August outdoor adventures

Lenticular clouds near Mount Rainier

August was jam-packed with outdoor adventures - two backpacking trips, some day paddles, day hikes, lots of fun work outside, visiting friends, and mushrooms. Life doesn't get much better than that right?

 Backpacking in North Cascades National Recreation Area along Ross Lake with Nickie and Carolé.

 Cascades from our camp on Ross Lake

 Wine, chocolate, and good friends

We were treated to a visit from our friend Gretchen in August - last sighted at our wedding in 2009! Ralph came to see Gretchen too and fun was had by all. When friends of yours, like Gretchen, live in the U.K. you have to take every second with them you can grab. We also got to meet her kiddos and we collectively discussed ways to see her husband and our friend, Matt, again. Someday I guess we will have to take a trip to the U.K. eh?

Jay's new kayak, named Iridaea after a lovely red algae, was ready for a real paddle after we bought her. We were busy the next several weekends so we decided to paddle out after work to Burrows Island and the lighthouse for dinner. The light was perfect, the company was perfect, the kayaks were perfect, and the food and wine were perfect. It was a ridiculous night.

 Alaria and Burrows Light

 Jay paddling back to Skyline Marina with Mt. Baker in alpenglow.

It took some work and some luck, but we (J&J and Nickie and Carolé) scored on an overnight backpacking permit in Mount Rainier National Park on the Spray Park Loop trail. Our drive to the park was awesome with big lenticular clouds pouring off the mountain (first photo of this blog) but by the time we climbed to the 6,300 ft. high point on the trail, Rainier was hiding. We still, as you can see, had some fun along the way even though it was freezing (glad we know how to dress appropriately!).

 At the high point on the trail, right on the flanks of Rainier, with my love looking "down" on the Cascades.

 Heading down to Seattle Park

 Nickie, Jay, and Carolé in Seattle Park watching for that mountain to appear. 

There it is! Yes!! After these clouds cleared, the views kept getting better and better. The huckleberries did too!

Descending into the huckleberries and not sure if I should eat every berry in sight or watch Rainier and the lenticular clouds pouring off that majestic mountain. 

The next morning we kept losing all the elevation we gained (and lost) yesterday. I knew we had a big elevation gain push at the end of the day when I would want a light pack, but then we found this mushroom. Into my pack it went for a 10 mile wander back to the car.

Yum.

 Crossing a bridge along the Carbon River

 The Carbon Glacier

What four people look like after 3,000 ft. in elevation gain in 1.5 miles.

This beauty was treated well back home. 

All August photos can be found here:https://goo.gl/photos/4WK3aZCiyZH3jefU7

Hiking to American Lake in some good ol' smoke

After leaving NY and MA we came back to a week of work and then another weekend of play. The forecast was great - warm and sunny with clear blue skies. Sure sounded like we should head to some big volcanoes! So Nickie, Carolé, Jay, and I decided to hike in the Okanogan Wenatchee National Forest just outside of Mount Rainier National Park (we wanted to have their dog Beebee join us, hence no hikes in the park). We read about a trail to a lovely alpine lake called American Lake and we hit the road! 

We spent Friday night at their place near Seattle and woke in the morning to a very hazy sky. It was supposed to be clear! As we drove closer and closer to the trailhead, we concluded correctly that the winds had shifted and we were going to spend the weekend hiking in the smoke from the wildfires that were raging around WA and OR. We checked with the rangers and made sure there were no active fires near our planned hike and decided to go for it! It was like hiking through a campfire - it smelled lovely and only made me cough a few times.

But the smoke totally obscured our view of Rainier. If you read my blog a bit, you know that Nickie and Carolé just moved to the USA from South Africa (after living in Cape Town for 12 years). This was their first time near Mt. Rainier and I was stoked to see their reaction when they saw that volcano up close and personal for the first time. Here is the view of Mt. Rainier! Amazing! Note the sarcasm. No jaw dropping experience for us....but it was still an awesome hike.

 
I found this satellite image that was taken over WA on the weekend we were hiking - you can easily see the Olympic Peninsula on the top left corner and you can actually see the white dot of Mt. Rainier (why couldn't we see it on the ground!??). The smoke covers almost all of Puget Sound and there is a little gap over the Cascades. That is misleading, because we were in the middle of the Cascades and we couldn't see very well at all. But this image was taken on Saturday when the smoke wasn't too bad - it actually got worse on Sunday when we hiked back out.

Jay and Nickie try to hitch a ride out of the smoke??

 Awesome camp near the lake

 American Lake through the haze

 Beebee and I went for a swim! 

What would a hike be without some downtime by a lake with good food, good friends, and a bottle of wine?

 We even got to watch two female common goldeneyes fluff their feathers

Serious smoke on the hike out

 Goofballs.

No hike is complete without a beer at the end of the day! 

All August photos are here, hike photos are at the end of the album: https://picasaweb.google.com/111221596171793333099/August2015?authuser=0&authkey=Gv1sRgCOTBn-WKoMmvcA&feat=directlink

Norse Peak Wilderness

First campsite at Goat Lake (look for the tent to the far right)

Wayyyyyy back in September we headed out on a long weekend backpacking trip to celebrate my birthday and our anniversary. Jay found a nice loop hike in the Norse Peak Wilderness that promised few people, mountain goats, and loads of views of big volcanoes. Awesome! The goats delivered for us! We saw so many of them on this trip - plus loads of elk bugling and bear sign. We hiked up a million switchbacks and then back down again to camp the first night at Goat Lake. Reports were flying that the northern lights had potential to make it south to WA that evening. I was so excited about this possibility that I got no sleep at all...and for no reason. =( We got out of the tent in the middle of the night to check the clear, starry, sky for the lights with no luck. Even though I knew there were no lights, I was still too excited to fall back asleep. Man. I was tired the next day as a result!

 The hike out from Goat Lake was beautiful and chilly!

It would have been sweet if we had made it to Basin Lake to camp on the first night - just look at this place! Alas, the lake was too far for us to reach with the late start we got on Friday and it was too close for us to stop at on Saturday. So we simply enjoyed the amazing view of the emerald water and all the goats on the hill above the lake.

 Tons of goats! 

The spot where we planned on getting water was already occupied by a zillion tadpoles - a delight for these nerdy biologists. After walking around a bit more we found a non-tadpole-ish source for our drinking water and sat down for a tasty lunch in the hot sun. 

It was mid-September but the huckleberries were already changing color in the Norse Peak Wilderness. I had been hoping to pick lots of huckleberries, but they were totally done. This was the only bummer of the trip.

We hiked along the Pacific Crest Trail (PCT) in the morning, then headed off of it for the afternoon to head south to Crown Point and finally picked the PCT up again to head north on our loop. The big northern turn onto the PCT slammed us right into this awesome view of Mt. Rainier.

Pacific Crest Trail - Norse Peak Wilderness

View from Camp Two of Rainier

This was a horrible place to camp. Horrible. We were surrounded by horny elk bugling in the morning and the sun was far too bright on that ugly volcano right by our tent. Don't ever come here.

Within our view of Rainier was a view of Crystal Mountain Ski Resort - you can see a tiny building to the left side of the image. I can't believe we haven't been skiing there yet. Jay and I need to go and fix this problem on a clear day so Rainier can be our ski buddy.

 On our third day we climbed up to Norse Peak for the best views of the entire trip! 

The views included Mt. Adams (in this shot), Mount Rainier, and Mt. Baker far off in the north. We could also see the Enchantment Range and the craggy North Cascades. A Cooper's hawk flew overhead. A pika made that cute shrieky sound. And I was very happy.

Pika doing that cute pika thang. I seriously love these little mammals.

https://picasaweb.google.com/111221596171793333099/September2014?authkey=Gv1sRgCLXbr83ct9S4KQ