Hike of the Week

Friday, July 23, 2010

Common Wealth Basin

I was originally going to hike up to Annette Lake, but when I got there at 10:00, the parking lot was already full. so, I decided to do some cross country up into common Wealth Basin. My plan was to photograph the light reflecting off of common wealth creek. I was able to get some nice green

and blue reflections

And I continued my journey of learning the name of a new flower every week. Except for this one which doesn’t seem to be in my book.

But I did find Canadian dogwood

And I was able to identify the wild life that I saw. This is a fish

It was a most pleasant hike, but I am still concerned that I continually run into flowers that are not in my the “150 most common flowers of the cascades” book. I must be a most un-common hiker.

Photos of Common Wealth Basin

Snow Lake

I’ve been waiting for the snow to clear at the ever so appropriately named Snow Lake so I could hike there. I arrived at the parking lot and was about the two hundredth car there and that was on a Thursday.

But because of the snow on the trail and steep drop offs, I decided not to hike down. On my way out, I ran into mountain search and rescue who were coming up to help some people who disagreed with my assessment. So I worked my way back cross country, still running into a lot of snow, but not the steep dangerous kind. Here is a waterfall where I have pictures of friends and family cooling off on a warm summer day, but that is when there is no snow and a lot less water.

But since there was all of that snow, there were also some great waterfalls. I counted seven coming down the cliffs just above source lake. You can also cool off by standing at the base of a waterfall and looking up to photograph it, but be very selective in the water falls that you choose.

Looking out over the Alpental Valley, the water falls are at my back, you can see Adam’s condominium. It is the white dot in the center of the picture.

And I am constantly amazed that as soon as the snow gives an inch, the flowers start colonizing.

Pictures of Snow lake hike

Thursday, July 15, 2010

Hiking with Rich and Mary

Rich, Mary and I, though went hiking up Kachess Ridge. It was a sunny day though Rich said it was just like a lovely winter day in Arizona.

The stonecrop was in bloom

and it was a great hike along Silver Creek. There were waterfalls, lookouts with views where we ate out lunch and beautiful meadows.

It was a beautiful day for a pleasant stroll through the woods, with a stream to cool your feet off at the end.

Pictures of Kachess ridge Hike

Mason Lake

I’m a little behind on my postings. Last week I headed up to Mason Lake and it was so clear that you could see the Olympics. This view is looking out along the south fork of the Snoqualmie River, I-90 to the rest of you,

Even Mt Rainier poked its head above the lower peaks.

The bear grass was out, but as you can see, it is a steep trail up to Bandera Peak.

But eventually I reached Mason Lake. It was beautiful and for this time of the year, there were amazingly few bugs.

I spent about an hour setting here and relaxing and then headed to Island Lake, but I ran into snow before I got there and stopped and headed back home. It was a a beautiful day and a cool hike in the shade. Of course it was kind of hot in the open slopes with the bear grass, but there were a lot of places along the trail to relax.

Pictures of hike

Friday, June 25, 2010

Kachess Ridge

Went back to Kachess Ridge to see if the snow has melted out. Jim joined me which makes the hike a lot more pleasant. The day was beautiful with blue skies and a pleasant temperature in the low 70’s. The trail itself goes up very steeply, but it is mostly in the shade and usually has a cool breeze coming up from the creek. There is a trail/scramble off of the main trail to the top of the ridge where an aircraft beacon used to be located. Beacons were put on several of the peaks in the Cascades to guide mail planes at night during the 1930’s. Once we broke out of the trees there was a great hike along the ridge with views down to Kachess lake and over to Rainier. n

On the way up, we scrambled to a ridge with with a great garden of Spreading Stonecrop. It’s one of the best flowers I’ve seen grow from a pile of rocks.

And we had a pleasant time setting on the mossy banks of silver creek.

Photos of kachess Ridge

Lake 22

It is not the prettiest name for a lake and on Thursday, it may have been the only place in the state that wasn’t sunny, but I went hiking there anyway. The hike is easy and there is lots to see, but I would have really liked to have had some sunshine. I don’t think I have ever gone hiking on the mountain loop highway and had sunshine. But it is one of the few lakes in the world that is accessible and in its natural state. It was set aside as a Natural Research Area in 1947 to study the effects on water, land and wild life when it is left unmanaged and undeveloped. The entire trail is in old growth timber. It is well known for its Western Red Cedar

It has weeping walls where plants grow on a vertical garden

and of course there is a lake.

Creek 22 flows from the lake and has at least six waterfalls that are easily accessible

And all of this is there because of the abundant rain.

Photos of Lake 22

Thursday, June 10, 2010

Back to LT Murray

It is my second hike in a row where it was sunny and the temperature was in the high comfortable. I was up on this hike about three weeks ago, but the flowers were just starting to come out. I returned to see them and succeeded admirably.

There was a rattlesnake across my path, but no mosquitoes. The snake and I worked out an agreement where by he would disappear into the grass and I wouldn’t following trying to take pictures. I think it worked out to the benefit of us both.

I stopped counting the variety of flowers at about forty, but there were plenty more if you include the flowering bushes. This is a great hike because of the wide range of terrain in a short hike. There are great grass fields,