The area north of Hwy 410 lies just outside the Mt Rainier National Park. It’s a network of interwoven trails allowing you to create your own hike by mixing & matching experiences. I combined a ridge hike through a burnt out section of forest, lunch at Noble Knob, and a side trip to George Lake for a quick swing in the hammock. I had the place pretty much to myself.
I can’t remember how many years this hike has been on my bucket list. It just always seemed so far away that it wasn’t convenient to visit. I happened to be along the Columbia River so I made a three hour detour to swing by Palouse on the way home to western Washington. The wind was a real factor on this day so it limited what I was willing to do. On a calm day, the loop trail would be great fun and not nearly as dangerous.
I’ve had this one on my list for awhile now. I tried hiking it a couple of years ago in the Fall but it was too late in the day and the forest road was closed. Last year in August a fire burned 36,808 acres between Lake Cle Elum and the Teanaway, including the west side of Jolly Mountain. I thought I’d do this one early before something else stopped me.
The goal for the day was to visit Crystal Peak a few miles away, but the National Park road doesn’t open for another month, so I did some quick recalculating and found this hike instead. It was a bit longer than I wanted for the first hike of the season, but I’m glad I put in the extra effort.
I have a goal to get to as many fire lookouts as I can and this one has always seemed so easy that I've pushed it down on the list. I drove the two hours to the trailhead a couple of weeks ago only to be stopped by a couple of nice rangers who told me to turn around because the mountain was in danger of a large nearby fire. Today the fire is mostly out and the trail is back open.
The last time I hiked this trail was in October of 2014. I wanted to see it in the summer to experience the wildflowers, and they did not disappoint. The only downside was the amount of biting insects and the lack of wind to keep them away. Stop for more than a few seconds and you become part of the food chain. Super annoying, but well-worth the price of admission to see this amazing country. This easily ranks as one of the best hikes in the PNW for me.
Deep in the heart of the North Cascades between the US-Canada border and Hwy 542 you will find Yellow Aster Butte. It's known to be a popular location for hikers and backpackers alike and beautiful year-round with sweeping 360° views of Canada to the north and Mt Baker to the south. It's a stunning region protected from development by the North Cascades National Park. You'll find few roads but many trails that weave throughout the park.
This isn't a trail report as much as a ship report since we only saw these from the deck of the cruise ship, but it was so stunning I had to do a report. Glacier Bay National Park covers 3.3 million acres in Southeast Alaska. It's packed full of beautifully rugged mountains, forests, fjords and of course, glaciers. The cruise ship gets you as close as it can and then spins around in circles for a half hour so you can get a good look at everything.
From Skagway you'll need to take the White Pass train to the Laughton Glacier trailhead at mile 14. There's an early train at 7:30am and a later train at 12:30. We took the latter thinking we would have enough time to quickly get to the glacier, spend a bit of time and return before the train came back to pick us up. It turned out that the train was slower than we anticipated getting to the trailhead, so we were moving a pretty good clip up to the glacier, and then ran all the way back. Missing the train would have meant missing the cruise ship, and we didn't want to be "those people".
The Mendenhall Glacier / Nugget Falls trail is located just outside of Juneau, Alaska. It's a very flat, very simple, very crowded trail filled with tourists from the cruise ships. It's totally not my scene, but there was little time to do anything else with the few hours we had in town. The skies above are filled with excursion helicopters and sea planes, and the bay is full of kayak tours. The only option we could see might have been the West Glacier Trail on the other side of the bay, but we could not find anyone to take us there and pick us up.
Someone once said this location was so high that only Angel's could land there. Angel's Landing is a must for any visitor to ZNP. It offer's the quintessential park view as well as offering bragging rights to anyone who dares to ascend the narrow sandstone fin leading to the top. This is not for the faint of heart, so if you don't think you can do it, be smart and stop at the upper staging area.
While not much of a hike, this is the route to follow to reach the entrance to The Narrows which is probably the most well-known hike in the park. Due to high water volume and the risk of a flash flood, The Narrows was closed while we were there, but I wanted to get a feel for it because I will be back!
We happened to visit the park on the annual free admission weekend, so the crowds were pretty large. We knew we wanted to do Angel's Landing, but didn't want to navigate the spine of that trail while dodging tons of people. Instead, we put that off for a mid-week hike and chose one of the more difficult trails instead with the idea that there would be fewer hikers. Observation point is higher than and overlooks Angel's Landing, providing probably the most stunning views in the park. It's a difficult trail with a wide variety of landscapes. If you can do it, it's well worth it.
We spent a few days hiking the main trails in the park and getting a plan put together for a more extensive (prepared) visit next fall. This is an amazing national park with a well-organized system created for the millions of visitors the park welcomes each year. Trams carry you to the trail heads and alleviate the hassle of dealing with traffic and cars. The air is cleaner, the noise is reduced, and the experience is enhanced. You never have to wait more than a couple of minutes for the next tram to arrive. I thought I would hate it, but I loved it. That said, this particular hike is accessed off Hwy 9, through the tunnels in your private vehicle.
I did a day hike up here in May and wanted to get back for an overnight to this amazing location. There's really no easy way to get here. One trail is long and hard. The other trail is shorter and hard. I opted for the long and hard route which is a little safer with a heavy pack. So far this is the hardest hike I have done, but it was worth the struggle. If someone hadn't of stolen my GoPro out of my tent while I was exploring, this would have been a perfect trip.
Two years after Mt St Helens erupted in 1980, the Mount St Helens National Volcanic Monument area was established to protect the surrounding 110k acres and allow the land to recover naturally. One year later visitors were able to drive to Windy Ridge four miles northeast of the crater. It was from this road that I connected to Boundary Trail 1 which traces the monument perimeter leading first to Norway Pass and then on to the Mt Margaret Backcountry area.
I've been coming to the San Juan Islands two hours north of Seattle for the last 30 years and each time we try to do something new. Turtleback Mountain is on Orcas Island and a ferry or small plane is the only feasible way to get there if you don't have your own boat (like me). There are several trailheads with interweaving trails over the mountain. We took the South Trail near Westsound.
Our long-anticipated trip to The Enchantments began in mid-August with an overnight trip to Leanvenworth, WA and some amazing Brats for dinner in town. This was the perfect base for an early start up to Colchuck Lake for our three day adventure that began with the engagement of my youngest daughter at our campsite on the lake. The following day we tackled the intimidating Aasgard Pass to visit the Core Enchantments area and some of the most amazing views in the state.
We have our friend Gary to thank for hosting us on this spectacular backpacking trip. We hiked to Garibaldi Lake north of Vancouver BC last weekend and camped for two nights. The drive to the trailhead alone reveals sites that would have made the trip worthwhile. The hike is 9km in to the lake which is fed by a glacier that dominates the opposite side. The color of the water is almost beyond description and made me feel that I should desaturate the photo so I wouldn't be accused of color-tampering.
