Laurabelle’s Blog

This weekend Jeff and I tried our hike to Sky High Lakes and Summit Lake a second time. I guess the third time will have to be the charm for this one.

We drove up to Yreka on Friday and got to the ranger station in Fort Jones just in time to get our campfire permit for the year. The lady who issued our permit mentioned that there might be snow on the trail, but we weren't sure her information was accurate or relevant to us (she was reporting information given by rangers and didn't seem familiar with the trail herself). We decided to proceed with the hike regardless.

We spent the night in a motel and got on the trail by about 9am on Saturday morning.

The trail was lovely and felt easier than it had last year, both because the temperature was more comfortable and because Jeff had new boots (and therefore complained less). The streams were deeper than last year but still passable; we encountered a few snow patches at medium elevations but nothing to worry about.

Friday was a holiday at Jeff’s work, so I took a day off too, and we made a day trip to Yosemite National Park.

The day commenced at 3:30am, and we were on the road by 4:40am. The highways were empty that early in the morning, so we made good time and reached the trailhead shortly after 8am. It isn’t much of a trailhead, just a little gravel parking lot with a couple of road signs that there’s a trail somewhere around. It was 8:30am when we hit the trail.

The guidebook described the first half-mile as punishing, but we found it to be nothing of the sort (possibly because it was still early and the air chilly). Before we entered trees, the top of the hill featured lovely views of Yosemite Valley, including El Capitan and Yosemite Falls.

Remember how good Jeff and I are about misjudging our hikes? (Witness Lena Lake, Mount Rainier, and Annette Lake.) We did it again—but I’ll get to that later.

This weekend’s hike was in Olympic National Park, just south of Port Angeles. There, three connecting trails form a loop that winds up and over mountain ridges for most of its length, affording spectacular views to the north, east, and south. The plan was as follows:

• Saturday: Heart of the Hills to Heather Park (4 miles, steady ascent, ~3500 feet elevation gain)
• Sunday: Heather Park to Lake Angeles along the Klahhane Ridge (~4.5 miles, up and down over the ridge with a net descent to the lake)
• Monday: Lake Angeles back down to Heart of the Hills (~3.5 miles, gently downhill)

Unfortunately I can’t point you at a map, but I had one, and it sure seemed like a good plan. We could have gone around the loop in the other direction, but I figured that it would be better to get the worst over on the first day. That way, the second and third days would be relatively easy.

The catch is that maps don’t tell you everything. Neither do guide books.

It seems that Jeff and I have gotten pretty good at miscalculating the weather for our hikes. We didn’t think it was going to rain when we went to Lower Lena Lake, and we didn’t think it was going to be that snowy or rainy at Mount Rainier either. The same problems plagued our hike to Annette Lake on Saturday.

The rain wasn’t such a problem, particularly since we were well-prepared this time and were not staying overnight. The problem was that although Jeff thought it would be a nice low-altitude hike, there turned out to be a lot of snow on the trail. That made the hike a lot harder and a fair bit less pleasant for me, although we got a couple of



gorgeous views once the rain let up and the mist cleared away a little bit. (The thumbnail to the side links to Flickr, where I’ve uploaded a 1024×768 image (401Kb) that I think would be fantastic as a desktop background. Feel free to download it for personal use only.)

Annette Lake is a charming little mountain lake, fed by a small waterfall. At this time of year it was perfectly still, frozen over with a film of ice and snow. All the same, Jeff and I don’t think we’ll ever go back there. The trail is a very popular one, too popular for our taste, especially since it’s right next to I-90. Although it’s nice that the trailhead is so accessible, we could hear the highway almost all the way to the lake. There weren’t many people on the trail that day, but we did run across a couple of moron mountain-bikers plowing uphill through the snow, even though that part of the trail was off-limits to bicycles. (There are reasons for that, some of which the bikers were learning the hard way.)

On the bright side, I discovered that my regimen of physical exercise has been paying off. My heart went thunka-thunka-thunka instead of pitter-pat, and I didn’t have to stop so often on the uphill climb, at least not until we got into the snow. It was really the packed-down, slippery snow that strained my feet, ankles, and knees by constantly throwing me off-balance. Other than that, I didn’t do too badly.

Next month: Heather Park and Lake Angeles trails in Olympic National Park! The two trails connect and together form a nice 12-mile loop.

This weekend Jeff and I hiked a section of the Wonderland Trail at Mount Rainier. The Wonderland Trail winds a 93-mile circle around Mount Rainier, and some day (maybe soon) I hope to do the whole thing. (But not yet!)

This time we planned to start from Longmire and hike northwest along the trail with Mirror Lakes as our eventual goal. We were to spend the first night at Pyramid Creek, then hike up to Mirror Lakes the second day and come back down to spend the night at Devils Dream. On the third day we would hike back out. We thought it was a pretty good, conservative plan. It’s only about 3.5 miles from Longmire to Pyramid Creek and 2.2 from there to Devils Dream. Mirror Lakes are another couple of miles beyond Devils Dream (but they’re relatively level miles—relatively).

That was the theory, anyway. As we all know, practice is always its own creature.

You can find our proposed route on the Mount Rainier National Park Trails Map (look toward the lower left-hand corner). Also see another hiker’s description of traveling essentially the same section of trail. Finally, the Seattle Times has a nice set of pages about the Wonderland Trail.

It’s snowing so much today that the steeper hills are practically impassable, and buses are slipping even on relatively mild hills like University Way. It’s complete craziness! The University is still open, but classes were cancelled as of 12:30 today. Guess when my first class was supposed to start. *smirk*

Unfortunately I was already at the University when I found that out, since I had come early in order to buy textbooks before the lunchtime rush, and Jeff has work instead of class and thus didn’t get off. That bites, because the only thing that would make the slog home bearable is his company. So I’m sitting in the computer lab in Mary Gates, waiting for him to—

—Wait, never mind, he just walked in. He couldn’t find his boss, so we’re going home. Rock!

P.S. It’s almost 22:00 right now, and it’s raining, and the water appears to be freezing on top of the snow. Kathy told me not to worry about coming in tomorrow if the weather’s bad (yay!), but Jeff might have class. Even if he does, he might not go in. It’s going to be wretched and dangerous out there tomorrow.

Ever since I came back to Seattle last Tuesday, the temperature has been around freezing. Tuesday night there was enough snow to accumulate on the ground; this morning there’s no snow yet, but the weather gurus are predicting up to 4 inches of snow tonight and tomorrow morning. Yikes! Jeff and I were planning on jogging tomorrow, but I think that in light of the circumstances, perhaps we won’t.