Snoqualmie Pass Visitors Center

Did the photo snowshoe hike led by Chuck Davis on Feb 15.
The snow was coming down pretty hard and the cloud cover was low so not great photo ops but Chuck was terrific and prepared with thoughtful lessons on composition, histograms, etc — he covered a lot of territory and was very knowledgeable. He was warm, friendly, entertaining, and professional. His walk really had a great blend of nature, photography and safety education. He took us off trail a little which was great and we tried to find the elusive snowshoe hare. The caboose ranger was Hailu who was very nice, friendly and professional. I always felt safe and able to ask any questions or let them know if I was cold or working too hard. They were very aware of how people were feeling and ensured a pleasant time by keeping a good pace. The staff in the office was also terrific — all of them. I called several times in advance with questions and if it went to voice mail, they ALWAYS called me back — WOW! Don’t get that much anymore. You can tell they love what they do and want the best for the patrons. If you have never tried snowshoeing before they’ll provide you with free snowshoes, poles and only ask for a donation. It is a great safe environment to go tromping including younger ones. Highly recommend for beginners or not.
Our trip was in Commonwealth Basin and I think it was about 3 mi roundtrip — pretty easy exercise, but some uphill. I think it ended a little early because we were getting a little chilled. The photo walk is not very aerobic so be prepared with layers to do some stopping for discussion, lunch and picture taking.

After having read/​heard about the snowshoe walk that Snoqualmie Falls Park offers, a group of us finally went and had our chances to snowshoe for the first time at Snoqualmie Falls Park. The rangers at the Snoqualmie Falls Park Visitor Center were very friendly and helpful. You could tell they love the nature and love showing off how amazing and beautiful the nature in the Pacific Northwest is!
Our 90 min (the walk was actually free, but with a suggested donation of $ 15/​person) snowshoe walk was scheduled at 10am and the weather happened to be perfect! It was sunny, not too cold… and clear sky! :) Very beautiful! The walk itself was not too strenuous… as it was just a mile walk (although it involved going up and down the hill a bit… so if you are taking someone senior, make sure they are comfortable with walking… a couple people brought their own snow/​walking poles too!). There was so much snow (and even a thick, fresh layer of snow when we went!) even though it was already getting into Spring in early March. From what we found out, the walk that we did was on the snow that was 5 – 6 feet above the ground… how amazing was that! We started off the walk with how to put on snow shoe, then did a little race to get us more oriented into our snowshoe, did some nature walk and ended with time for some photo /​snowball fight opportunities.
If you are interested in the snowshoe walk, I highly recommend calling and making reservations ahead of time. They only offer free walks on weekends and only in Jan-​Mar and even though we called almost a month ahead of our scheduled, the tours were very much booked (although there may be a few spots open up because of last min no-​shows if you happened to get lucky). This snowshoe nature walk is a great, very fun experience for anyone (family and/​or friends) and a good, short trip away from Seattle!