Friday, August 6, 2010

I have a map of the Salmo Priest Wilderness, and I keep track of all the trails I have hiked within the wilderness by highlighting the trails as I complete them.  At this point there are only a few trails that are not highlighted, and today I added one more trail to my list of completed hikes in this area.  The trail I needed and the starting point for today's hike was the Slate Creek Trail (#525).  It is 4.2 miles long and intersects the North Fork Trail (#507) which leads up to Crowell Ridge in 2.7 miles (Crowell Ridge #515).  I nearly made it to the end of Crowell Ridge (3.7 to Bear Pasture or 2.2 to the end of the ridge), but I reached my turnaround time just 1/2 mile shy of the end of the ridge before it drops down to Bear Pasture.  I was considering hiking a little longer when I started to hear thunder in the distance--that made my decision for me!  The rain caught me in the last four miles of the hike and I walked out in rain, lightening and thunder.  It was a little scary, and I wasn't able to hike as fast as I would have liked because of the downfall on the trail.  The good news is that there are no downed trees on the North Fork Trail--I helped with a trail clearing crew on that trail during Hike-a-Thon last year, so it was nice to see that the trail is still clear.  Now I want to see if I can get some friends to help clear the Slate Creek Trail, too.

Salmo Priest Wilderness!  My FAVORITE place!

Crowell Ridge Trail

Abercrombie & Hooknose Mountains as seen from Crowell Ridge

Crowell Ridge

Sullivan Mountain Lookout in the distance--there is a trailhead there, but it is a very rough road to get to it!

Wildlife!

Read my WTA trip report here.

Today's mileage = 17.2 miles
Grand total for the month = 77.42 miles

Thursday, August 5, 2010

This was the weekend for the Mountaineers' summer outing at the Noisy Creek campground on Sullivan Lake.  I made plans to leave town on Thursday so I could get in some extra miles before the group hikes I planned to lead on Saturday and Sunday.  I got a late start, so I didn't have time to get in the mileage I had originally planned for today.  I wanted to hike in the Little Pend O'Reille Wildlife Refuge; I'll have to save that one for a later date.  Instead I drove directly to Sullivan Lake and hiked the Elk Creek Falls Trail (#560), the Mill Pond Trail (#550), and the Mill Pond Flume Trail (#520).

Elk Creek Falls

Indian Pipes

Today's mileage = 3.36 miles
Grand total for the month = 60.22 miles

Iller Creek

Today I went to the school and was able to do some xc work while the girls were out running.  A couple of the girls used the whirlpool after their run & I joined them--my knees were swollen this morning, and then the calf still hurts.  After that I went up to Iller Creek for a hike.  I hardly ever hike up there; instead I like to use the trail system up there to get in a quick trail run after work during the school year.  The lower section of the trail is in great shape--this is one of the trails I have worked on with the WTA.  In fact, there are two sections of the trail that I consider "my sections" because I helped to build them.  Iller Creek also made the cut for this month's Backpacker magazine.  I was even quoted!  The trail is not as spectacular as my usual haunts, but I love how close it is.  I think it takes me less than ten minutes to get there from the school.

View from Big Rock

Trailhead kiosk

Today's mileage = 5.5
Grand total for the month = 56.86

Update!

This afternoon I went up to the Mount Spokane Nordic Area for an afternoon run/hike.  My calf survived the Cake Walk without so much as a twinge, so I thought perhaps I was ready to run again.  I decided to play it safe by running the trails out to junction one and back, and at nine minutes and thirty-five seconds (approximately how long I managed last time, too) my calf tightened up again.  Ugh.  I sooooo want to run right now--especially since I arrived home to a phone message that there is space for me in this year's Cutthroat Classic.  I have been on a waiting list since June, I can now get in...but I know I shouldn't.  If I can't make it to ten minutes tonight, how can I make it eleven miles in a few weeks?  Sigh.

I'm getting ahead of myself, though.  I didn't stop at ten minutes tonight--instead I grabbed my backpack and started hiking out around Shadow Mountain.  I knew that there would be huckleberries out there, and I hung out on the flank of the mountain for a couple hours in order to pick them.

The trails: (RUN) Valley View to Bear Grass to Brian's Hill.  (HIKE) Bear Grass to the car, then back on Bear Grass to Sam's Swoop to Eagle Crest to Shady Way to the Shadow Mountain Loop to Wild Moose to Hemlock to Blue Jay to Bear Grass.  (12.6K)

Grand total for the day = 7.81 miles; grand total for the month = 51.36 miles

Cake Walk 2010, August 1, 2010

This is the best possible way to kick off my Hike-a-Thon campaign--43.55 miles on the Kettle Crest Trail!

We set our shuttle Saturday night, camped at the White Mountain TH, survived the late-night thunderstorm, and hit the trail at 5:38am on Sunday morning.

My marker of authenticity at the southernmost point on the Kettle Crest Trail.

The wildflower displays were fantastic this year.  Normally the flowers would be gone by now, but with the cool spring and lingering snow in the high country, now is the optimal time for flower viewing.

Near White Mountain

Near White Mountain

 We also found that the rain that fell at the trailhead was hail on the ridge.  It looked as though it had snowed.

Between White Mountain and Barnaby Buttes

More wildflowers.

I noticed the following sign at Sherman Pass.  I'll use this for my "English Wall of Shame" at school, but in a way the sign is fitting.  We had just finished the 13.31-mile southern portion of the trail, and the "trial" was about to begin--the northern section is 30.24 miles.

At the "trialhead"

I arrived at the pass at approximately 10AM (so I was only twelve hours from finishing my hike!).

the description of where we had been

the description of where we were going

From the pass it was time to start climbing--the high point of this route is Copper Butte, elevation 7,140'.  It's the sixth highest mountain in Eastern Washington.  The wildflowers were fantastic at the top.

Near Wapaloosie Mountain

Indian paintbrush smiley face?

The wildflowers on Copper Butte

This is also an area that has been shaped by wildfire--the most recent near Copper Butte was 1994.  The standing snags are stunning.

Snags between Lambert & Midnight Mountains

The live trees are also spectacular.

The standing snags that were not killed by fire are covered with moss:

In the late evening a thunderstorm moved in; we spent the last hour or so walking through the storm and rain-showers.  I finished just after 10pm, so it was 16.5 hours of walking to complete this 43.55 mile day-hike--my biggest day-hike ever! 

One week!

Hike-a-Thon officially starts one week from today!  By this time next week I'll be somewhere on the Kettle Crest trail, starting H-A-T off right by getting in a huge mileage day.  The only bad news is that I'm still stuck on the bike.  I managed a ten minute run yesterday before the pain set in again.  I hate being injured, but I'm thankful that it's not an injury that affects my hiking.  I just fear that I'm not in good enough shape for what I have planned for next month.

Lake Estelle, Moose Lake, & Lake Darling, July 17-18, 2010

My calf is still not at 100%, so still no running for me; this meant missing out on Toaster Splash on the 17th, so I needed a hiking trip to make up for it.  I hiked Lake Estelle and Moose Lake on Saturday, and my calf and knee were both killing me.  I ended up cutting the hike a little short in order to spend some time knee-deep in the icy stream near camp.  This was a cool little hike, though.  I saw a lot of wildflowers, including some I had never seen before.
  

Pretty purplish-blue flowers

Mariposa Lilies

Alpine Laural

Avens

Cool rocks in the frigid stream where I iced my legs

On Sunday we hiked a loop to Lake Darling, Pend O'reille Peak, Lunch Peak, and then back to the car.  I have been trying to make it to Lake Darling for years--the first time I tried to go there was too much snow; the second time I tried to go there was a lightening-strike fire that closed the entire area.  Now I have finally been there!  And the best part is that my calf was feeling a lot better on this hike.

Elephant Head

Indian Paintbrush

Lake Darling from Pend O'reille Peak

Moose we spooked along the trail

 

Map Nirvana

I'm feeling a little sad because I should be in Chewelah right now, just finished with the 2010 edition of the Chataqua Challenge.  Instead I'm home in my pj's, still icing an achy calf and a crunchy knee.  Being injured is never fun, but I guess it's not quite as bad when injury coincides with ninety-degree temperatures; yesterday I filled up a kiddy pool, tossed in an ice pack, and created my own icy whirlpool on the front lawn. 


Since I can't be out running, I'm using my extra time to sort and catalog maps.  The Mountaineers have recently received two large map donations, and I'm the new map librarian.  There are topo maps, national forest maps, and green trails maps--hundreds of them!  It's a good thing I picked up a filing cabinet at a yard sale last week.  It's fun to look at all of the maps and get some new ideas about places to hike! 

Hike-a-Thon 2010!

It's almost time!  I am now registered for hike-a-thon and ready to start raising money!  Fortunately, I don't need to start counting my miles until August because I am spending more time with ice-packs than anything else right now.  My right calf is tight, and my left knee is hurting...so if I try to hike and favor one, I irritate the other.  I hope it starts to feel better soon--I really want to race in the Chewelah Chataqua Challenge this weekend.  It should be good by August anyway, and I am trying to hike 300 miles for H-A-T this year.  Follow the link at the top to check on my fund-raising status, and follow this blog to see how I'm doing on mileage! 

 A couple of pictures from last year's H-A-T:  The first was an attempt to look like I was walking on water.  The second is me sitting on a giant cedar stump along the road leading to the trailhead.  You can't tell from the picture, but the stump was hollow in the center.  I was about 6' up, and terrified I was going to fall into the stump and not be able to get back out!

Kettle Crest Backpack!

This trip just goes to show how things don't always go according to plan, but changed plans can be pretty fantastic, too!


The original plan was to drive to Sherman Pass on Thursday night to set up our shuttle, then carcamp at Deer Creek/Boulder Summit, and start hiking Friday morning.  We planned to hike about 23 miles on Friday an camp between Walpaloosie and Jungle Hill, then hike 16 miles on Saturday to end at White Mountain, and then finish up on Sunday with a 6 mile dayhike to the southern trailhead before returning the 10 miles to Sherman Pass.

Here's how it really worked:
Thursday--everything went according to plan.  It started raining as we were setting up camp that night.
Friday--it poured as we ate breakfast and packed.  It rained off and on as we hiked, and it started hailing when we stopped for lunch.  It warmed up a little in the afternoon--I was down to shorts and a tanktop for a little while--but then the wind picked up again.  We ran into downfall and snow on the trail at Copper Butte, and a lot of snow on the trail as we got to Walpaloosie.  When we reached the intersection of the Walpaloosie/Kettle Crest trails we decided to call it a day; we were less than a mile short of our goal mileage for the day.  The sunset up there was amazing (cloudy, little patches of sun on surrounding peaks, and a cool double rainbow); however, it was FREEZING (it even snowed for a little while--on the 2nd of July!).

Rainy day

Cool trees

 

 So pretty when it wasn't raining (or hailing or sleeting or snowing)

 Clouds+sunset=beautiful!

Saturday--we woke up to frost on the ground...brrrr.  We hiked to Sherman Pass, according to plan, but then decided to just carcamp Saturday night and only do a dayhike the next day.  The weather was just not showing any sign of improvement!  However, carcamping allowed us to enjoy a campfire that night and A LOT of s'mores [new s'mores experiment that was successful = toasted marshmallow between the wafers of an oreo cookie (with the cream filling)--amazing!]

Looking tougher than we felt at this point

Sunday--we packed up, returned to the trailhead, and hiked the Sherman Peak Loop plus the extra out to Snow Peak Cabin.  I made it home by 4pm; not bad!

National Recreation Trail!

More Roadless Areas

I have been neglecting this thing again...so to start with, here's an update on my roadless area visits:
1)Clackamas Mountain.   The day after I visited Twin Sisters, I joined one of Conservation Northwest's hike series events, a day hike to Clackamas Mountain.  This is an amazing area, and the trailhead is right on highway twenty and only eight miles out of Republic.  It isn't in any guidebook, and therefore it seems very lightly used despite its proximity to town.  

 

Shooting star

 

Dead snag (fire-killed)

 

View of Fir Mountain, across the highway

 

Cool rock formation seen from the trail

2) Rendezvous Weekend Hike #1: June 24th, King Mountain.  I showed up a couple days early for Rendezvous Weekend so that I could get some extra hiking in--school is finally out, so I really needed some hiking and camping!  I got a late start on the first day, so I picked the 6 mile route to King Mountain (and added a little extra for the hike out to Little King, the mountain with the view).  This route is open to motorized use, so I spent a lot of my hike picking up trash.  Frustrating.  I think I picked up about ten pounds or so.  The early portion of the hike is heavily treed with intermittent views, but the view from Little King is very good.  Not as spectacular as Clackamas or the mountains on the Crest, but not a bad hike either.

 

View from Little King (King proper has no view)

3)  Rendezvous Weekend Hike #2: June 25th, Profanity Peak.  For this hike I started at the Ryan's Cabin trailhead.  I hiked up the Ryan's Cabin trail to intersect the Kettle Crest, then out the Kettle Crest.  According to the guidebook (50 Hikes for Eastern Washington's Highest Mountains) there is no trail to Profanity; one must simply clamber over all the downfall to get to the top.  I wandered around off-trail for awhile, and gave up on the idea of going to the top; there was so much downfall off trail that it seemed dangerous.  I started to cut some of the downfall that was on the trail, heading back towards Ryan's Cabin--and then I discovered an old, overgrown trail that led to an open hillside and easy access to Profanity's summit!  This one is a gorgeous hike!

 

Clypso orchids along the trail

 

The old trail (not on the map!) leads to this open meadow for an easy hike up Profanity Peak

4) Rendezvous Weekend Hike #3: June 26hth, White Mountain.  This is one of the best views in the Kettle Range.  This one was a group hike for Rendezvous Weekend, and there were seven of us all together.  We started at the southern trailhead for the Kettle Crest, making it a six mile hike.  We met a trail contractor hired to bring the trail up to forest service standards; the Kettle Crest is going to be in great shape this summer!

 

Rocks, snags, and sky.

 

Butterfly!

 

View from the top

 

Writing letters for wilderness protection for this area! 

 

Hikers on the point, Edds Mountain in the near distance, and the Cascades in the background