Tonga Ridge...Well the Fire Road to Tonga Ridge

After quite a busy week at work, and evenings spent painting our home indoors, we were ready to get outside and away from town. 
Sunday morning, our good friends Jacob and Natasha met up at our place, loaded up the Skybox (car top storage) and we headed off for adventure. 
Side Note-This was our first trip using the newly acquired Skybox for all our gear, Lily had the entire back of the Tribute to herself, and all 4 people rode with plenty of space.  Thanks Mom and Dad!
The best thing about traveling with J&N is that they are up for just about anything and will push to see around the next turn just in case there is a perfect vista! 
Today's hike after starting to drive north; we decided on doing Tonga Ridge.  The snowshoe book does mention that this trailhead may be hard to reach after the early season because of too much snow.  We decided although we are in the middle of winter that the chance was worth it because the book also mentions superb vista views.  After about a hour and a half of driving we reached Tonga Ridge Rd.  Unfortunately we only made it about 4 miles down the road before we were stopped by a lot of snow on the road.  We parked the car and decided to just walk along the road.  The first half of our walk was without snowshoes, because although our car could go no further there were tire tracks that had flattened the snow making it quite walkable. Since we knew at some point we would need the snowshoes, I got a little pack training in too.  I hauled both Ryan and my snowshoes along with all our clothing (because Ry can sure sweat when he is going up) in my pack. 
Side note- I think that we learned a little lesson on this hike.  If we want to really condition for Mt. Rainier we are going to need to both carry our own packs and make them heavy with a gourmet lunch or something else fun like that. 
About 2 miles or so on the main road we took a right as the book says to do and tried to find the actual Tonga Ridge trailhead.  We did have the option to go on a more leavel trail or head up towards the trailhead.  Without even really thinking Natasha says lets go up.  I love Natasha's attitude!  This is one of many reasons I love hiking with J&N.  We have a mountain to climb in July and we are going to be prepared.  This side road (we think it was #310) required our snowshoes, so we strapped them on and up we went.  A little over 3.5 miles we came to the trailhead for Tonga Ridge.  Well at least we know where it is and perhaps we will visit again on a sunnier day for another chance at some good vista views.  Today we got a glimpse at a few jagged mountains for a moment, but mostly we enjoyed the solitude of just us out in the snow with pretty evergreens looking even greener in the grayish background.   The hike back to the car was just about all downhill and sure seemed A LOT easier then the way up, we made it back in just over an hour. 
To end a great hike we stopped for some burgers, fries and shakes, and still had time to make it to church.  Great day!

No pictures from our trip, in our excitement to go we completely forgot the camera. 
Here is a picture from Washington Trail Association of what we should have seen had the weather not been so socked in and we had actually started at the trailhead.  Definitely a reason to go back, who wants to go?