Goat Mountain Fall 2014

On the trail

Seventeen Senior Trailblazers started up the Goat Mountain trail for our third visit this year. We had some fitful stops and starts, but we eventually all got sorted into two groups: a few would try to get to the actual summit of Goat Mountain, rather than the overlook, where we usually stop. I was in the second group, just happy to be getting up into the High Country for yet another wonderful trip, without rain! This is the only day this entire week when we were not expecting rain, and sure enough we stayed dry.

Mushrooms were everywhere, all sorts of them

Since there has been so much rain lately, mushrooms had sprouted out of the ground everywhere. These (above) look almost like slimy loaves of bread. I was hoping that we would have a good view of the surrounding mountains after struggling for almost 3,000 feet of elevation to get to the overlook, but the skies might have been dry but they were certainly not cloud free.

Owen in front of Mt. Sefrit

We were joined today by a new (to me) guy who usually hikes with the other Senior Trailblazer group. Here is is standing in front of Mt. Sefrit, for his first time ever up to the Goat Mountain overlook. He has a wry sense of humor and had me laughing more than once today.

The Goat Mountain summit in snow

By the time we got into the open, we saw that the summit group would be dealing with fresh snow that must have fallen overnight. As you can see, however, the surrounding hills were alive with fall colors, even with gray skies that make it difficult to determine the summit from the background.

The group below me, with autumn in full swing

I wasn't able to capture very many pictures today, as I was struggling the entire way, feeling like my legs had lead in them. I wasn't alone, but those four who decided to try for the summit were only a short distance from the top before they turned around. We used the walkie-talkies to communicate with each other.

Those wonderful fall colors

As we began our descent, we knew that we should meet up by the time we got to the cars, and it all turned out well in the end. Although it was late before we got home (since the daylight hours are so much less than earlier in the summer), I think I can say we were all very glad to get home and enjoy our evening after a fine day in the wilderness. If this precipitation keeps up all next week, we might have just done our final trip for the season, but we are hoping for one or even two more. We'll see. Anyway, it was another great day, but I am sure tired and glad to be home!
:-)

What an aurora

From Astronomy Picture of the Day

Part of my morning routine is to read my blogging friends' latest posts, make a quick check of the news of the day, read a few of my favorite comics, and check out the Astronomy Picture of the Day. This is today's picture, and I was simply amazed when I looked at it. I've never before even seen a picture of an auroral corona. Taken last month in Norway by Harald Albrigtsen, the page gives more information about it:

Somewhat uncommon, an auroral corona appears as a center point for a surrounding display and may occur when an aurora develops directly overhead, or when auroral rays are pointed nearly toward the observer. This picturesque but brief green and purple aurora exhibition occurred last month high above Kvaløya, Tromsø, Norway. The Sessøyfjorden fjord runs through the foreground, while numerous stars are visible far in the distance.

Wow! It's such a beautiful picture I figured I'd share it with you, along with perhaps get you in the habit of looking at some fabulous part of our universe each morning. I am always bedazzled by spiral galaxies, mostly, but this... just wow!
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Another long weekend, for some

"Homeland Security: Fighting Terrorism since 1492"

Gene was wearing this t-shirt at the coffee shop yesterday, and I thought the message was quite appropriate for the upcoming holiday on Monday: Columbus Day. This is a federal holiday (meaning we won't get mail delivery and the banks will be closed) around the country. I just looked it up for this area, however, and found that the schools will be open and actually, most of the banks as well. There's quite a kerfuffle brewing over Columbus Day here in the Pacific Northwest.

Seattle voted this year to change the title of the holiday to "Indigenous People's Day" to honor the contributions of Native Americans on this day, instead of Columbus' discovery of America in October 1492. This led Italian Americans to object, saying (according to this article) that "this is a big insult to those of us of Italian heritage. We feel disrespected. America wouldn't be America without Christopher Columbus."

Sigh. And here in Bellingham, the City Council will vote on an ordinance that would have the date of October 13 designated as "Coast Salish Day." It will be interesting to see how all this plays out. Oh, and on another subject, I have already interviewed two of my friends to follow up with the idea of having a short biography here on the blog (Gene and Rita), but I've still got to write them and get an okay from each, making sure I get the facts right. I'm having fun already!

Sheltered from the rain

This morning, 14 of the walkers gathered in hopes of beating the rain that was on its way. Actually, we had just finished our walk when the heavy rain began. It kept up like this (see it coming off the roof?) for maybe a half hour and then the sun came out! It's one of those October days when sun, rain and clouds vie for dominance. It's that in-between time of year, and we all gathered afterwards for some coffee and conversation. A nice day, actually.
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High Pass Trail 2014

Twin Lakes, Winchester/High Pass trailhead

Today sixteen Senior Trailblazers gathered to hike up to Winchester Mountain, or maybe the High Pass Trail, depending on how many of us showed up. The Mt. Baker Wilderness Area requires that all groups be comprised of fewer than 12 hikers, so we decided that we would break into two groups, one going up to Winchester Mountain, and the rest of us (today it was four of us) continue up to the High Pass Trail. Since I had hiked up Winchester earlier this summer, I opted to go where I hadn't been before, the High Pass Trail.

Karen with a halo

Neither of these are long hikes: I think it's only four miles round trip to the top of Winchester, and just a little bit more than that to High Pass. But today was a simply perfect day, whichever route one took. Everyone who had never been to the top of Winchester Mountain went that direction, and we rejoined everyone at a predetermined time at Twin Lakes later. The blueberries were so profuse that we ate to our heart's content and still couldn't keep up! Where are the bears?

Peggy picking blueberries

It was impossible not to stop and pick blueberries to pop into your mouth. Each one had a slightly different taste, and I kept thinking I would find the perfect one and stop, but I never did. You can see in the picture below why I couldn't stop.

So many blueberries!

Mercy! By the time we had reached the top of High Pass, I noticed that I wasn't, for some reason, a bit hungry and anxious for lunch. And then we saw the view. Another fine portrait of Mt. Baker, one that you just don't see all that often. From this vantage point, it looks lopped off flat on the top, but from where I am sitting now (my living room), it looks completely round. Here's my view this afternoon:

Mt. Baker from High Pass

What a beautiful mountain! I will never tire of taking pictures of her, and I hope I'll have many more years of hikes in the wilderness to capture this mountain in all of her different characters. Today it was a perfect blend of temperature, clouds, fall colors, and serenity. And then it was time to start back down and join our other Winchester cohorts. It wasn't easy, because we kept having to stop and sample more, well, you know, blueberries.

Al in Blueberry Heaven

It was a really perfect day in so many ways. We only hiked somewhere around four or five miles, with a measly 1,600 feet of elevation gain and loss, which means I am sitting here at my laptop feeling like a million bucks, not tired, and filled with so much gratitude for another fine day in the wilderness. The only part I missed is not being with the larger group and spending time with my other Senior Trailblazers. They managed to have a great time without me, as I learned when we all met up at the end. We headed down to Graham's in Glacier to share some ice cream memories, and now we are in our own abodes, happy to have been on a great hike today.
:-)

Tuesday again already?

Front porch pansy

I went to the garden shop a few weeks back to get some flowers that would brighten up my front porch, since many of my pretty summer plants had finished blooming and/or gave up the ghost. These lovely pansies were a surprise, because they are my favorite color and frilly to boot. The plant didn't have any blooms, but lots of them were ready to emerge when I bought it. I hope they will last for awhile to brighten my comings and goings.

Although I'm retired, I have a fairly constant weekly schedule: Tuesdays are the one day each week when I take two classes back to back at the Y, starting at 8:00am and finishing at 10:00am. I don't exactly look forward to it, because I know I'll be tired afterwards, but after a shower and a nice cup of coffee, I feel simply great. It's also the only time during the week when I lift weights. (The class is actually held two days a week, Tuesdays and Thursdays, but I am out in the wilderness on Thursdays.) It's a class I don't like to miss, since keeping my strength up helps in many other aspects of my daily life.

I am mulling the possibility of writing some biographies about the interesting people in my life. I realized the other day that many of you think of me as being a rarified animal in the scheme of things. Not true! Maybe I could begin to interview some of the people at the Y who interest me, and write an article about each one. Would you like to know more about those fascinating people I hit the trails with? I'm thinking of Rita particularly, who is 75 and hikes, tap dances, bikes all day long sometimes, and recently took up scuba diving. What do you think?
:-)

Great documentary and a good book

I just got back from seeing a new documentary, Pelican Dreams, with my friend Judy. It's so new that the link, which takes you to Rotten Tomatoes, doesn't give a rating. Yet. In my opinion, it will be a really good one, because it was not only inspiring, I simply loved getting to know about pelicans. The film follows a young female pelican that lands on the Golden Gate Bridge and is rescued, until her release back into the wild.

Plus you also get to know a whole lot more about pelicans than you would ever know otherwise. I am now a fan of these fine birds, although I knew very little about them other than having watched them dive for fish along the Florida beach when I was visiting my sister. I highly recommend it.

We are very fortunate here in Bellingham to have an independent theater in town that gives us what it calls "Doctober" showing lots of documentaries during the month, with only a single screening, or sometimes more than one (like this one, which sold out last night and was shown one more time today). I'm looking forward to seeing a lot more wonderful documentaries this month.

And the book? One of my blogging friends (I don't remember who it was) suggested a book, and I went immediately to the local library website and put a hold on it. Once it came, I delved into it and was completely floored by the historical information that is covered in the book. It's called The Burglary: J. Edgar Hoover's Secret F.B.I. written by Betty Medsger. It tells the story of eight regular people who broke into the FBI's office in Media, Pennsylvania in 1971 and stole all the files. They not only burgled the place, but they were never caught. At the beginning of this year, Medsger released the book that outed six of the eight, for the first time. There is a fascinating article on the New York Times, Burglars Who Took on the F.B.I. Abandon Shadows, which pretty much tells the whole story.

The book is long, and covers some other similar events that just amazed me, mostly because I never knew about all this. I must have been busy raising kids and dealing with my own personal drama not to have known much of this history. Whoever it was that pointed me toward that book, thank you! And now I'm returning the favor.
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Excelsior Pass via Damfino

Damfino Lake, the biggest anyway

Thirteen Senior Trailblazers showed up today on a very fine, sunny day, as compared to our last two rather wet hikes. It looked for awhile like I wouldn't be able to join them, since I managed to lock my car keys into my trunk, with all my hiking gear safely inside. Fortunately, Rita volunteered to drive me home quickly to get my spare key, with the understanding we would join the rest of the group at the Glacier Ranger Station. Thanks to Rita, we were only around ten minutes behind the others! And she never went over the speed limit too. This is a day I wouldn't have wanted to miss.

Cold at the start, but more sun than clouds

We were bundled up at the start of the hike, even though the sun was warming things up pretty quickly. Here we stopped to make clothing adjustments before we would come out of the forest into full sun. The road to begin this hike has been closed for years, and when it opened up late last fall, we decided to try it. We didn't get far, as you can see from this trip report last November. Today, we made it to Excelsior Pass.

Lots of blueberry bushes along the way

After a fairly short trip through the forest, you follow this beautiful valley up to Excelsior Pass. Once we got out into the open, it turned out to be a simply beautiful day, with a few clouds but mostly sun as we ascended to the pass.

New snow on the peaks

Once we reached the pass, we had incredible views all around. It was almost noon, but since this part of the hike enters the wilderness area, we decided that some hikers would climb to the top of Excelsior Peak, while the rest of us would hike along the High Divide for awhile before stopping for lunch. The views of the surrounding peaks were incredible. Here's my best picture of Mt. Baker taken today.

Mt. Baker with new snow and a few clouds

I am always awestruck by the beauty of this mountain that I can often see from my front porch, which shows many of her faces to me on our hikes. After we had separated, and the eight of us stopped for a nice lunch in the sunshine, I looked over at Excelsior Peak and could see the others in our group had also stopped for lunch. They are the little dots at the top of the peak.

The Excelsior Peak Five

Yes, that's the peak. I can only see four dots, but I think the other person is just not quite in line with the others. We decided that we would regroup at the junction at 1:30pm. In the meantime, the rest of us had a nice lunch and then went for a short half-hour walk along the High Divide.

Carol, mountains, sun, clouds

As you can clearly see from this picture, it was a wonderful sunny day. We decided after lunch to take off and go as far as we could in a half hour. Looking ahead, I saw this really interesting looking spot, filled with red, with our trail crossing right in the middle of it (look close and you can see the trail).

That red is a big blueberry patch

The blueberry bushes have mostly turned red, as you can see here, and I was hoping that I might be able to get a picture, once we traveled to that red spot, of the backlit blueberry bushes with the mountains behind. Instead, this is what I got:

Blueberry bushes and mountains behind

Those bushes were so incredibly RED that I couldn't believe what I was seeing on the camera. I didn't manage to capture the mountains behind very well, but doesn't that look like a field of chili peppers rather than a field of blueberry bushes? I think we all ate so many blueberries and huckleberries today that we really didn't need to have lunch.

Colorful mountain ash in the foreground

On the way back, the sun was fairly low in the sky, and I kept trying to get some pictures that would show you how well the fall colors are coming along. I think this picture did a good job of it. By the time we reached our cars, we had traveled around seven miles (round trip) and 2,000 feet up and down. Not one of our hardest hikes, but one of our favorites. I had a GREAT day, thanks to my dear hiking friends, who did not let me down, and the magnificent wilderness area in our back yard.
:-)