Andrew admiring the glorious wild flowers
Andrew at Crystal Peak -- Lake is in foreground, ridges along horizon
Andrew with one of his marmot friends
These were Andrew's favorite flowers
Yesterday, Andrew and I went on a most memorable long hike. When I took him, Rosie, Steve and Rebekah up to Crystal Point last week, he looked at Crystal Lake well below our perch on the peak and said he would like to go from the peak to the lake. This is no small task as there is no easy way to make that trek. The lake is surrounded by massive, towering rock mountains with sheer cliffs that descend to the valley with the lake. I appeared that the only feasible ways down to the lake were to take the trail we had come up back to the point where it splits for the lake or to bushwhack along the ridge over to Sourdough Gap that would allow us back into the valley.
The first alternative had no adventure whatsoever – to just follow the trail everyone else takes so I told him we would come back and do the bushwhacking route together. Yesterday was clear in the morning and after doing a few things around the house – spraying the weeds along the driveway… -- Andrew and I got our pack ready – chocolate, Kremas, sandwhiches, water, GPS… and drove the 40 minute drive to the trailhead. We started hiking at 12:30 and covered a lot of ground over the next seven hours (11 miles and 4,900 feet of elevation gain).
I let Andrew lead most of the day and he kept up an amazing pace. To get to the peak – a 3.5 mile climb with 3,100 feet of elevation gain – it took us 1 hour 44 minutes with 1 hour 22 minutes hiking time and 22 minutes of resting. To cover that much elevation gain in that period of time is impressive by virtually anyone’s standards. When we got to the peak he was not even tired. We stopped, ate our lunch, admired the view and surveyed our potential routes. Unfortunately, some clouds had rolled in and Rainier and Adams were mostly covered so the view was not like it had been the prior two times I had been there but it was still gorgeous. We were not complaining about a little cloud cover as it has been at least three weeks since we have had that and we need the rain (It did indeed rain last night and today).
We set off on our adventure hugging the ridge for the first half mile or so. The ridge was very steep in a few parts and required negotiating through some trees and rocks but it was fun. However, eventually we hit a part with real exposure that would require some serious scrambling and risk to stay on the ridge so we decided to go around the other side of the mountains and stay near the ridge. This was pure bushwhacking as we traversed the area on some steep terrain. We were reluctant to descend and give up the altitude we had gained as we hoped to get back to the ridgeline with its fabulous views. But each time we ventured back up to the ridge we were met with climbing that was far too risky for us so we would go back down a little ways and resume our traverse. Andrew was a great sport about the whole thing as we had to back track a few times and some of the terrain was not easy to surmount.
Eventually we ran into some steep and risky places that we decided we would have to go around and would require us to descend all the way to Sheep Lake – another beautiful mountain lake that we had hiked to five or so years ago with the Harstons from the same place we start our much beloved Naches hike off 410 just below the pass. There we hooked up with the Pacific Coast Trail for a mile or so and it took us up and over Sourdough Gap and then took the trail back to Crystal Lake. As we hit the ridge many fast moving clouds were coming out of the Crystal Lake valley and at times we could hardly see a few feet in front of us the cloud cover was so thick. But it cleared eventually.
At one point on the Pacific Coast Trail we thought we were going the wrong way and so we decided to once again bushwhack our way to the ridge where we would find our way back to Crystal Lake. As we traversed a steep part of the mountain, we heard the sharp whistle of a marmot and then saw a few of them on the rocks. Andrew walked over by them and got within a few feet. They were not afraid of him and he loved spending some time observing them. As he played with the marmots I pulled out the map again and realized that the trail we had been on was actually the right trail, so we worked our way back to it but were glad we had made that wrong turn as we would not have seen the marmots if we had stayed on the right trail.
Once we got to the Lake Drew was fascinated by how many salamanders were in the clear waters of that beautiful lake. When we were there with Julie, John, Joyce, Rosie and Rebekah five weeks ago it was totally frozen over and the surrounding area was all snow. Now there were only a few snow patches in the surrounding area. What a dramatic change in a few short weeks. One of the highlights of the day were the amazing wildflowers at virtually every step once we got above treeline which was most of our day. The variety was stunning as we must have seen 15 or 20 different species. The colors ranged from deep pink to purple to blue to red to white… In places the lupine was so thick that the smell was incredible. As we would cross one area or ridge we would find a anew variety that we hadn’t seen to that point in the day.
It was indeed a wonderful hike and Andrew was a great companion – not a word of complaint all day long, a real sense of adventure and a wonderful appreciation for the incredible beauty of nature. By the time we got back to the car seven hours after we had begun, my feet and knees were quite sore and we were both hungry and a bit tired.
