The view from the trailhead, which we reached around 7:30 PM after leaving straight from Seattle around 4:30. We drove through a crazy rainstorm on Snoqualmie Pass and were glad when it was relatively drier on the east side of the mountains! Unfortunately, we had forgotten to print out the map/directions for where we were going, and we ended up unknowingly at the wrong trailhead.
We planned to head up the trail for a few miles, camp, and then make our way to this summit the next morning...
However, we soon had an inkling that we weren't on the right trail or even the right mountain. The trail was soaking wet and slippery with mud and multiple creek crossings, and snow began to appear about a mile after we began the hike. The trail we had meant to go on was reported to be snow-free 3-4 miles up. 
Eventually, we lost the trail entirely and agreed that we were definitely not where we had planned to go. It was starting to get dark, though, so we decided to keep going and look for a dry place to camp.
The patches of snow on the trail were fairly deep and slippery and made for slow going, particularly when we kept postholing and sinking up to our knees in the snow. I even almost fell in a creek that was hidden underneath the snow.
We finally managed to locate a relatively level, snow-free and dry spot and set up camp right before it got dark. Luckily the rain held off, and we managed to stay relatively warm and dry throughout the night.
The next morning we woke up to a bluebird day - bright blue skies, sunny and warm. We had breakfast at this nice little spot and then decided to do some exploring. We were about halfway up one of the walls of the Esmerelda Basin (we later learned, upon consulting a map) and decided to do some off trail scrambling to get up to a viewpoint.
The barely visible rocky peak was our goal. The route was not incredibly steep until we got out of the trees onto a snowfield, and spent an hour or two tentatively picking our way up patches of snow and scree. It was very slow and frustrating going both up and down because, well, I'm afraid of heights!! But the view from the ledge we made it to was very striking and rewarding. The pics from the viewpoint are on DBF's camera so hopefully I will get a chance to post them soon!
Shortly after we reached our tent from this exploring mission, clouds began to roll in over the basin, and we decided to head further out into eastern Washington and do a night of car camping in somewhere with sunnier weather. We ended up camping along the Cle Elum river near Roslyn, in a gorgeous riverside campsite. We set up a fire pit on the rocky island in the middle of the river and ate dinner and drank beers under the stars. It was a warm and cozy night, and we woke up to brilliant blue skies and a warm, sunny morning before reluctantly heading back towards Seattle.We didn't really end up going where we had planned, and the hiking was definitely challenging, but all in all it ended up being a great weekend!
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