Diablo Lake | My Everyday Photos

Last weekend I had a wedding to photograph at the North Cascades Environmental Learning Center on Diablo Lake. It’s a beautiful location and a terrific venue for a wedding. There are rooms for guests to stay and wonderful food – much of it locally sourced. Diablo Lake is just over the crest of the North Cascades via Highway 20. It is one of three dammed reservoirs on the Skagit River and its color is a wonderful turquoise from the glacial runoff of the high mountains. To get to the learning center, you have to cross Diablo Dam, an old structure, quite unlike the dams of the Columbia River. Sunday morning we had a nice hike to Sourdough Falls before returning home.

Dams were built prettier in those days.

Looking straight down

Can you imagine what the Skagit River was like before the dams?

I hate to see dogs lumped in with guns and smoking.

Sweet looking berry growing by the trail

my new friend

Rock stairs near the end of the trail

Shadows on wet rocks

A spent mayfly

Tiny little garden tucked into the rocks

Sourdough Falls

Big growth rings

My dear friend came to visit from Wenatchee early this week and we got to enjoy good times spent outdoors. She and I learned to paddle kayaks on the Columbia and now she is a competitive paddler while I simply enjoy a day in my boat whenever I can. I do miss the water of the big river. Up here I have small lakes and they have their own charm, that’s for sure. On Monday we took our boats over the North Cascades to Diablo Lake, a reservoir on the Skagit River. Diablo and Ross Lakes both have greenish-colored water from all the glacial deposits of the high Cascade Mountains. They are deep and cold. We had smooth glassy water to begin and as we went up the gorge we had a nice wind behind us. Of course that was a wind we had go against on the return trip. As we got to the big open water, it was pretty stiff and we had an interesting swell when we turned up the Thunder Arm of the lake. It was lots of fun!

The next day we had planned a hike to a lookout but after a big rain storm and the threat of more rain showers we decided to stay closer to the valley bottom and enjoyed a nice three mile walk in the woods. The early morning rain left everything fresh and fragrant. The flowers were outstanding. The scent of the wild roses was enough to make a person swoon. Well, maybe not so much. It was lovely though. I managed to lose my lens cap along the way so if you are on the Patterson Lake trail and find a small lens cap, please let me know.