled up an unmarked easy 4th class knife ridge just to the west of Little Three Creek Lake, and before we knew it we topped out onto a seemingly endless snowy plateau encompassing Broken Top, Mt Bachelor, and all of the Three Sisters. After another hour or so of post-holing and practicing our glissades we ran into some backcountry skiers and watched them slice up the gravity defying corn snow slopes below us.
Somehow we made it back to camp before 3pm and although freezing, soaked, and exhausted decided it would be fun to try and fit a 24 mile mountain bike ride in down the Metolius Windigo Trail to Sisters for dinner at Three Creeks Brewing. And a well deserved dinner it was. Even though it was literally all downhill—a net loss of 3,000’—it was a lot to pack into a day. The trail was rough, dusty, and demanding and we rolled into Sisters just at dusk ready for a big meal. Our recovery the following day consisted of lounging around in the ponderosas outside of Sisters while we bouldered and top-roped some short, bulbous, yet painfully sharp climbs on a little-know crag. Fantastic way to spend the holiday weekend, and we’re already making plans to come for a fatbike, yurt, and ski trip in the winter!
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