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Tag Archives: Slate Peak

A Better Day for Us

As the Cougar Flats fire began to explode I was high in the mountains with my friend Mary from Montana. The weather was hot that week – 100 plus degress so we were anxious to get someplace cooler. We packed a little lunch for us and the dogs and headed to Harts Pass. Indeed, it was a glorious day in high country and we were lucky to enjoy it.

We started out on the Buckskin trail descending into the basin below Slate Peak
How to get a Labrador retriever’s attention
Hey – did Gus get a cookie?
My, what a big tongue you have Luna
Tiny bubbles in the creek
Smoke on the horizon down valley
Glacier lily
Pretty white flower that looks like miniature bear grass next to shooting stars
Two women and three dogs with a self timer? That was a challenge!
Mary and the Labradors!
She found a rock that looked like her home state of Montana
Mount Baker
Gus was insistent on trying to climb the stairs despite the sign that specifically said not to.
The smoke grew as the day went by
The Pasayten Wilderness looking north to Alaska
North Cascades
Silky Phacelia
Maybe my favorite wildflower

End of Summer Hike

The days are growing shorter and this week the forecast promises cooler temperatures and rain again. Fall is coming. Summer is always the shortest season here in the Methow. Luna and I got up high in the mountains once more this past week to enjoy the sunshine and warmth before fall’s chill settles in.

I always have to stop and take in this view
That’s where we are going
A group of three ravens kept us company
Luna runs for joy
She’s wearing a colorful scarf because hunting season has started. I would not want anyone to mistake her for a bear or mule deer
We hiked across and down that talus slope and through the basin
Blue gentian – one of the few blooming wildflowers
A few creeks were still flowing, probably from the previous week’s downpour
Aster with pollinators
Two of these Red-tailed Hawks soared above us – kiting in search of food
There were few mushrooms along this route
And the view down valley from up high
Mountains looming above the ridge where we started
Slate Peak
Are we going that way?
Canada is only twenty miles away, thirty if you are on the nearby PCT.
A disappearing snow patch
Old, dirty snow
Ravens watch
We went up this trail to return to the road
Mt Baker
We made a little detour to the lookout before walking down the road to the car
I always like to take a walk through the silver forest. There are usually good birds
Another hawk
It could have been the same one we saw earlier
Tiny Campanula flowers

Slate Peak

Friends are visiting from Iowa this week and we are busy showing them the highlights of the valley and Ken is trying to take Paul to all the great fishing spots, despite the fact that steelhead season didn’t open when they thought it might. Little trout from streams and big trout in lakes will have to suffice for this visit. Yesterday we drove to Slate Peak and hiked around the basin below it and enjoyed the fall colors and migrating raptors. We saw Rough-legged Hawk, Prairie Falcon, Northern Harriers and some unidentified accipitor. Later the guys caught small trout in a beautiful mountain stream while Corly and I went to see spawaning chinook salmon in the Methow River. It was a lovely day.

 

Luna is practicing on the edge of Slate Peak for her upcoming agility trial

 

The last of the blue sky days

 

Smoke from the lingering wildfires creates some hazy conditions that doesn’t quite block the view of Mt Baker

 

Ken and Corly are dwarfed by the Pasayten Wilderness stretching off to Canada

 

Ken and Paul have been friends for 25 years and though they seldom see each other it’s as if they were together all the time!

 

Luna

 

This is the basin I hiked through a month or so ago. See that here.

 

Slate Peak Lookout

 

These sedimentary rocks show that while we were over 7000′ elevation, this land was once underwater.

 

Lunch from the Rocking Horse Bakery, Mazama Store and a local orchardist served on a lichen covered rock!

 

Does Luna really like Paul so much or is she considering his lunch?

 

Lichens

 

Fall colors in an old burned forest

 

No shortage of cameras

 

If a tree falls in the forest…………

 

Not Yet Fall

It’s been a few weeks since I had a nice hike in the mountains. I had grand plans for a hike every week this summer and have fallen far short of that goal. Yesterday’s hike was a good one. With the passing of Labor Day and the start of school, it sems that summer is over. Nights are cooler and days are way shorter. The light is marvelous and the air is crisp making for perfect hiking conditions. Luna and I drove most of the way to Slate Peak and then took the Buckskin trail down into the basin below the lookout. We left the trail and rambled through the basin and then up to the ridge where we found the West Fork of the Pasayten trail and returned to the road and walked back to the car. It was not a long hike but it was long on views and surprisingly, quite a few flowers. There were also lots of migrating birds – in particular I noticed Cooper’s Hawks, American Pipits and White – crowned Sparrows. Also many finches in flight that I could not identify.

 

Almost to Mazama on highway 20 I saw this free range or feral piano, abandoned by the side of the road. There was a package of castors to replace the broken ones. I’ve seen bbq’s, out dated tv’s, couches, even old satellite dishes; but this is the first time of seen a piano on the side of a road.

 

Luna is wearing red because it’s hunting season and more than once I’ve benn told that she looks like a black bear.

 

This photo needs some arrows to show our route. Our trail drops down there in the shade on the bottom right of the image and then you can barely see it crossing the talus (rock) slope to the left before it drops down into the meadow. We crossed through the larch trees and on the other side of them left the trail to ramble up through the basin and to the ridge, where we joined the second trail and it took us to the road just below and to the left of the lookout on the high point.

Red leaves show that there’s already been a frost. It was 42 in the sunshine when we started our hike. I was glad I had a jacket and wool gloves.

 

Luna is already out on the trail.

 

In the meadow there were lots of flowers. Here is a paintbrush (Castilleja sp) with blue gentian in the background

 

I love the dark blue gentian, a late summer flower in the high country.

 

Looking back at the trail as we enter the trees.

There was a family of Cooper’s Hawks calling loudly and flying around in this area.

 

Moss shows that the area is still wet despite the fact that we’ve had no rain in a month or more.

 

I could not resist this tiny scene

 

How many months of lupine are there? Seems like I’ve been seeing it since April!

 

Pink monkeyflower and its shadows.

 

More paintbrush. I saw at least three different colors of it.

 

Someone’s burrow. It is pretty good sized. Maybe a marmot? I think they live in rocks. A wolverine?

 

Another view looking back. We’ve left the trail and are heading up now.

 

And looking down valley. Within a month all those larch (tamarack) trees will turn golden and their needles will begin to drop.

 

A much-needed rest in the shade.

 

Now we are higher than when we started.

 

My cell phone has a compass app. I wonder how it works even without a cell signal? Any ideas?

 

Looking north towards Canada. The stunted spruce and other species of trees at high elevations are sometimes referred to as krumholtz – crooked, bent or twisted

 

Luna was happy to find two lingering snow patches

 

And up to the road. It was almost a mile walk back to the car.

 

Views to the west from the road. That’s Mount Baker in the middle.

 

And a last view of the lookout

 

We stopped in a silver forest to look for birds. Mostly Yellow-rumped Wablers. Also a Townsend’s Solitaire.

 

An aster next to the creek.

 

Ahhhhhh.

 

 

Hiking in the North Cascades

Here it is – mid-summer and I’ve barely been out on any hikes. That needs to change. Yesterday I had a window of opportunity and drove up to Harts Pass. It’s a rugged and narrow road and if you are afraid of heights, you’d best not look out the window. The drop down to the Methow River is precipitous, to say the least. One particularly bad stretch is called Dead Horse Point in honor of a string of pack horses that went over the edge back in the days before there was a road. The trail and the eventual road were put in to service the mining camps and the old and now abandoned, town of Barron, headquarters of gold mining in the Harts Pass area. It’s hard to imagine that at one time there were 1000’s of miners, a store, and other components of a rough community so high in the mountains. Now it’s primarily a recreation area and access to the Pasayten Wilderness. The road ends just below the lookout at Slate Peak, about 7400′ elevation. This is the highest maintained road in Washington. Snow has not all melted so I parked about a mile and a half below the lookout and with Luna, walked to the top. The views were stunning and wildflowers abundant. The temperature was 77. It was very refreshing. In Winthrop it was 97.

 

My what a big tongue you have!

 

I have forgotten more wildflower names than I know these days.

 

A yellow violet, maybe Viola glabella

 

 One of the phloxes

 

Slate Peak in the distance. You can see a similar view in this post from last November 7 at the beginning of winter

 

 

 

Luna looking over the edge. She’s not afraid of heights. You can see Mount Baker in NW Washington on the left side of the image.

 

 

Heading down and looking back at the lookout. You can see part of the Pacific Crest Trail down below.

 

Nice thing to do after a hike.

 

Caltha sp. ?

 

 Anemone occidentalis

 

Buttercups, Ranunculus sp.

 

A burned silver forest

 

These yellow glacier lillies, Erythronium grandiflorum, bloom immediately following snow melt.

 

Paintbrush, Castilleja sp.

 

Another Phlox sp.

 

Monkeyflower, Mimulus sp.

I am learning a new camera – one of the mirrorless micro 4/3 models and finding it not the most intuitive thing I’ve ever held. Hopefully images will improve with practice. Wish me luck. I may return to carrying the large heavy DSLR although I’d really like to cut down on the weight I take hiking with me.