A flowery day along Ingalls Creek

I used to make an annual May trip to hike the Ingalls Creek Trail. I remember the wildflowers to be one of the best shows I could find in the Cascades early in the year. As the long wilderness valley climbs from 2000' toward 4000' it allows you to see flowers of all seasons. When balsamroot and lupines are blooming in late May at the lower elevations, you reach far into the valley and find Glacier Lilies, Western Trillium, and many other early blooming species where spring is just waking up. And all of this along the thundering roar of Ingalls Creek which drains massive mountain ranges on both the north and south sides. Birds fill the trees along the valley bottom, but you can't hear them - the creek is too loud! But pausing and watching for a moment reveals all of the grosbeaks, tanagers, chickadees, and the list goes on. But the real show is at your feet.

(above: Glacier lily; flowering Kinnickinick; Hooker fairy-bells; Fern-leaf desert parsley; False Solomon seal)

For whatever reason, I had not hiked this trail for likely 12-13 years after having hiked it annually for at least five years in a row. A recent return visit, hiking 5+ miles up the valley, has me now knowing I'll never let that happen again! What a show...flowering serviceberry and chokecherry bushes/trees, deerbrush ready to blow out its fragrant flowers, lupines, red and yellow paintbrush (yellow ones I sure don't see very often around here), arrowleaf balsamroot, prairie-star flower, hooker's fairy bells, calypso orchids, larkspur, western trillium, glacier lilies, false solomon seal, vanilla leaf, three species of desert parsley including lovely areas of fern-leaf desert parsley, yellow violets, and more...all blooming at once! It was a fiesta of color and fragrance. Oh, and a brief hailshower, some rain, and one lovely female common merganser flying up the creek, all made for a wonderful day with a friend.

(above: Ballhead waterleaf; Ingalls Creek at creek-side and a fun rock art by previous bored hikers :) )

It has been a long cold spring, but even nature will push through and let spring and summer get here eventually!

There's moss in that there forest...and waterfalls...and good friends

What a joy it was recently the past few days to escape for a much needed mental break from stressful recent times and not only get outdoors, but have it turn out to be a new trail for me which was one of the best new additions for me in some time, all while shared with great friends. Karen Sykes, Bob, and myself headed SE down SR-410 from Enumclaw into the White River Valley and thoroughly enjoyed hours of hiking up the Palisades Trail. Moss covering every rock, maple tree branch, even cliffs covered with moss alongside of waterfalls. Huge old growth trees, calypso orchids growing out of the forest floor moss, western trilliums, yellow violets, spooky views from atop the palisade cliffs,

even getting into a dusting of snow still on the ground once above 4000' elevation.

This area is such prime early season hiking as it never has as much snow as the areas in the Central Cascades, and the southern exposure always melts the snowpack off sooner. Karen, Bob, and myself shared hours of stories and ideas all while we strolled the 9 miles of hiking we did and dozens of photos we took. What a great day! A sure thing bet this trail is in the next edition of the Day Hiking books as well as other projects I'm working on.

Thanks for a great day in the mountains, Karen & Bob!

Peaceful wanderings in the Pack Forest

A very wet past 72 hours got me antsy to go hike more new areas for future projects and get a good fix of waterfall hunting in the meantime. The Pack Forest lands south of Eatonville offer a wonderful opportunity for peaceful lonely roaming and there are many trails and roads to choose from. With the dark "dripping" clouds hanging on tight to the foothills my friend and I decided to leave places like Hugo Peak for a second visit in coming weeks, thus we opted to roam northward and enjoy the waterfalls along a stunning gorge where the Little Mashel River flows toward Eatonville where it joins the Mashel River.

What a stellar day of moss and water! The heavy rains of the previous 3 days had the river flowing at a very strong level causing numerous other smaller waterfalls to be cascading over the cliffs than you might normally see, I would have to assume. The overcast light, fresh green moss and leaves coming out, all made for a very lush peaceful setting. And very muddy to slop around in - I think we almost filled our boots with mud on a few occasions as we hiked down toward Lower Mashel Falls!

Return visit will have to happen to fully appreciate roaming the highlands up around Hugo Peak and the Trail of Giants. Western Trillium was starting to bloom in force, Red-flowering Current was blooming near the river, and water was the enjoyment for the day to go along with wonderful company of a good friend. Thanks Michael.

Fuller Mountain - a mossy kind of trail overlooked by most

Yesterday dawned as a day due to be bright, sunny, and lacking rain. Like many days of this past winter! So having a chance to fit in a day on the trail to get to a needed area for future projects I loaded my gear, cameras, and border collie to enjoy a quick 3+ hour hike up Fuller Mountain in the Snoqualmie Forest lands of Hancock Timber NE of the Snoqualmie Valley.

We crossed Ten Creek just fine on the footlog that still stands after all these years. Funny now how my dog runs across it and even I have to take it easy - silly dog! She is the smartest Bauer family member and she knows it. The trail isn't as "faint" as I remember it to be, but still in 2 rocky scree crossings the trail is basically "lost" and you just have to be smart about knowing where it would come out on the other side - not a lot of places to look to find it if you are "lost" as the trail is on a steep mountainside! The mossy viewpoint at the summit area (not the actual summit but with in 5' elevation of being the top) was a great lunch, and then my wonder dog hiker buddy and me headed back out. Much to do - lunch, yard, kids, and Little League!

A great day....

Skookum Flat Trail hiking - a great day on the trail with my dog

Yesterday brought nearly 70* temperatures to some western lowland locations and even at 2000' elevation SE of Enumclaw, the warm winds saw me hiking a stellar day in nearly 60* weather. A good portion of the day was spent along the Skookum Flats Trail that runs along the White River, and what a great day to enjoy being out sharing fresh air with my border collie!

Green mossy carpets covering the damp forest floor and actual sandy beaches down along the White River.

The river is so low this winter it was like a summer stroll to the river! Even my wonder mutt seemed to take notice of the massive groves of huge old growth trees.

Mixing in a very steep side scramble up to the base of Skookum Falls where it comes down hundreds of feet where Skookum Creek dumps off of the plateau above, and we had yet another memorable day together in the outdoors. She was content to relax while I drove around locating a few other trailheads that I need to return to this spring, and she never complained about my driving all day!

Thanks for the great day yesterday pooch - we'll get out again next week!

Have a smile-filled day

Everyone knows I love the outdoors. I love hiking, I like just feeling good about the world, and there is always a lot of good around us to celebrate what is right in this world. It is a very cold morning right now outside as the clear sky starts to get light in the east this early. With our mild El Nino winter, it is hard to imagine that being down in the mid-20s right now is the most cold night we've had in 2010 so far! Now that is a mild winter! The bright clear morning however...now that is a celebration to kick off another great day. Celebrate what is right in the world around you, and you can start with a smile!
(photo: "Smiling" log along the Greg Ball Trail hiking up toward Wallace Lake)

What to do when the to-do list is too overdone? Go for a hike on the Snoqulamie Valley Trail!

So, I'm swamped with things that I need to get done. Between having been preparing for a trip, been on the trip, returned to 2+ weeks of sickness in the family, and being stressed and tired from everything listed, I have seen every part of my photography as well as personal life fall behind schedule! People still waiting to see images from me, broken things needing attention, people needing to be taken here and there. I simply don't know where to start, so today I dove right in and did something that would help me the most: I called my border collie to go for a ride, and we went for a short hike!

The calm air before the incoming storm, yellow leaves from the cottonwoods and a few maples littered the ground, and we had a few good miles to ourselves both on the Snoqualmie Valley Trail and on side-trails off it that head up into the Hancock Tree Farm (aka Snoqualmie Tree Farm, aka old Weyerhaeuser Lands). I returned refreshed, relaxed, and ready to actually start making a few of the 1001 phone calls to clients, presentation arrangements, making appointments for doctors and dentist visits, and other joys of normal life. The dog? She returned smiling as she fell asleep for a nap...until I started the tractor to work, when she had to thus work then again too!

Glowing gold of alpine larch trees

This time of year an annual march to the high country by avid hikers is going at a frantic pace. Larch tree lovers are roaming for a fix of the golden glow of fall larch trees everywhere and the current nice weather has them really in a fit over where to go this coming weekend! Sad to say, most alpine larch trees are turning color later than the typical first week or two of October this year and what I have seen shows that we are a good week away from the prime showing of these magical golden autumn trees. But with the weather forecast turning wet and gray next week I went on with a personal wish to enjoy the hike to Ingalls Lake yesterday and was a little bit surprised and lucky! I expected mostly green needle larch trees but found that a few areas are quite nice if you look hard enough.

A great day to enjoy not only good company of a friend, golden larch trees trying to encourage the masses of other larch trees to hurry up and give up the green color, but also seeing well over 50 wild turkeys driving to/from the trailhead, three coyotes, and then two mountain goats in Headlight Basin before Ingalls Lake! See? If Alan leaves his big lens at home to save weight, the wildlife will come!

More of the same - great peak tagging in the South-Central Cascades!

Back at it again with Dennis! Just a few days after our last trip we headed back to the exact same region SE of Greenwater to explore not two, but this time three peaks up the FR 70 territory! Three great hikes, one stellar fall hiking day in the warm sun while the lowlands were socked in under the marine layer of fog/clouds that we could see all day. Raptors soared past us on the summit of Colquhoun Peak at this former lookout site.

We enjoyed hitting the PCT a mile high at 5220’ Windy Gap and zip south, around, and then up Pyramid Peak where the spectacular rocky summit area surprised and delighted us.

Then we cruised more forest service roads to a ridge we eyeballed early in the morning from Colquhoun which we declared needed roaming. Soon we found ourselves in alpine delight with late afternoon light as we strolled and grunted along Sawmill Ridge! Is there anything wrong with a nap at 4:00pm? I should say not, and to that, what another great day it was in the South-Central Cascades!

George, Noble, and Kelly

I think after the weather we had on Monday hiking in the area NE of Mount Rainier, I'm thinking we will have a wonderful fall of weather before El Nino kicks in for a great winter of hiking! The day couldn't have been any more perfect - sunny and "hot" but not overly warm and a nice breeze. No bugs either now that they have had a few bad bouts of weather to fight.

I headed back out with good friend Dennis as we explored two areas off of FR 70 just south of Greenwater east of SR 410. First up was a backdoor way in to the Noble Knob area yielding the most amazing huckleberry feasting I’ve ever seen! Then we hiked around George Lake, up and over Noble Knob to complete a loop back. Still having a good part of the afternoon left we headed across the valley to zip up to check on the progress with the Kelly Butte lookout restoration. Another grand 3.5 mile hike with fall colors, light winds, and views galore!

I think it’s time to head out again tomorrow – likely more under appreciated peaks in this same FR 70 area. Not only has this all been a lot of fun, but it is all great new data and photographs for me to use in upcoming future new editions of the Day Hiking books.

Might it be autumn yet?

Maybe by looking at the plant life in the mountains you won't quite yet think fall is in full swing. Sure, there are some colors starting to show as vine maples are red in a few places, huckleberries are barely starting to turn crimson but for the highest elevations where vivid red is already happening. But the wildlife is not waiting for some weatherman to indicate to them things are changing – they are busy doing their thing! Wait at most any ridge along the Cascade Crest east slopes and you’ll see numerous raptors soaring over them in their migration southward (turkey vultures, many hawk species, etc…). And as the photo shows, hiking virtually any trail will show signs of the Douglas Squirrel busy dropping the huge fir cones to the ground to then later scurry down to get the seeds out of. A hike into the Alpine Lakes Wilderness to Melakwa Lake yesterday brought me to this lovely cone, and while looking at it two other cones came crashing down from high in the trees above me – bombs away and watch out!

What do you call a trail with a view of Mount Rainier?

Rainier View I suppose? Well this "original" name is indeed the official trail name of the trail leading S/SW from high up at Corral Pass. I headed up the crazily steep and rough FR 7174 the six miles to Corral Pass as I have always wanted to get up close to Castle Mountain, what is beyond the "Rainier View" part of this trail where everyone who might hike here mainly goes. A beautiful Sunday and only 2-3 other small groups were seen while the parking area just 0.1 mile back down the road for Noble Knob? Packed! That makes sense as that area is also popular with the mountain bike groups. Why not on this glorious smooth easy trail? Well, that's because you enter the Norse Peak Wilderness in just 1/4 mile from the trailhead. This area also offers a great one-way hike opportunity to hike down the Greenwater Trail to Hidden Lake, Echo Lake, and out past the Greenwater Lakes area. Today however I enjoyed going about 1.2 miles beyond the viewing area people lunch at and got up on Castle Mountain as far as I was comfortable to scramble. Well now, the "view" from here was 250% more spectacular than down lower even! I particularly enjoyed the view east at Ravens Roost and that area of the Little Naches River region. You could see the Stuart Range and the other Central Cascades like Mount Daniel just fine as well.

Boy, it looked like a looonnnggg ways down to the White River below me :) A great new hike for the next editions of the Day Hiking books coming eventually!