Boy, its been a long time since we had some great sunny weather. All week long the forecast was for mid to upper 70’s and it actually came true for once!
There was no way I would give up the chance to get up and go for an early hike. My original plan was to take an easy hike on Saturday to break myself in for a longer one on Sunday, but the forecasts had been modified for Sunday to be the cloudier and cooler day. So I decided to just bite the bullet so to speak and go for the longer one Saturday.
Since there is still plenty of snow in the upper elevations of the Cascades, and avalance danger was elevated with the warmer weather this weekend, I kept it close to home and did Mt Washington, which is our view out the back window. Its 4.5 miles each way and moderately difficult.
I went to bed about 9:15 Friday night so I could get up at 5:30 Saturday morning. I had my lunch prepared Friday nite and my pack was ready. After a good bowl of oatmeal and some hot chocolate at 6am, I got a start at the trail head at 6:50 and just took it easy the whole way up. There were 4 other cars in the lot, but I didn’t run into any other people all the way up to the top, nice and quiet. Leaving the house in fog, I broke into the clear about a mile up the freeway. Pictures show lots of fog in the whole valley.
These two pics were from the half way viewpoint.
I ran into one man at the top who was just leaving who obviously got an earlier start than me, but I was then alone on top for 45 minutes, a lot longer than I expected. Lots of sunshine, the skies were very clear with great views of the surrounding cascades, and the olympics too, as well as Mt Rainier.
1/2 mile from the top, looking up you can barely see the weather station
at the top with the weather station
looking down at Chester Morse Lake
Chester Morse dam
this last pic shows Rattlesnake Ledge in the center.
The previous time I tried this mtn, I stopped about 3/4 mile short having run out of energy. I suspect it was lack of water. This time I drank plenty before I left the house, and it made a big difference. A slow and steady hike with one stop for a protein energy bar also helped. I arrived at the top at 9:20, just 2.5 hours up. It felt really good to soak in the sun at the top, and I even laid down on a flat rock for a little while.
After 45 minutes the next person to arrive was a middle aged woman who didn’t even acknowledge me. I usually wait for some eye contact before I say something, but she kept her head down, probably didn’t even see me. My flat rock was about 50 yards down from the top so she just kept on going up. I heard her greet some other man up there so I wondered how he got there without passing me. Once I started down, I saw some foot prints where he must have scrambled up off trail, a short cut of sorts. I hate when normally smart hikers do that, go off trail, causing damage and erosion to otherwise pristine areas.
I had spent one hour at the top, so at 10:25 I put my pack back on and headed down. My feet were already sore, not having been on a good long hike like this for awhile, knees too, so I just took it easy going down. My hiking poles were very helpful at this point. There were lots of people coming up but I didn’t count them all, but guessing now I would have to say it was probably 35-40. Popular, but lots less than Mt Si would have been. I got back to the car at 1pm and that last mile down was almost excruciating as I had a blister starting on my little toe. My ankles and knees weren’t great either but it sure felt good to sit in the car after changing out of my boots.