Trail Maniacs

Sun 2/8 – Mt Si, first time this year

David — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 06:32:59 +0000

I’m too greedy to actually buy a full day pass for just mediocre snow and clouds, besides I’m too impatient to get in waiting lines to ski on weekends.
To up the ante a bit, I picked Mt Si. Nice and balmy February hike (no wonder there’s not much snow). For teasers, the last half mile had some snow/ice cover. View was soso, high cloud ceiling with some sun spots. Warmed up on good hot Assam tea (complete with sugar and milk) before heading down. Enjoyed the company and chat with Jim (a local hiker I met on the way up) for most of the descent.
Sorry, no pics, light wasn’t great, plus the camera battery was almost discharged.

Besides the overdue physical excercise, I now realize how therapeutical those hikes can be, a welcome stress relief from helping Lisa with her battle with cancer.

Stats:

Distance:	8mi / 13km roundtrip
Elevation gain:	3400ft / 1020m
High point:	3980ft / 1194m
Hiking time:	2:05 up, 1:20 down
Weather:	mostly cloudy, 40 at TH

Hikers:
David

Tagged: Hiking, Mt Si

Sun 2/1 West Tiger 3 – starting the new season

David — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 03:08:58 +0000

Snow is getting rare again, I’ve been getting lazy: time to restart my hiking again to get some much needed exercise again. No big effort to get going, that’s what Tiger mountain is really good for. And for a Sunday, the trail was not as crowded that I was afraid it would be.

Stats:

Distance:	6mi / 9.6km roundtrip
Elevation gain:	2170ft / 650m
High point:	2522ft / 757m
Hiking time:	65min up, 45min down
Weather:	cloudy, 40 at TH

Hikers:
David

Tagged: Hiking, Tiger Mtn

Sat/Sun 8/23-24 Recon to Three Fingers Lookout

David — Mon, 25 Aug 2008 02:54:21 +0000

Siew Moi, Norm and I volunteered for a reconnaissance tour up to Three Fingers Lookout to assess snow damage it has sustained from last winter. This September, Everett Mountaineers will organize a work party to repair and maintain the lookout.

The turn from Mountain Loop highway to FS road #41 is a bit tricky to find, look for a left turn next to a electric line post with a large antenna atop of it. On the drive up the partially rough forest road we surprised a young pair of Black bear cubs crossing the road.
The hike to TFL is a bit longer right now as the forest road is blocked by a mudslide about 1.5mi before the trailhead. From the trail head of trail #641, the tread is a bit rough, plenty of roots and boulders, with some water running through the trail. We passed Saddle Lake which is pretty but currently quite inhospitable due to plenty of bugs. Shortly before Goat Flat, a Black bear mother and her 2 cubs were foraging a couple hundred yards from the trail. Eventually they picked up our scent and trolled their way.
After lunch at Goat Flat, we traversed along the southern flank to make our way into the basin leading up to Tin Can Gap. Crossing snow fields and following steep switchbacks we reached Tin Can Gap.
The last 1+ miles from Tin Can Gap to the lookout are more technical, with either rock climbing in the slightly mossy moats or traversing over steep snow fields. In a couple of weeks, the regular trail should be free of snow again, making this passage easier.
The final ascend to the lookout includes a straight up and reasonable snowfield (its top snow was also our closest water source), finished with a little scramble and a final 100ft climb up 3 ladders and installed ropes. The lookout is precariously and smugly placed right on top of one of the 3 fingers, with only little space to spare on 2 sides of it and vertical drops on its E and W sides. But the view from there is truly amazing, feels like top of the world!
We missed out on a colorful sunset, as the clouds over the Olympics closed in too much and covered up much of the sun. But the sunrise the next morning compensated: all fiery colors and a dramatic setting with fast moving clouds. We finished our damage assessment of the lookout and started our descend in a strong and gusty wind. The top snowfield cheated me out of glissading, the snow had gotten hard again over night and didn’t allow me to “ski” down.
On the crossing of the final snow field back to Tin Can Gap, it happened: even though I was properly geared up with my crampons and axe, while taking one more step, the ice under my stationary foot gave way and I slipped. The snow was too hard and rippled, so my ice axe wouldn’t dig in and I couldn’t arrest my fall down the ~40 degree steep ice field. I didn’t dare to fully dig in my crampons during my slide as I didn’t want to topple over and go down head first. So all I could do during my ~150ft slide is to keep myself feet-down first and brace for the impact on the rock band below (and no, my life did not flash past my eyes). On impact, my legs took up most of the fall energy, I bounced off the rock and ended up on my backpack in the moat. A bit shaken, I peeled myself off my pack and emerged out of the moat to wave my by now alarmed trail buddies atop that I’m fine. I collected my spilled gear, put on the one crampon that ripped of my boot, took a couple of deep breaths and started my climb back up the ice field. I progessed slowly, carefully kicking my way back up the ice, didn’t want to dare my fate twice. Overall I ended up lucky, just a couple shallow cuts on hands and legs, bruised shoulder and arm and a swollen knee. I was still able to hike out the remaining ~7miles out to the car on my own power.
Thank god the rest of the hike continued rather uneventful and we made it back to my truck just in time before the big rain started.

More pictures:

Stats:

Distance:	17mi / 27.2km roundtrip
Elevation gain:	~4200ft / 1260m
High point:	6854ft / 2056m
Hiking time:	8hrs up on Sat, 6:30 down on Sun
Weather:	Sunny on Sat; windy, cloudy on Sun, barely escaped the incoming rain

Hikers:
Siew Moi, Norm, David

Wed/Thu 8/13-14 Mt Pilchuck Lookout painting

David — Fri, 15 Aug 2008 03:37:07 +0000

Yet another Pilchuck work party, this time to scrape, prime and paint catwalk railings, shutters and shutter supports. Lisa and I joined Norm from the Everett Mountaineers. Plan was to hike in early Wed morning, work all day and stay overnight and for Lisa and me to hike out in early Thu morning.
The previous work party had already primed some of the supports and shutters. We lowered the east and west shutters and then scraped the railing, with the spontaneous and friendly help of another hiking couple.

I climbed to the roof to scrape and prime the E and W shutter supports while Lisa took on the catwalk railings and Norm climbed underneath the lookout to prime the support structure. Towards noon the sun came out and helped dry out the primer coats so that in the afternoon we could apply top coats for railing, shutter supports and shutters.
After dinner in the evening, we enjoyed a marvelous sunset across Puget Sound & Cascades and with 3 volcanoes in clear sight (Mt Baker, Glacier Peak and of course, Mt Rainier). We woke and rose to an almost as colorful sunrise at 5:30. Lisa and I descended after breakfast and I got back to office by ~11am, completing my longest commute (5hrs) to work.
The Everett Herald recently ran an article of this effort that plenty other volunteers and us 3 supported. Gratifying to see the appreciation of other visitors and hikers

More pictures:

Stats:

Distance:	6mi / 9.6km roundtrip
Elevation gain:	2224ft / 667m
High point:	5324ft / 1597m
Hiking time:	2:30 in up, 1:30 down
Weather:	initially cloudy, wonderful sunset

Hikers:
Lisa, Norm, David

8/2 – 8/5 Wonderland Trail

David — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 05:44:07 +0000

Fellow trail maniac Marjan and I joined a group of Microsoft hikers to raise money for WNPF and to backpack ~1/3 of the Wonderland trail, from Mowich Lake to Sunrise.

The first day starts out cloudy. Ranger John recommends we deviate from the standard Wonderland trail and pick the Spray Park route to our first tent site, Carbon River Camp. Unfortunately we don’t get an opportunity to admire the views from that route, we hike mostly in fog and mist.
Second day the sun is back! We round the Carbon glacier and make our way through Moraine park to Mystic Lake and Mystic Camp.
Third day we traverse the terminal moraines of Winthrop glacier, admire the Garda Falls and climb up to our next camp, Granite Creek camp.
On our final fourth day, we cross over Skyscraper pass into Berkely Park, visit Frozen lake and descend to Sunrise ranger station, our final destination for this trip.
Given that the daily milage was moderate, we upped the ante on the gourmet side: Marjan and I planned and brought a bit more elaborate food to the trail. Most dinners we enjoy 2 courses, we splurge on gnocchi with fresh(!) basil (great idea, Marjan!), cucumber salad, fresh fruit, polenta with dried tomatoes, cheese, and of course, our daily red wine fix. Compared to the usual freeze-dried food, this cost us several extra pounds in our backpacks but the look on some of our fellow backpackers’ faces: priceless
What you cannot see in those pictures: the mosquitos around the creeks and lakes and especially at the camp sites are ferocious. Deed and bug nets keep them somehow at distance, but we still brought back plenty of battle wounds in form of itching mosquito bites (think 50 – 100 bites…)

More pictures from our fellow hikers:

Mary
James

Stats:

Distance:	27mi / 43.2km total distance
Elevation gain:	7000ft / 2100m
High point:	6700ft / 2010m

Hikers:
Marjan, David
Bethany, Mary, James, Steph

Wed 7/30 West Tiger cable line trail

David — Thu, 31 Jul 2008 06:30:20 +0000

This is the final practice hike before the Wonderland Trail hike. I decide to go for speed instead of weight: packed with just a light daypack I try speeding up the cable line trail, the diretissima to West #3.

Stats:

Distance:	5mi / 8.1km roundtrip
Elevation gain:	2170ft / 650m
High point:	2522ft / 757m
Hiking time:	45min up, 30min down
Weather:	cloudy, 60 at TH

Hikers:
David

Sat 7/26 Mt Pilchuck Lookout work party

David — Sun, 27 Jul 2008 04:16:29 +0000

Everett Mountaineers maintain the Pilchuck Lookout and together with Craig from MSClimb, they organized a work party to carry up material and do some emergency repair on the lookout’s cat walk, railing and cable stays.
Sat had a great turnout of hikers (more than 20 people) carrying tools and materials up to the lookout (thank god the National Guard already flew up the lumber, would have been clumsy to carry 2x8s on a pack…). Got to the TH by ~8:30, hiked up with Arthur from the Everett Mountaineers, with ~25lbs of tools. Trail was in much better shape than 3 weeks ago, but still large snowfields above ~4500ft. Arthur and I spent some time creating cairns to guide the following hikers across the snow fields.
I stayed up at the lookout for 6-7 hours to repair the currently closed catwalk around the lookout: first I ripped up a good part of the porch decking and replaced some of the rotten 2×8 joists, placed fresh vertical posts so that the porch won’t bounce anymore and rebuilt the broken railing (it got crushed by the snow load). Fun to balance out on the rock, above some nice verticals, and swing saw and hammer. It was a pleasure to remove the “emergency closure” sign at the end of the day!
On Sat the group was a bit short of crafty people, the other 3-4 “worker bees” redid the steel cables that anchor the lookout to the rock and started replacing some of the broken glass.

Stats:

Distance:	6mi / 9.6km roundtrip
Elevation gain:	2224ft / 667m
High point:	5324ft / 1597m
Hiking time:	1:30 in up, 50min down
Weather:	sunny, 70 at TH

Hikers:
David

Wed 7/23 Rattlesnake Mtn – Grand Prospect

David — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 04:59:06 +0000

It’s getting close to our Wonderland trail; this week we chose a medium length of ~9mi roundtrip with some altitude: Grand Prospect, the northern-most set of the illuminated radio-towers one can see driving west on I-90, right past North Bend.
First stop and aperitif after roughly 50 minutes at Stan’s Overlook. Refreshed, we tackle the remaining ~2/3 up through denser and older forest to the radio towers. We got a quick glance at the sun set over the Olympics shortly before we reach the Grand Prospect.

Stats:

Distance:	9mi / 24.4km roundtrip
Elevation gain:	2080ft / 624m
High point:	3060ft / 918m
Hiking time:	2:50hrs up, 1:45hrs down
Weather:	partially cloudy, 60 at TH

Hikers:
Marjan, David

Sat/Sun 7/19-20 Backpacking to Spider Gap

David — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 06:27:45 +0000

A backpacking trip that almost transplanted me back to good ole Switzerland: Spider Meadow has a very alpine look, with an open meadow down in the valley, flowers and marmots galore, surrounded by rugged mountains on either side and waterfalls pouring off the cliffs. Big difference to hiking in the Swiss Alps: here in the National Forest, one can readily camp in the backcountry. I even found a camp site made in heaven, more below.

I got to the trailhead of Phelbs Creek trail (#1511 in the Wenatchee National Forest) around 4pm. I wanted to enjoy plenty of daylight to search for a site and setup camp, so I rushed the first 5.5mi up to the beginning of the open meadow. That part was (as expected on a weekend) already quite populated and no sites were available anymore. Following advice of the WTA trail description, I had planned to find a more private site at the far end anyway. Halfway through the meadow, I had an interesting chat with a NF ranger who indicated that there might be still some available space along the trail up to Spider Gap or Phelbs Basin. I decided to venture all the way into the Phelbs Basin. Once I cleared the tree line, a gorgeous river valley opened, with no one else in there and several camp sites. So after 7+ miles from the trailhead, 1500ft higher and 2.5 hours later, I had my place for the night. Dinner was a good serving of Polenta (from scratch, 1/2 cup coarse ground cornmeal, broth, water, added dried & cut tomato, freshly roasted pumpkin seeds and a dash of cayenne). After waiting and watching the moonrise lighting up all the mountains around me and its bluish light eventually making it into the basin and my camp, I snuggled into my cozy sleeping bag for the night (~38F, clear sky).
The next morning, I got up around sunrise (5:30) and prepared breakfast (fast cooking oatmeal, brown sugar, cinnamon, mixed with dried cherries and cranberries), pumped water to refill my camelback, broke down camp and was on the trail around 7:00. On a steep trail, I hiked out of the meadow valley up to the lower end of the Spider glacier (climbs 1000ft in ~ half a mile).
At the bottom of the glacier, situated on a knob, I found the most fabulous camp site, overlooking the whole valley as if it were a balcony. A real room with a view! Next time I’m up in Spider, this will be my camp site of choice!
Right behind the camp site, the Spider Glacier snowfields start, leading up to the Spider Gap. The next ~1000ft over a .75 mile, I spent with plenty of kicking treads. Up at 7100ft, a splendid view over to Lyman Lake was the reward. Enjoyed a second breakfast and admired the view before starting my hike back to the car.
Descending back over the snowfield is a joy: some glissading and long strides take me back down to the Spider knob camp sites in ~10minutes. Another 30min later, I’m back in the Spider Meadow valley.
Time to hike out: Hiking back to the trailhead was mostly on autopilot, but on the final 3 miles, my feet develop several painful blisters. Hot weather and hiking on snow got my feet wet from the inside and the outside, causing hot chafing on the skin. Lesson learnt: Must pack a spare pair of dry socks next time.
The last 2 miles were a real exercise in endurance and pain tolerance… Back at the trail head, what a relief to finally get out of my boots.
A happy but tired David gets back on the road for the 2.5 hours drive back home. Soon after getting onto US-2 again, the unexpected happened: My truck’s front left tire blew, followed by a 30minutes “pitstop” in 90 degree searing sun, seeing me kneeling on hot concrete and manhandling the heavy truck (spare) tires. Still not clear what caused the tire to fail.

Rough road just to get to the trailhead at 3500ft.

At the trailhead, first glimpse to Buck Mtn?

The first 5 miles snake up through a light but shady forest.

Pitched my tent for the night in Phelps Basin, all by myself.

A sneak peak up to Red Mountain.

Trail climbing out of the Meadow valley to Spider Glacier.

Great view back down to Spider Meadow, looks very alpine.

Company: A marmot cautiously following my every move.

Parts of the trail are not for the faint of heart, but the trail is well maintained and safe to hike.

Camp site made in heaven! This balcony offers a splendid view down to the Meadow; next time in Spider Meadow, I’ll venture the extra 40 min to get up here!

View from the gorgeous camp sites at the bottom of Spider glacier.

Gulp! More than a 3/4 mile of toe kicking snow and ice is waiting for me. Spider Gap is behind the saddle at the far end.

Made it! View from Spider Gap to the other side, Lyman Glacier with Lyman Lake, Cloudy Peak behind.

Getting there:
Drive US-2 beyond Stevens Pass and turn north on Lake Wenatchee Road (Highway 207, milepost 81), near the town of Coles Corner. At 4.3 miles, after crossing over the Wenatchee River, take the right fork to Chiwawa Loop Road. After 1.4 miles turn left onto Chiwawa River road (FS62/6200). At 28.1 miles take right fork to Phelps Creek trailhead (FS6211). At 3.4 miles and 3500′, park your car with ALL the others.
More pictures:

My smugmug gallery

Stats:

Trail/map:	Wenatchee NF: Phelps Creek #1511 / Green Trails #113
Distance:	18mi / 28.8km roundtrip
Elevation gain:	3600ft / 1080m
High point:	7100ft / 2130m
Hiking time:	2:50 in (7.5mi), 4hrs out (10.5mi)
Weather:	sunny, 80 at TH

Hikers:
David

Thu 7/17 – Mt Si, fast lane

David — Fri, 18 Jul 2008 06:17:26 +0000

This week’s hike to Si I chose to go light & fast: small daypack, 2 qt camelbak water bladder and some granola bars.
From the trailhead up tothe Snoqualmie view point took me 95minutes, including playing photographer for a bunch of UW students at the 3.5mi viewpoint. Subtracting the ~15minutes of breaks along the ascend, this makes for a 80min actual travel time, averaging 3 miles per hour.
Descend was exactly one hour, with mostly jogging and only misstepping once in the dark, but no damage (sheepish grin). Unfortunatly, the jog down had me lose my Swiss army knive

Stats:

Distance:	8mi / 13km roundtrip
Elevation gain:	3400ft / 1020m
High point:	3980ft / 1194m
Hiking time:	1:35 up, 1hr down
Weather:	sunny, 70 at TH

Hikers:
David