Fall Hikes #1

Some days, you just gotta get the hikes in where you can.
I'm so bummed that my last two hikes have been without G.

But there's a good reason:

F R I D A Y

I'm teaching four classes. Four is an overload. Three of the four are classes I haven't taught before and they're literature classes. Two are online. So I'm busy.

But I'm only IN class 4 days a week.

Don't get me wrong; I work about 55 hours a week right now. But I can squeeze in a hike on Fridays if I really bust my butt.

Two weeks ago I hiked Ingalls Pass to Ingalls Lake.

This may not seem like much; it's not called "Scary, Really Steep Pass". It sounds like a Little House on the Prairie episode. Maybe Half Pint twists her ankle and Manly has to come save her on a horse or something.

It's actually a pretty challenging hike.

For which I was mostly unprepared.

My friend Lisa teaches in the English department at our university.  She's awesome and is older than I am. She's an experienced hiker. I put myself in her capable hands when she suggested a day hike on Friday. She's in the same teaching boat as I am, except for the fact that she's also the coordinator for one of the programs.

So I took a backpack with a knife, a kerchief, three protein bars because it might be more than two hours of a hike, and a big bottle of water. Also, I had no idea where we were going.

Lisa brought a lunch. And hiking sticks. And two bottles of water. All of which I wished I had brought!

We drove almost an hour up the Teanaway, past Camp Wahoo, and parked the car.  Then we went up.  Thank goodness Lisa lent me one of her walking sticks. We went up, up, up, up, up and up some more. We hiked above the tree line. We could almost reach out and touch Mt. Stuart. I had to stop to take my inhaler. To breathe, to just catch up to this not-quite-a-fireball lady who was kicking my butt up and down a mountain.

We did a lot of what's called "scrambling".  That's where there are so many rocks and not really a clear trail so you scramble towards a pile of rocks, a cairn, and hope that it's leading you the right way.

We saw some hikers, some campers, and were passed by two men from Seattle who had ducked out of work to hike the pass.

We came upon a mountain goat who was not particularly impressed with us.  He reminded me of an old video game I used to play by Blizzard, where random animals lived in parts of the grid and never really left that territory. They didn't interact with the players but if you bothered them, they would damage you even if you were wearing armor. He or she was a pretty tough looking goat. This is not to say that she/he didn't pose for some pictures for us. I'll share them below.

Our final scramble was sort of surreal. It was over the lip of a small pass and on the other side was Ingalls lake. The lake was fed entirely by melted snow and rain water. There were no streams and it looks like something out of the Sound of Music. We rested, ate our treats and left for the hike back. It was about 12 miles round trip. I was way over my time, and had to cancel plans with G to go out that night.

That's one understanding man. I was like "I owe you". He said "No you don't. We're married. It'll even out."

MM Hmm.  I never forget these things.
Here are a few photos:

This way, said the spider to the fly.

Are we going up this, or around?

Up.

Well this isn't so bad.

Pretty little mountain meadow

That's Mt. Adams in the distance.  To the right, not pictured, is Mt. Rainier

The trail. By trail I mean "trail"

That's Mt. Stuart in the distance. See all the sweat?

Pristine and glassy.

Should I be singing "The Sound of Music"?

Love the larch trees

There's no delicate way to say this: mountain goat butt.

My amazing, super fit, fun, great conversationalist hiking buddy

Yes, that's the equivalent of 327 flights of stairs. 

This is my favorite picture of the day

See? He posed for a photo op.

Looking down on the tree line

That's Mt. Stuart in the distance

So that was hike #1. Pretty dramatic, right? With an expert to guide us and sandwiches. Like 5 hours of hiking up and down and a change of 2,500 feet in elevation.

In the next blog, I'll illustrate the second one.

Hike

I am slowly making friends in Ellensburg, Washington.  Don't worry, I haven't forgotten my other friends. We just talk on the phone now more than we used to.  And we FB, and text and send each other pictures.
But I do need fr.  But I do need friends that exist in my own town. And when a fellow English teacher at CWU asked if we wanted to go hiking, I jumped at the chance.  Grey did too. Rather, he almost did. He got sick the day before, with a fever and an aversion to light.  Makes it hard to read.  I made him some warm vegetarian chili, which he used to make frito chili pie (kind of an abomination, if you ask me) and tossed some medicine down his throat.  He took medicine.  That's a sure sign it's not a passing fancy.  If Grey is willing to take medicine, I'm practically ready to call the paramedics.

Anyway, I got up at my usual time.  Did I mention that I'm done teaching at CWU for the quarter? Six thirty in the morning. I have a cat alarm that goes off if you don't feed it and turn the water on for her by 6:45. Made and frosted a couple dozen sugar cookies.  They look terrible- I need a better icing recipe.  Will try a buttercream tomorrow.  They do taste great, so for now I'll just close my eyes and eat them.

Got an entire pot a little coffee in me and cleaned up. Grey slept through the whole thing, right up until 11:30 when I poured a cup and grabbed a few ugly sugar cookies and barged into the bedroom.  Poor guy still wasn't feeling well so I left him to his devices and went to have fun. It was over 40 degrees and the Umtanum Canyon was filled with shadows from a bright day.

We crossed a bridge and made our way up the canyon, talking and telling stories the whole way.

Suspension bridge and the entrance to the Umtanum Canyon

Lisa Norris teaches Creative Writing at CWU and is a wonderful author too.  A good hiker, coffee drinker and teacher of English, lover of books and dogs.  And a great storyteller too.  If I wasn't so busy apparently spilling out my life story, I could listen to her for hours.

Up the canyon, we found what you find in nature: poop.  Lots of poop.  Someone's dog lost it a number of times along the trail and there was poop everywhere. Miles of poop.  Lisa's dog added some of her own to the mix.  Maybe it was a challenge accepted. Welcome to nature.  At least the trail was well marked. There was deer poop too, in places.  And bits of destroyed saplings that a beaver cut down and used to build a dam.

It was about 6 miles, round trip and felt wonderful to get out and stretch my legs.  I will need to invest in some good hiking boots for the next time we go.

Rimrock hundreds of feet tall rimmed the canyon and usually, there are big horn sheep around.  We didn't see any until the drive home, when we spotted a couple dozen on the hillside about 5 miles from our hiking spot.  I just feel bad that Grey missed it.
This time.
We're going again soon! Oh, do I love winter, and stories and friends and getting out of the house.

Tiesel

Babblin' brook

Ignore the squint