Category: Hikes
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Rattlesnake Ridge Winter Hike – 1/2/17
We went on our first hike of the New Year yesterday, up to Rattlesnake Ledge. We had originally planned on snowshoeing, but the forecast in the mountains and on the east side of the crest were for temps in the teens and windchill below zero. That really didn’t sound fun, so we picked a hike closer…
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Big Rock Park and Ebright Park, Sammamish
Annika and I went on an local outing on Friday. We wanted to explore some of the parks on the east side of the metro area. We also wanted to check out some nature play areas as we research ideas for adding a new play area to our school. I had heard good things about…
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Heather and Maple Pass TR, 9/30/16
Ah, the mythical larches. I hadn’t heard of these magical trees until I started following various hiking forums several years ago. Every September and October, reports started coming out about people going to great lengths to see them. I didn’t pay much attention for a few years, then I started to view those TRs wistfully,…
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Second Burroughs Loop, Trip Report 9/9/16
The road to Sunrise will be closing next month, so we felt it was time to get up high again. Gabe has been wanting to hike to Second Burroughs since he got his new camera, and I thought it would be fun to take a different path than the normal Sourdough Ridge Trail that we’ve…
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Chain Lakes, Mt. Baker, Trip Report 9/16/16
Fall is definitely in the air, especially up high in the mountains. We feel the internal drive to get out to see fall colors and enjoy the high country before the snow comes and we are stuck down low for the winter. Gabe requested a trip to Artist Point again, as he remembered it being…
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Book Review: 100 Classic Hikes: Washington by Craig Romano
My bookshelf has two rows of various hiking guides, but recently a new guide came out that will have a prominent spot in the first row. Craig Romano has rewritten and updated Harvey Manning and Ira Spring’s original 100 Classic Hikes in Washington book from 1998, including some of the initial hikes, but adding some new…
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Panorama Point, Mount Rainier Trip Report, 8/25/16
Ah, summer! Time for big adventures, getting up to high elevations, wildflowers, mountains, and glorious light. Last week I let the kids each bring a friend along to Mount Rainier. We were hoping to catch the wildflower show, and we did see some flowers, but we also did an amazing hike up to Panorama Point.…
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Trip Report: Yellowstone National Park
Our family was fortunate to be able to take a big road trip this summer, and we chose Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons for a visit. We were gone for nine days, driving and camping along the way. We stopped at Craters of the Moon on the way back. Wow, what a trip this was!…
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North Cascades National Park – National Park Week 2016
North Cascades National Park is one of my favorite places to explore. Rugged mountains, jade-green water, few roads, autumn colors – all these things and more draw visitors to the park. North Cascades is smaller than Mt. Rainier or Olympic NP, and gets far fewer visitors. It’s still possible to find solitude in the…
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Squires Lake Trip Report – 3/25/16
I’m still researching hikes up in the Bellingham area, so we took the afternoon and hiked around Squires Lake just south of that city. We had sunshine most of the drive up there (except for a convergence zone of dark showers north of Everett), but once we got close to the Chuckanuts, we could see…