Columbia Mountain

I still haven't been able to go to my roadless area, but I did finally make it to the Kettle Crest this weekend.  There was a new layer of snow and everything was so bright!  It was great to finally be outside--I was sick earlier in the week & I feel as though it has been ages since I have seen sunshine!  

 

Rock formations along the Kettle Crest trail.

 

View of Sherman Peak & Snow Peak from Columbia Mountain.

  

View towards Republic.

  

Crossing a meadow.

  

This spruce grouse charged us from along the side of the trail on the way back down.

I have adopted a roadless area!  Now I just need to plan a trip to go visit it and take lots of photos.  Check out the map below:

Fall trail running on Mount Spokane

I would probably hardly run at all if not for trail running, so whenever I have a chance I go up to Mount Spokane to run on the trails up there.  In the summer the mountain trails allow me to escape the summer heat.  This time of the year they allow me to escape the monotony of the roads (the trouble with coaching high schoolers is that we're stuck running around the school every day), plus I get to watch the changing of the seasons.  This year I kept returning to the mountain to capture the changing larch trees.

I started out too early for much color.  This was taken on October 17th on Horse Mountain.

This was taken the same day; the color was a little better on the other side of the meadow, but not much.

The color had really improved by the time I ran trail 110 on October 25th.

By November 7 the colors were really spectacular.  This one was taken from near the lower entrance to the Mount Kit Carson Loop Road.

However, by November 8 everything was looking pretty much the same color!

Trail run in Riverside State Park

The team did a waterstation for the Spokane Marathon as a fundraiser (the Bloomsday Road Runners Club donates the proceeds from the marathon to the local high school xc programs -- pretty cool!).  We were stationed along Centennial Trail near the military cemetery, and we were done with the water station by 11am, so I went for a nice run out on the rock trail by the river.  It was like the good old days.  I miss having such easy access to the trail system out in Riverside State Park.  It was also pretty cool to be running along on the trail with no one around but hearing people cheer for the marathoners on the other side of the river. 

Hike-A-Thon

I found out how I did for this August's Hike-a-Thon:  I raised $469.38, hiked the most total miles at 252.5, hiked the 2nd most miles in a single day at 28.6 (the most was 62!!!), and hiked the most miles on a trailwork party at 20.3 (although for some reason it's only showing as 9.1 on WTA website).  

I wish I knew how some of the participants raised so much money.  The most was $3,465, and he had 59 sponsors!  I need to brainstorm some ideas for doing better next year.  The hiking part is easy.  I'm contemplating parts of the PCT through Washington and the Wonderland Trail in addition to my usual trips to the Kettle Crest and the Salmo Priest.  I have also been thinking about doing a long trailwork party for the last couple of years.  I'd like to take the Shedroof Divide out to Little Snowy Top, then drop down the trail that leads to the Upper Priest River (I hear it hasn't been cleared in several years), then follow the Upper Priest to the trail that leads back up through Cabinet Pass and back to the Divide.  It would be a long trip, and I fear that we'd encounter so much downfall that would wouldn't be able to finish it, but it would be a really good hike.  As for the money part, I think I'm going to start by asking people to pledge a penny or a nickel per mile.  I bet a lot of people would be willing to pledge that much, and then I'll just hike so many miles that it will yield a good total.  I wonder how hard it would be to hit 500 miles?   

This picture is of trailwork

on Crowell Ridge, August 2009.

This is where I got the majority

of my trailwork miles for Hike-a-Thon.

Five people hiking/clearing 16.7 miles in three days -- not bad!

I started this thing two years ago, then got sidetracked and didn't even bother to finish the information on the initial trip I was writing about. However, then I did the WTA's Hike-a-Thon during the month of August and had a lot of fun keeping track of all my hiking trips. I think I'm going to try to revive this thing. Not that I'll have very many cool trips in the next month or two; cross country & work & my procrastination with Pro-Cert are all going to get in the way of getting outside. However, I'll do what I can, and then by next summer I'll be ready to keep track of all the trips I plan.

Wallowas Backpack, August 12-17, 2007

• Sunday, August 12, 2007

Four members of the Spokane Mountaineers left very early in the morning for the five hour trip from Spokane to the Two Pan trailhead near Enterprise, Oregon. We originally intended to hike along the east fork of the Lostine River and camp at Mirror Lake...we were so anxious to hit the trail that we accidentally hiked up the west fork trail instead. Fortunately, this mistake turned out to be a good one. Mirror Lake gets the most traffic; instead, we ended up having Minam Lake almost entirely to ourselves.

Above: Minam Lake

• Monday, August 13, 2007

The plan for today: hike from Minam Lake to Mirror Lake, set up camp, and tackle Eagle Cap without the heavy packs.

Above: our first view of the lakes basin. Mirror Lake is the large lake on the left; Eagle Cap is the prominent peak on the right.

Above: the view from Eagle Cap. The east fork of the Lostine River meanders through the valley on the left. Mirror Lake (and somewhere on the far side of the lake, our tents) is on the left; Moccasin Lake is on the right. The prominent peak on the right is the Matterhorn.Above: the view of Glacier Lake from the summit of Eagle Cap (our intended camp for Tuesday and Wednesday nights).

Above: a snowfield below Eagle Cap. There are not many places where one can do this in August!Above: back at Mirror Lake, watching the alpenglow on Eagle Cap.

• Tuesday, August 14, 2007

Today we packed up camp to travel to Glacier Lake, but we split into two groups for the trip. The 'short hike' group traveled over Glacier Pass to the lake, a distance of approximately 3.5 miles. I was on the 'long hike' -- we took the route past Moccasin, Douglas, Craig, Lily, Lee, and Horseshoe Lakes, then up the West Fork Wallowa River and past Frazier Lake before arriving at Glacier Lake. This route was around 12.5 miles; it was a hot day so we stopped a couple times to swim along the way. We arrived in camp with plenty of time left to watch the amazing sunset.
Above: a black & white shot of Glacier Lake. We kept hearing/seeing rock fall from the large snowfield on the peak in the upper right corner. Above: sunset at Glacier Lake. The only thing better? Sunrise!

• Wednesday, August 15, 2007

Today I woke up at 6am, and I started taking pictures of the amazing sunrise before I even got out of the sleeping bag. I was afraid that the light wouldn't last, but it did. I walked three-quarters of the way around the lake (no easy thing, as rocky as it is, and me in tevas). I hoped to walk all the way around the lake, but was stopped by a section of sheer cliffs along the shoreline. I had to retrace my steps all the way to camp. It was 8am before I made it back, but I had taken some spectacular pictures and discovered Upper Glacier Lake and a couple small ponds along the way.

After breakfast we packed up enough food and water for the day and took a day trip over to Prospect Lake (no formal trail, but the route was fairly obvious). Prospect is deep and very cold, but I guess that's to be expected at above 8,000 feet elevation. We then scrambled up and over the ridge to drop down to Little Frazier Lake. By the time we reached the lake a storm had started to move in and it began to rain. We picked up the Hawkins Pass trail to continue down, then took the main trail back to Glacier Lake from Frazier Lake. By the time we got back to camp we could hear thunder in the distance, but the storm never did materialize.