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- Apr 20, 2013
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In September I had the pleasure of a nice 10 day trip, mostly in Washington.
I know there are not many trip reports on here from Washington, so maybe you all might enjoy some more photos of some of these places.
Plus, I have not posted a report in a while and have enjoyed many of the recent reports, although I am not feeling particularly witty with this one. So if you're bored, just enjoy the pictures.
What we did:
We took the long way up E Idaho from Utah, then across Couer d'Alene and Spokane over to the Cascades.
Once there we would meet up with a friend, backpack, and then I had a night booked at a campsite near Rainier. (please note that Sir Mt Rainier or Sir Tahoma is Sir-Not-Appearing-In-This-Trip-Report...)
The original plan had been to drop down to the Eagle Cap for another backpack.
With fire and smoke in the Eagle Cap,, we ended up ditching the plans for Eagle Cap (Sadly). Even worse with other fires near places we had as Plan B, we had to look for Plan C. We were not satisfied with the options and forecast for Plan C....
So, for many reasons we ended up on the Olympic Peninsula for the second part of the trip.
Planning for this trip was information overload. There were so many places on the list, and there are obviously a lifetime of trails that are still on my list.
There were 3 other trips we routed from the same trailhead as this one...
A few observations:
Wonderfully Steep buttkicker climbs (especially only 3 weeks recovering from Covid)
Rain is wet
Smokey skies suck
Misty mornings, berries from black to blue were wonderful, and so were wonderfully cold swims in lakes and streams
Some trees are really tall, and some deadfall made for fun challenges
Some pinecones are massive and as they fall they just might just miss you by inches
After all that, here are some pictures with limited commentary:
All packed for two separate trips. Separated food and separated clothes.
Food and supplies all taken care of.
All reports showed terrible smoke from Eastern Oregon across Idaho... including a fire right off the scenic byway. Regardless, we went the long way and ditched the freeway at Blackfoot and went across the top of Craters of the Moon and then a byway north.
When we stopped here, my eyes and throat were pretty irritated. The smoke does not look as bad as it felt.
We stopped out front of Chief Joseph Ranch, where there was a hot set and filming in progress. Then we continued on and took a break at Lake Como.
It felt too early to stop, and it was too smokey, so we scratched a few potential campsites off the list, grabbed a lunch/dinner and continued north.
Montana had a little less smoke. Although I had joked with my uncle of showing up in the dark and pitching a tent on his front lawn at Flathead Lake, we did not go that far north and stopped at a nice quiet campsite.
The morning was cold enough for some good mist on the creek.
We found a diner and took our time with breakfast and then hit a few tourist spots to buy some stickers my buddy wanted and then west we went.
By afternoon we had passed out of Idaho into Washington. I think some of the area was beautiful, but it was still smokey and we only stopped at the Columbia to stretch.
We did stop at a couple touristy fruit markets, and then after a quick late lunch, we went up into the Cascades.
We found a campsite for the night, and then went to check out a trailhead and stumbled on what is a well-known set of pools complete with some great rocks to jump off, salmon swimming in the creek, and insta-lamers in bikinis.
We were a little limited on camping, not just because it was a Saturday night, but also because a couple of weeks before this trip a neighbor had backed his jeep into my Tacoma. The Tacoma was still in the body shop, and so we road-tripped in the minivan. This limited us on access during the whole trip.
The next morning, right on time, my friend rolled in.
We dropped the van off at a trailhead and went on to our actual departure trailhead.
For a Sunday morning with the lot only 1/2 full we took time and contemplated the future direction of our lives and our life choices to that point. hahaha
We had two routes planned, and only time for one of them. We chose one, and headed out.
After a good first climb, we arrived at a lake that was green, surrounded by green, reflecting green.
As we neared today's pass, we had this in view and plenty of berries to distract us.
Descending the pass after lunch. During lunch we spent some time talking to those on the PCT who were mostly being forced to change plans because of a fire just north that was growing in size, and fire in the NCNP
Autumn was not in full color, but it was starting.
Beautiful.
We found home for the night, took a few swigs of water, and then off we went for another lake nestled up in a cirque a couple miles away.
While planning it had looked a bit steep to want to take our packs and stay the night, but perhaps we should have. The scramble down with a pack might have sucked.
When we reached the lake, it sprinkled on us a little while.
Panorama with a dozen goats if you know where to look.
I am sure there is a route, just not sure of difficulty over the ridge to the left and to the next day's destination, but we stuck to trails and took the long way.
Dinner was a creamy mushroom pasta that we ate in the dark.
A little rain overnight gave way to partly cloudy, quite smokey.
Smokey and difficult lighting continued through the second day.
More start of autumn colors
This buck had a few does already, and had also paid some blood price for them it looked like. This was only a few feet off trail.
Some patchy sun as we went up and then down again on the PCT.
Some more autumn colors and smoke.
Some of these reminded me of the Barrows, perhaps some Barrow-wights would come out at night?
After a lunch break it was back into the steepest climb of the trip. It seemed like some of the downfall was kept purposely to keep the trail from being a pack trail. Given we had already done mileage and not starting fresh it was a rough climb. We passed one solitary backpacker on the way up, and he was the only person we would see up there. Pretty good for a more popular place.
Almost there.
The destination.
We had our choice of sites and took one with a ton of berries, views and a good place to swim.
I went in almost immediately on arriving and it was real nice.
Smokey.
Sunset with smoke.
Before dawn there was that distinct stillness in the heavy air. In the twilight I slipped out and sat by the lake. Some banks of fog and mist were so dense that I could barely see the water in front of me.
Lovely.
After breakfast and staining our hands blue with berries, we climbed up to a higher lake. A nice climb on steep slickrock-like granite.
The climb was again rewarded. Quite a wonderful highlight.
So many shades of blue.
Excellent as we kept climbing, and some of the clouds parted.
Some nice views on the shoulder. First one looking back where we went over, and the rest looking down into the next canyon over.
This lake though...
At the upper lake the marmots had been quite distressed, constantly on their hind legs and whistling.
We had thought it was just us. (I mean, isn't everything about us?)
After coming down back to the lake we split up. One friend stopped and took a dip, while I found a place to sit and watch the different blues of the lake, and my other friend watched the marmots and pikas.
After a while, I stood up and went back to my one friend. He called and pointed, I only saw a flash of brown tail, but my other friend saw a wolverine that looked at him, before disappearing. After the trip we read a report from a few weeks before where a wolverine and pups had been seen at the lake.
We waited a few minutes, but there was not a second appearance.
Seems a better reason for the more than irritated marmots.
A different lake, a different shade of blue.
Time for another swim.
Late in the afternoon there was a massive boom that came at us from the foot of the lake, ricocheted and thundered by us, then up into the upper bowls and the peak and echoed back. Quite spectacular.
In Utah we had just had a meteor that had caused a sonic boom earlier in the summer, and this was like that, but much louder.
We wondered what it was.
On the way down it happened again, and this time we could see across the valley to see a big puff from an explosion. I suspect dynamite, but I dunno. Trailwork, or it seemed on the map there could be old mine claims.
Either way, the reverberating boom up in the cirque was pretty awesome.
Some cloud drama on the way back down. At least most of the smoke was cleared out.
Sunset at yet another lake. The last night of this backpack.
Pinecones falling from great heights all around us all through the night.
Morning reflections as more of the smoke returned.
Some of the peaks that were covered with clouds on the way down the day before looked good in the morning light.
Forded the creek. The footbridge a little ways down creek was out, but this was more fun anyways.
Some sunlight.
A nice creek that went through a canyon with some nice pools that were really great. Lunchtime.
A bit more autumn color every day. I was sad we were not there for the height of color or especially for Larches, but it also meant there were not many people on the trail.
After a quick shower at my friend's house, we left him behind and drove in the dark to a campground near Rainier.
We slept under some magnificently tall cedars and pines, and then woke up before dawn and drove on up to Sunrise through the mist and clouds. We had some hope, but our hopes were dashed.
Thus, Mt Rainier-not-appearing-in-this-film.
Such a tease.
After being skunked and looking at the forecast for the next few days, we switched gears. There was not a lot of desire in the legs to do some more up and down mileage just to be socked out in clouds or rain turning to snow.
We drove some roads, saw some waterfalls and nice stuff, but then decided we would pivot and head north.
We stopped for some excellent Bibimbap at a Korean restaurant.
Outside in the parking lot I was challenged to a swordfight by a guy in a gladiator helmet. He yelled, "I am Maximus!" at me as we got in the van and drove away. We got about 20 mins away and my friend realized he had left hat, sunglasses and jacket at the restaurant.
When we got back, the gladiator was still there, and so I yelled "I am Sparticus". He came over and challenged me to a sword fight, but I had no sword, and he only had a stick, so we called it a draw and he ran away.
Sad but true.
Then we were off to the north. Without any pre-planning we were shooting to get to the ranger station while they were still open. We missed them by about 20 minutes.
So instead, we ended up at a campsite right up on the Strait, with great views and put up our tents a few feet from a cliff overlooking the ocean.
Sunset and sunrise treated us well. There was an old WWII bunker and gun placement, which was cool, and our campsite neighbors were all kind and interesting.
The places was crawling with raccoons. We had some fun spotlighting them in our headlamps, giving them voices, and making our neighbor laugh her head off before she finally joined us. Then we pulled out the ukulele until it was a really late 1020pm... as we watched cruise and container ships travel the strait in the dark.
Sunset
Sunrise
A little later it went gold.
We paid a visit to the ranger station, looking for some permits for our final night. The only thing really appealing was not possible with a van, and some access roads were closed or supposed to be pretty beat up. Hurricane Ridge had closed earlier that week for repairs... so on we went into vampire and werewolf country.
It was nice to spend time on the beach and people watch.
Although next time we are getting permits and backpacking on the beach.
A little evaporation mist.
We wound around the coast and sandwiched stops at Hoh and Quinault in between more coastal driving.
We had to wait half an hour to get into Hoh, but that was not bad.
Then we drove to the more touristy, dare I say not as nice parts of the coast, ate an expensive deep-fried fish dinner and found a campsite. We woke up around 5am for the long drive back to Utah. Where we dropped down to Portland and went along the Columbia River gorge.
Sunrise over the misty farms north of Portland was actually quite spectacular, but no photos. Same goes for the gorge, where some portions of the river had hundreds of boats fishing for salmon, and of course the many waterfalls and other sights along the way.
There was a lot of great country, and it was with a bit of longing that we passed a still very smokey Eagle Cap... We stopped into Caldwell ID, in time for a town festival and lunch, and then hit a massively dark thunderstorm around Snowville at sunset. Where we passed a few cars and trucks that had gone off the road.
The only regret was not getting in a second backpack. If I had looked at the weather report after trip 1, we might have just repacked food and gone on the second trip from the same trailhead, for example. Or had some other backups besides Rainier in mind. Circumnavigating the peninsula was fine and beautiful, but I was sad to have missed the solitude of another backpack.
But for sure, I will be back to the PNW. Plus, the Bitterroots moved right up the list, as they looked great in spite of all the smoke. Too many places, so little time.
I know there are not many trip reports on here from Washington, so maybe you all might enjoy some more photos of some of these places.
Plus, I have not posted a report in a while and have enjoyed many of the recent reports, although I am not feeling particularly witty with this one. So if you're bored, just enjoy the pictures.
What we did:
We took the long way up E Idaho from Utah, then across Couer d'Alene and Spokane over to the Cascades.
Once there we would meet up with a friend, backpack, and then I had a night booked at a campsite near Rainier. (please note that Sir Mt Rainier or Sir Tahoma is Sir-Not-Appearing-In-This-Trip-Report...)
The original plan had been to drop down to the Eagle Cap for another backpack.
With fire and smoke in the Eagle Cap,, we ended up ditching the plans for Eagle Cap (Sadly). Even worse with other fires near places we had as Plan B, we had to look for Plan C. We were not satisfied with the options and forecast for Plan C....
So, for many reasons we ended up on the Olympic Peninsula for the second part of the trip.
Planning for this trip was information overload. There were so many places on the list, and there are obviously a lifetime of trails that are still on my list.
There were 3 other trips we routed from the same trailhead as this one...
A few observations:
Wonderfully Steep buttkicker climbs (especially only 3 weeks recovering from Covid)
Rain is wet
Smokey skies suck
Misty mornings, berries from black to blue were wonderful, and so were wonderfully cold swims in lakes and streams
Some trees are really tall, and some deadfall made for fun challenges
Some pinecones are massive and as they fall they just might just miss you by inches
After all that, here are some pictures with limited commentary:
All packed for two separate trips. Separated food and separated clothes.
Food and supplies all taken care of.
All reports showed terrible smoke from Eastern Oregon across Idaho... including a fire right off the scenic byway. Regardless, we went the long way and ditched the freeway at Blackfoot and went across the top of Craters of the Moon and then a byway north.
When we stopped here, my eyes and throat were pretty irritated. The smoke does not look as bad as it felt.
We stopped out front of Chief Joseph Ranch, where there was a hot set and filming in progress. Then we continued on and took a break at Lake Como.
It felt too early to stop, and it was too smokey, so we scratched a few potential campsites off the list, grabbed a lunch/dinner and continued north.
Montana had a little less smoke. Although I had joked with my uncle of showing up in the dark and pitching a tent on his front lawn at Flathead Lake, we did not go that far north and stopped at a nice quiet campsite.
The morning was cold enough for some good mist on the creek.
We found a diner and took our time with breakfast and then hit a few tourist spots to buy some stickers my buddy wanted and then west we went.
By afternoon we had passed out of Idaho into Washington. I think some of the area was beautiful, but it was still smokey and we only stopped at the Columbia to stretch.
We did stop at a couple touristy fruit markets, and then after a quick late lunch, we went up into the Cascades.
We found a campsite for the night, and then went to check out a trailhead and stumbled on what is a well-known set of pools complete with some great rocks to jump off, salmon swimming in the creek, and insta-lamers in bikinis.
We were a little limited on camping, not just because it was a Saturday night, but also because a couple of weeks before this trip a neighbor had backed his jeep into my Tacoma. The Tacoma was still in the body shop, and so we road-tripped in the minivan. This limited us on access during the whole trip.
The next morning, right on time, my friend rolled in.
We dropped the van off at a trailhead and went on to our actual departure trailhead.
For a Sunday morning with the lot only 1/2 full we took time and contemplated the future direction of our lives and our life choices to that point. hahaha
We had two routes planned, and only time for one of them. We chose one, and headed out.
After a good first climb, we arrived at a lake that was green, surrounded by green, reflecting green.
As we neared today's pass, we had this in view and plenty of berries to distract us.
Descending the pass after lunch. During lunch we spent some time talking to those on the PCT who were mostly being forced to change plans because of a fire just north that was growing in size, and fire in the NCNP
Autumn was not in full color, but it was starting.
Beautiful.
We found home for the night, took a few swigs of water, and then off we went for another lake nestled up in a cirque a couple miles away.
While planning it had looked a bit steep to want to take our packs and stay the night, but perhaps we should have. The scramble down with a pack might have sucked.
When we reached the lake, it sprinkled on us a little while.
Panorama with a dozen goats if you know where to look.
I am sure there is a route, just not sure of difficulty over the ridge to the left and to the next day's destination, but we stuck to trails and took the long way.
Dinner was a creamy mushroom pasta that we ate in the dark.
A little rain overnight gave way to partly cloudy, quite smokey.
Smokey and difficult lighting continued through the second day.
More start of autumn colors
This buck had a few does already, and had also paid some blood price for them it looked like. This was only a few feet off trail.
Some patchy sun as we went up and then down again on the PCT.
Some more autumn colors and smoke.
Some of these reminded me of the Barrows, perhaps some Barrow-wights would come out at night?
After a lunch break it was back into the steepest climb of the trip. It seemed like some of the downfall was kept purposely to keep the trail from being a pack trail. Given we had already done mileage and not starting fresh it was a rough climb. We passed one solitary backpacker on the way up, and he was the only person we would see up there. Pretty good for a more popular place.
Almost there.
The destination.
We had our choice of sites and took one with a ton of berries, views and a good place to swim.
I went in almost immediately on arriving and it was real nice.
Smokey.
Sunset with smoke.
Before dawn there was that distinct stillness in the heavy air. In the twilight I slipped out and sat by the lake. Some banks of fog and mist were so dense that I could barely see the water in front of me.
Lovely.
After breakfast and staining our hands blue with berries, we climbed up to a higher lake. A nice climb on steep slickrock-like granite.
The climb was again rewarded. Quite a wonderful highlight.
So many shades of blue.
Excellent as we kept climbing, and some of the clouds parted.
Some nice views on the shoulder. First one looking back where we went over, and the rest looking down into the next canyon over.
This lake though...
At the upper lake the marmots had been quite distressed, constantly on their hind legs and whistling.
We had thought it was just us. (I mean, isn't everything about us?)
After coming down back to the lake we split up. One friend stopped and took a dip, while I found a place to sit and watch the different blues of the lake, and my other friend watched the marmots and pikas.
After a while, I stood up and went back to my one friend. He called and pointed, I only saw a flash of brown tail, but my other friend saw a wolverine that looked at him, before disappearing. After the trip we read a report from a few weeks before where a wolverine and pups had been seen at the lake.
We waited a few minutes, but there was not a second appearance.
Seems a better reason for the more than irritated marmots.
A different lake, a different shade of blue.
Time for another swim.
Late in the afternoon there was a massive boom that came at us from the foot of the lake, ricocheted and thundered by us, then up into the upper bowls and the peak and echoed back. Quite spectacular.
In Utah we had just had a meteor that had caused a sonic boom earlier in the summer, and this was like that, but much louder.
We wondered what it was.
On the way down it happened again, and this time we could see across the valley to see a big puff from an explosion. I suspect dynamite, but I dunno. Trailwork, or it seemed on the map there could be old mine claims.
Either way, the reverberating boom up in the cirque was pretty awesome.
Some cloud drama on the way back down. At least most of the smoke was cleared out.
Sunset at yet another lake. The last night of this backpack.
Pinecones falling from great heights all around us all through the night.
Morning reflections as more of the smoke returned.
Some of the peaks that were covered with clouds on the way down the day before looked good in the morning light.
Forded the creek. The footbridge a little ways down creek was out, but this was more fun anyways.
Some sunlight.
A nice creek that went through a canyon with some nice pools that were really great. Lunchtime.
A bit more autumn color every day. I was sad we were not there for the height of color or especially for Larches, but it also meant there were not many people on the trail.
After a quick shower at my friend's house, we left him behind and drove in the dark to a campground near Rainier.
We slept under some magnificently tall cedars and pines, and then woke up before dawn and drove on up to Sunrise through the mist and clouds. We had some hope, but our hopes were dashed.
Thus, Mt Rainier-not-appearing-in-this-film.
Such a tease.
After being skunked and looking at the forecast for the next few days, we switched gears. There was not a lot of desire in the legs to do some more up and down mileage just to be socked out in clouds or rain turning to snow.
We drove some roads, saw some waterfalls and nice stuff, but then decided we would pivot and head north.
We stopped for some excellent Bibimbap at a Korean restaurant.
Outside in the parking lot I was challenged to a swordfight by a guy in a gladiator helmet. He yelled, "I am Maximus!" at me as we got in the van and drove away. We got about 20 mins away and my friend realized he had left hat, sunglasses and jacket at the restaurant.
When we got back, the gladiator was still there, and so I yelled "I am Sparticus". He came over and challenged me to a sword fight, but I had no sword, and he only had a stick, so we called it a draw and he ran away.
Sad but true.
Then we were off to the north. Without any pre-planning we were shooting to get to the ranger station while they were still open. We missed them by about 20 minutes.
So instead, we ended up at a campsite right up on the Strait, with great views and put up our tents a few feet from a cliff overlooking the ocean.
Sunset and sunrise treated us well. There was an old WWII bunker and gun placement, which was cool, and our campsite neighbors were all kind and interesting.
The places was crawling with raccoons. We had some fun spotlighting them in our headlamps, giving them voices, and making our neighbor laugh her head off before she finally joined us. Then we pulled out the ukulele until it was a really late 1020pm... as we watched cruise and container ships travel the strait in the dark.
Sunset
Sunrise
A little later it went gold.
We paid a visit to the ranger station, looking for some permits for our final night. The only thing really appealing was not possible with a van, and some access roads were closed or supposed to be pretty beat up. Hurricane Ridge had closed earlier that week for repairs... so on we went into vampire and werewolf country.
It was nice to spend time on the beach and people watch.
Although next time we are getting permits and backpacking on the beach.
A little evaporation mist.
We wound around the coast and sandwiched stops at Hoh and Quinault in between more coastal driving.
We had to wait half an hour to get into Hoh, but that was not bad.
Then we drove to the more touristy, dare I say not as nice parts of the coast, ate an expensive deep-fried fish dinner and found a campsite. We woke up around 5am for the long drive back to Utah. Where we dropped down to Portland and went along the Columbia River gorge.
Sunrise over the misty farms north of Portland was actually quite spectacular, but no photos. Same goes for the gorge, where some portions of the river had hundreds of boats fishing for salmon, and of course the many waterfalls and other sights along the way.
There was a lot of great country, and it was with a bit of longing that we passed a still very smokey Eagle Cap... We stopped into Caldwell ID, in time for a town festival and lunch, and then hit a massively dark thunderstorm around Snowville at sunset. Where we passed a few cars and trucks that had gone off the road.
The only regret was not getting in a second backpack. If I had looked at the weather report after trip 1, we might have just repacked food and gone on the second trip from the same trailhead, for example. Or had some other backups besides Rainier in mind. Circumnavigating the peninsula was fine and beautiful, but I was sad to have missed the solitude of another backpack.
But for sure, I will be back to the PNW. Plus, the Bitterroots moved right up the list, as they looked great in spite of all the smoke. Too many places, so little time.
