Memories from September 2

Today I walked the 12 miles to the High Bridge Ranger Station where I could catch a bus to Stehekin. Stehekin is on the northern tip of Lake Chelan and only accessible by ferry or float plane. There’s one road which runs between the town and the trail with stops at a couple of hiking spots, a ranch, and an excellent bakery. The walk itself was pretty uneventful with moderate foliage and light rain.

The view if Lake Chelan from Stehekin.

I was waiting for the public showers and laundry machines to become available when a hiker named Safe Bet I’d met on the bus said he’d booked a room an asked if I wanted to split it since there was a second bed. Originally, my plan had been to get out on the last bus. However, a well informed family which vacations in Stehekin every year said the ranch had a large or all you can eat dinner then pointed out free camping and so I decided to stay the night.  In the end I wound up going in for half the room which was a very nice break from the rain which has been dogging me on and off for the last few days. Things cleared up in the afternoon and a few hikers celebrated Safe Bet’s birthday on the deck overlooking the water.

Memories from September 1
It rained on and off for most of the day so I don’t have very many pictures. Water messes with the capacitive touch screen on my phone so I can’t swipe to open the camera from the lock screen. Also, clouds obscured most of the views so there wasn’t as much to take photograph.

During drier spells, I did get some pictures. This bridge, over the Suiattle River is the longest I’ve seen in the back country.

Here’s an amusing trail sign. North and South are within a few degrees of each other. Across from them (behind me) was a trail sign to Suiattle Road or something like that.

For a moment, I was hoping it would clear up.

Red Cross and Napoleon who I camped with last night caught up while I was taking a snack break. Toward the beginning of a long, climb shortly before the rain restarted. Napoleon left the break hiking like a mad man and I chased him up the hill for my own motivation. Like yesterday, I think the scenery would have been fantastic as the terrain seemed to open up towards the crest into an lush, unoccluded (except for the clouds), well watered, and sufficiently varied trail. Here was an attempt to capture the gist of it.

I wound up camping just short of a ford where a trail side boulder had a large space beneath, making for a warm and sheltered campsite. The last mile or so had appeared untouched by the rain and I considered trying to build a fire to dry my clothes. Since I’ll be getting in to Stehekin tomorrow, I washed my socks instead since they were wet anyways and spent a little time trying to arrange logs to bridge to creek.

Memories from August 31

The first part of today was mostly a walk in the woods. I did learn that if you’re going to break a bridge, this is the way to do it (lower left). That way, it’s still usable, at least later in the season when the creek is low.

During a break at Glacier Creek, was passed by Lap Song (who I knew of as Will) who I last saw at the Deep Creek Hotsprings and Matador (who I knew as Emily) who I last saw at the Big Bear Hostel. I remember Emily in particular because she carried a Bluetooth keyboard so she could blog and correspond more easily. They had flipped up to Canada from Castella and are now hiking south to avoid being stuck in Washington at the end of fall.

The long uphill portion of the  morning and early afternoon eventually lead out of the woods and contained some really nice scenery.

Valley and clouds. The clouds have been more and more a factor in the hike. It’s been cooler because of the overcast and sometimes the softer light makes it easier to take pictures but other times the contrast between cloud makes it hard not to over expose the sky.

A small water fall by the trail.

Two streams merging where the trail crosses.

The top of the first climb for the day. Look at the mountains at the horizon.

From there the trail descended several thousand feet to Milk Creek which would have been more aptly named Water Creek, like most creeks. On the way down, I passed an elderly woman on her way up to Mica Lake carrying a fully loaded, old school external frame pack. She was moving slowly but surely and I was suitably impressed since many people, when their hair are as white as hers, like to use the hand rail when climbing the stairs. The punch line, though was that trailing by a switchback or two was a visibly younger, late middle aged lady who I assume was her hiking partner.

I don’t have any more photos from the day since it started raining while I was drawing water at Milk Creek. There was a long climb out of the creek and two women I met at there had gotten a tip about an unmarked campsite several switchbacks up. Given that the next listed campsite was over four miles up the hill, it seemed like a great place to stop. In actuality, it was probably more like 10 switchbacks up and by that time, I’d gotten used to the rain. There was exactly enough room for two tents so I left it to the women.

When the trail finally reached the crown of the hill and broke out of the trees, I was able to catch glimpses of the opposing hillsides through holes in the constantly changing cloud. Sometimes it was forested and plain, other times it might be ragged rock with a waterfall. Over the crest of the hill, there was only grey-white cloud in the expanse away from the hillside but I imagine it would have been beautiful as the trail wandered trough low, bright green brush (aka hikerwash) and small pine trees with frequent streams.

As the light began to lessen, my socks and shorts were soaked from the hiker wash and my shirt under my rain jacket was damp, I’m not sure from sweat or rain which had wetted through. I had been seeing fresh tracks in the new mud and wasn’t surprised at having to share the campsite with other hikers. My fingers had gotten cold enough to lose much strength so, while full limb tasks like hammering in tent stakes were as easy as usual, untangling guy lines, zipping up my sleeping bag, and opening foods wrappers for dinner were surprisingly difficult. Ironically, it makes me glad that I didn’t have a stove since operating one is a relatively complex manual task and I just wanted to lie in my sleeping bag and wait for my body to warm itself up.

Washington has a well deserved reputation for being wet. I had been hoping that if I were done early enough I might slip through before the rain. Oh well.

Memories from August 30.

If the trail keeps turning up days like today, northern Washington will beat the Sierra for my favorite section. The trail was usually exposed so there was an almost continuous view of craggy ridges, lush multi-green hillsides, and sometimes snowy mountains. The exposure can be unpleasant because of constant sunlight but today was overcast which brought out the colors and kept me cool. The dominant ground cover has been blueberries and huckleberries which makes me think that the reason this area was classified as wilderness was because the Big Blueberry wanted to constraint supply…

There were lots of these little meadows.

Fields of huckleberries with the constantly shifting clouds which characterized today.

A large part of what made today so special was that the area seems encircled by distant, rough terrain. I took lots of pictures of it but things which are far away show up really small in pictures. Here’s a reasonable one. Look across the middle how the horizon is underscored with snowy mountains.

This is what I meant when I used the term, “multi-green”. There are so many different shades of green that you want to eat it like a vegetable.

Lake Sally Ann. At this point in the season many of the lakes don’t seem to have outlet streams which makes me a little wary of drawing water from them. Of course, I could go back to treating my water but ain’t nobody got time for that.

The PCT is supposed to be a horse trail as well. I’ve never seen this before.

Almost done.

Fire in the sky. Not the most amazing picture but I didn’t take anything from the hiker-only section which climbed above everything I could see, as the sun was on the horizon, and then into the mist before dropping steeply into a different valley.

What a visually sumptuous day. If I’d had a GigaPan, maybe I could have captured it.

Memories from August 29

Today I met a friend from home around 10am who brought me a resupply box. We hung out and hiked a few miles. I finished out the day by making it to Janus Lake.
Having camped last night just out of bounds at Steven’s Pass Ski Resort, I woke up with a star ship peeking in my window.

Ski lifts with dramatic clouds.

Today was short and didn’t crest anything notable. The trail mostly ran along forested hills like this.

Memories from August 28

Where I’m going today. About two months before starting this trip, I twisted my knee skiing here. The twist was bad enough that it took until the trup to heal which ruined my plans to train.

Look at the clouds.

I spy a new mountain. I bet that like Lassen, Shasta, Adam, and Rainier we ger to hike towards it for days as it slowly gets larger and larger.

This was not Mig Lake. Oh well.

Steven’s Pass Ski Resort. I hiked most of the way in with Panini but took a longer lunch than he did. I had a second lunch / first dinner at the restaurant here. I’d wanted to camp where I twisted my knee but it was all boulder field so I hiked out of bounds past the top of one of the ski lifts and found a dry pond which was flat.

This is Feugo who I hiked out of Scissors Crossing with when I did my first 30. We hadn’t seen each other since until Snoqualmie. He’s planning on finishing sooner than I am so this is probably the last I’ll see if him. Fuego is the only other hiker I know to only have used two pairs of shoes this trip.

Steven’s Pass by night.

Memories from August 27

Today some really great scenery. I finished the Goldmyer Hotsprings alternate and hiked out through the Deception Pass area to Deception Lake.

Lake Ivanhoe. The passing up through Miller Gap and down to it was really fantastic.

Most of my pictures don’t capture the colors of the water in many of the better lakes so here’s a study.

Overlooking Deep Lake from the top of a ridge before dropping in to the next valley.

This creek has a sign at the previous fork in the trail warning that it can be dangerous. While it is passable at this time of year, it was one of the more complex crossings I’ve done in a while since it was so wide and the trail enters and exits at very different places.

A live note written on a torn bit of envelope which I found tragically left on the trail.

Deception Lake. I usually cowboy camp but tonight, I set up the tarp.

Memories from August 26

I camped last night just a short distance past I90 at Snoqualmie Pass. So close in fact that when the trail angel who said they were going to make pancakes this morning didn’t appear to be stirring in their tent, I walked back to the Summit Pancake House. The most important thing I did during that time was that instead of hiking the PCT proper out of Snoqualmie, I was going to take an alternate route which goes by the Goldmyer Hotsprings which I’d heard about but never visited. Notably, the shortest way to get to the hot springs is a 4.5 mile hike but that’s only when the road is open and the caretaker implied it wasn’t. Also, the alternate route is shorter and has less climbing. As I discovered, though, it was pretty rocky in sections and going was slow. While I passed a bunch of day hikers, looked like they were all going up to one of the lakes which are in the first three miles of the nine or ten miles which may currently be the shortest public route to the hot springs. The funny thing about a pool of hot water is that it only feels great but only until you begin to over heat and then you want nothing more than to get out. So, despite my initial visions of potentially luxuriating all day in ease and comfort, I eventually hiked on. The trail after the hot springs follows the Snoqualmie river, which was very clear and clean, down a valley with high rock walls. I haven’t been in one like it since the Sierra. There were a number of blueberry and huckleberry bushes but I didn’t do much beyond grabbing the berries which were so well positioned that I could pick them without breaking stride. I camped a few miles before the end of the valley in an area covered with low, green berry plants and shorter pine trees with a nearby meadow and plenty of water. What a great day.

Snow Lake (not the only Snow Lake in WA) was the first body of water I happened across in the Alpine Lakes Wilderness.

The lakes, the foot traffic dies off and the trail gets rougher. There was a temporary sign about trail damage but fortunately nothing was completely blocked or washed out. There is a shrub which adds some red coloring to the otherwise green-grey color scheme. It might be the huckleberry’s fall color but I didn’t look too closely.

Crazy log bridge. You have to jump down to the first log. The Goldmyer Hotsprings website warns that the trail strenuous but they really weren’t kidding. It turns out there are other trails to get there, this is the back entrance.

The Goldmyer Hotsprings. There are three pools, the uppermost of which is a cave which goes back 30ft or so. It’s technically on private property which allows the nonprofit group which owns it to keep the area in a natural state, and provide a few amenities like the simple cabana from which I took this picture.

The Snoqualmie River is very clear.

This looks like it was once a piped spring and something has gone wrong.

I never expected to see a shower just sitting next to the trail if I hadn’t just had a bath, I might have used it.

The valley walls of the afternoon’s hike.

The most impressively obstructive deadfall I’ve seen and at this point, I’ve seen a few.

Valley walls by sunset.

Memories from August 25

Mirror Lake is 8-9mi from Snoqualmie Pass. I live a little less than an hour from the pass and have skied at the ski resort through which we descended to I90. The folks were in the area on vacation and so I got to see mom and dad. They even took me to see a movie, which is the most non-trail experience possible (sitting motionless instead of walking and synthetic instead if natural audio and visuals). After getting dropped off at the trail I was going to write a quick e-mail and get a mile or two in before camping. Instead, I ran into a trail angel about 0.1mi in and camped next to the picnic table they’d set up at with the promise of a pancake breakfast in the morning.

Mirror Lake where I started the day. The water is very still and you can see why its so named.

Hiking with Blackberry and Gibblets towards Snoqualmie Pass. The vegetation is dense and there were lots of blue berries and huckle berries. Puppy had already dropped behind to pick some. The ruggedness of the hills in the distance is exciting. I’ve hiked in them before but never gotten to approach from where I could see them except from beneath.

Snoqualmie Ski Resort without the snow. I’ve skied here several times and it looks very different but just familiar enough that you’re not sure whether or not you’ve seen it before.

Memories from August 24

Today’s objective was to get to Mirror Lake in time for a swim. There was a lot of elevation change at a steeper than normal grade. For comparison, there was 25% more elevation gain than when I did 51.5 miles into Timberline Lodge and today there was a little less than half the miles. I’m getting close to where I’ve day hiked near home and the trail felt more like those day hikes than the PCT.

Nice little view of Rainier. I think today will be the last on which I see it.

Hey look, evidence of civilization. Sometimes power lines are just an ugly scar on the earth. These fit into the scene pretty well.

Nature’s own water bottle fill station.

Looking towards Yakima Pass from the top of the outlet stream from Mirror Lake.

I’m getting near to places which I’ve day hiked and in some respects today felt pretty familiar. It was like a day hike, just longer.

This evening I had dinner with the family at the adjacent campsite. It was their first time taking their kids out camping and the kids were fun to play with while chatting about gear with dad or trail nutrition with mom. We told ghost stories and the dad used a branch of green pine needles which popped rapidly to create “zombie smoke” which turned him into a zombie at which point he chased the kids around. It was a really pleasant evening and a nice change while still being relaxing.