Goat was a great improvement

Jonelle, Al, Peggy (and me behind the camera)

I suspected we wouldn't have much of a crowd again today, when I woke to... you guessed it, rain. More rain after last week's soggy hike. (For the record, Bellingham broke the rainfall record last Thursday for the date by a factor of three!) But the hard core showed up, all right, four of us. We headed for Goat Mountain, a long drive for another possible wet hike, but it wasn't bad at all! A few sprinkles are nothing to intrepid hikers.

Lots of water, but beautiful new growth, too

The first part of this hike is in the trees, with switchbacks carrying us up toward the lookout meadow. We figured, however, that there would be little to see, as the fog and low clouds would obscure our views. Nevertheless, on the way up, we saw lots of flowers that are now gone at lower elevations. I captured these on the trail (you can enlarge by clicking the picture, but you know that, right?)

Top: wild ginger, woodland violets
Bottom: salmonberries, trillium

By the time we hit the meadow, we had moved from green woods to serious snow. Although the snow didn't start until we got to 4,600 feet, the landscape changed completely. We started hiking up the snow, looking for a place to stop for lunch.

Heading toward our lunch spot

As you can see from the way we are dressed, it still wasn't very cold and nobody had donned raincoats or warmer gear. But once we stopped at our lunch spot and turnaround point, we did bundle up. I decided to try to get a photo of all four of us by strapping my camera to a nearby branch. The results were mixed. My first try:

Humor provided by an accidental entertainer

You see that blue pad in the middle of the picture? I set the camera for a 10-second delay and rushed towards it over all the branches in the foreground. Before I reached it, I was head over heels down the slope. Peggy isn't in the picture because a leaf obscured her face. Here's my next attempt:

Al, me, Jonelle, and Peggy

That green decoration in Peggy's face is actually NOT on her hat but a branch that I never saw when I set up the picture. We were still quite comfortable and decided not to try to reach the lookout, since we weren't going to have any view anyway. We'll save that for another day.

Heading back to the car

It was, all in all, a beautiful day, with six-and-a-half miles covered, one of those in snow, and 2,500 feet of elevation gain and loss. Not bad for a day that started out looking to be much more wet and soggy than it was. I never had to put my raincoat on the entire day! Now I am warm and enjoying my well-earned glass of wine and looking forward to a good night's sleep after a fine day.
:-)