Friday, January 29, 2010

Another Rosey Mosey on the Dose














The start of the hike at the big washout


There was a pay station but I did not see a register for hikers





Burned Ridge from Constance fire


Park Entrance



Fire Damage


Rock Slide on the trail road



Lake Constance Trailhead demolished by the fire



No fishing!


Burt Rock and Cut tree



Fire Damage Pano


A pretty rock



This is the road!



Smashed sign


Dosewallips Falls



Dosewallips Falls


Neigh Neigh Neigh, but I am not a horse



Station Creek hydroelectric building, very recently buried



Drowned hydroelectric building and sign at the end of the road



Ralph the bear's old place in the valley



Do not enter sign for people coming down the trail.



The shit house was a welcome site indeed!



Lunch spot


Dosewallips falls on the walk out



Twisty


Elkhorn campground has had some maintenance


Green and blue


Mount Jupiter


The damage to the road from the Constance fire was not as bad as I expected. I saw two cyclists on the trail who were on their way out from camping.

My Jeep made it over the washout before the washout so I started my hike at the big washout. I was a bit scared driving over it but my Jeep did just fine.

I went 21 days without hiking due to sinus trouble. It felt really good to be back out there today. Maybe I will calm down a bit now.

After seeing how nasty Staircase is in the summer, I think I vote for this road to never being repaired; not that my vote counts for anything. I enjoyed the solitude and the lack of crowds and the lack of rangers. But I never actually saw what this place was like when the road was open.

I had enough energy to go up the trail, but I stopped at the campground because dogs are not allowed on the trails.

I started my hike at 10 am and finished at about 3:45. My moving average was 3.7 MPH on this smooth road/trail.

12 miles with
1,100 feet elevation gain
Average moving speed 3.7 miles per hour!

216 miles on my shoes

Other times I have blogged this hike

Saturday, November 22, 2008
Monday, February 11, 2008
Thursday, March 02, 2006
Wednesday, December 27, 2006

I also carried my then 12 month old the entire way on my back (after one hell of an argument with my husband) sometime in 2005, but before I started blogging. That may have been my favorite trip.
















Thursday, January 28, 2010

I need to hike



Protesting the installation of a US backed dictator in the Honduras.

I'm too manic and run down to figure out where to hike. I don't know how much stamina I will have tomorrow. I'll be manic so that will give me stamina but I also have a nasty upper and middle resperatory infection so that will slow me down. Maybe I will pick a long flat hike with no elevation gain. I want a hike where I can take my dog so that rules out the National Park. I also want a hike where I can take stunning award winning artistic photographs but I have not been able to take a decent picture for a while. Last night I tried to get a picture with the capitol dome in back and prostestors in the front and a vietnamese restaurant in the middle but the capital dome did not show up. Here it is anway.

I can't think, I can't think. I don't like not being able to think but this is a hiking blog so I'll leave it at that.

Tuesday, January 19, 2010

Too ill

I'm too ill to hike this week. I guess it's time for another round of augmenton. My ears really hurt. I'm Going to see the doctor tomorrow. In the mean time I'm in a manic panic. I need to hike!' I just scored a 38.

Here is a hiking related thing that I find to be hysterically funny when I am manic. The rest of the time it is just kinda humorous.

Barry the backwoods bastard says

If you clicked on that and came back and want to know what that is about this is what it is about

Monday, January 18, 2010

My toenail

So don't scroll down unless you want to see a picture of my toenail.

My right big toenail is falling off and it hurts because I keep catching the end of it under things and then more of the dying nail gets ripped out of the nail bed. Ouch!

I don't know how this happened but from what I've been told I probably kept my toenails too long and then killed them on a long descent as they jammed into the toe of my shoe over and over.

I think my left big toenail is beginning to do the same thing. There is a ridge about half way from the end of it and I think that ridge is the edge of a new toenail growing in.

The is new nail under the one that is falling off on my right foot. I just caught my nail on something while I was kicking dirty laundry into a pile and it hurts like hell! So here is the picture.. last warning. If you don't want to see my toe nail, don't scroll down.
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Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Petite 4s? :) There is no escaping from them!

Petit four, petits fours. Yes Petite 4's. I don't even know where my ceramic sock is and it's been 3 of those baby jesus things since someone filled it, but there is no escaping from petits fours. I have not opened them yet, but I know what they are. Yes, I KNOW WHAT IS IN THOSE BOXES. I'm waiting for the Mr. to come home. Thanks!





(photo credit)
English: Petit Fours Tower
Date
2006
Source
http://www.simonleebakery.com/weddingcakeindex.htm
Author
Simon Lee Bakery

Saturday, January 9, 2010

My pictures

I'm done posting my best pictures to the WTA. I did not realize that posting a trip report there gives them free license to use my pictures wherever they please on their website without even giving me proper credit.

They posted one of my favorite pictures in two different places and gave credit to my nick name. How lame to give photo credit to a nick name.

Who owns my photos here on this blog? I can't find any info on that. Can someone find the link for me?

It is shaping up to be a nice day. I could go hiking or biking but I don't have the energy for it at the moment. I've had a double ear infection for a few weeks now. Perhaps I should go get some anti-biotics.

Anyway here is some good news. I've completed college! Yes I've got my degree. My credits were just posted. I may go on and try for a dual degree, I'm not sure. The only thing I know for sure is that I am not going to college this quarter.

Thursday, January 7, 2010

Capitol Peak via North Rim, Rock Candy and Mount Molly


My track in google earth




Rocky Trail


Mount Rainier, radio tower and Mount Adams



(towers on the Peak)

This Capitol Peak is in the Capital Forest outside of Olympia. This is a working forest, that means that is it very ugly compared to the national park or national forest wilderness areas. But it is low elevation so can be a good alternative when the real mountains are snowbound.

This was my second attempt at this route. I waited until the weather was forecast was "mostly sunny" so I could see the views.. I did not see much sunlight and I got cold in the breeze, but at least it was not cloudy. I started my hike at 9am and finished at 4pm. My average moving speed was 2.4 MPH. My goal was to find my way to Capitol Peak and back before sunset and then take my kids to a potlock. I met my goal today.

I parked about a mile above the rock candy entrance and seem to have started my hike on the North Rim Trail. Some of the trail signs seem to be wrong, even some of the road signs were wrong, so it is hard to know for sure what trails and roads I was on. In this part of the Capitol Forest ORV’s are allowed and the trail is not every nice for walking on. There are huge ruts and mud puddle to be negotiated and my right ankle was not pleased.

I avoided Sundays mistake and did not have to climb Rock Candy Mountain. But to get to the Capitol Peak I had to hike up over a shoulder of Rock Candy and then back down it, so I had to regain some elevation on the way out. On Rock Candy Mountain I found a caramel colored rock that looked like candy.

Route finding was pretty easy for me this time and I never once had to pull out my capitol forest map. I had studied the map so well when I was home that I did not need to use it on the trail. I was helped along by some waypoints I had entered in my GPS that showed the road. Also, two geocaches helped me to know where I was.

At one point I had to make a detour around a huge road washout by bushwhacking straight up a hill to the nearest logging road.




When I finally made it onto the Mount Molly Loop I found the trail to be much nicer, as that loop is in the biker and hiker half of the forest where no ORV’s are allowed. I saw some trail work that was signed by the Friends of the Capitol Forest or FOCF. On the Mount Molly Loop trail I also found a rebound knob and a pair of glasses with the initials K.J. on them.


One of the geocaches that helped me to navigate was hidden by "moun10bike" and is one of the oldest 1% of caches left in the state. "moun10bike" is one of the founders of geocaching.com. His cache was right on the trail so it was really helpful. The other cache was on capital peak and it helped me too. The trail I took to the peak contoured below the peak and it was not obvious when I had passed the peak. But seeing the Geocache waypoint come and go told me that I had passed the peak. When I realized I had passed the geocache I bushwhacked up a bit and then found a trail to the peak. The peak had a nice enough view, but I still found it to be kind of drab. I only had 20 minutes to rest and take pictures on the peak if I wanted to make my turn around time of 1pm. From the peak there was a good view of the Cascades. I saw Baker, The Mountain, Mount Adams, Mount St. Helens and Mount Hood. I also saw the valleys and waterways around Olympia. There were only peek-a-boo-views of my beloved Olympic Mountains.

The view of Mount St. Helens was a bit marred by huge smoke stacks. I think those are the smoke stacks from TransAlta Corporation’s coal-burning power plant in Centralia. The plant is used to generate electricity to sell to California. The plant does not meet California air quality standards, so it was located in Washington instead of California. It is putting mercury into the high country lakes, contaminating the fish and blocking the views in two of our National Parks.

There was one workman at the top and he didn’t really know what to make of me being up there, so we ignored each other. I packed a large ham steak for my dog to eat and the silly thing would not eat it unless I hand fed it to her. What a goofy dog she is. I get frustrated with her not eating her food and instead begging for my lunch. I never imagined she would turn her nose up at a giant ham steak I packed for her this time. I hand fed about half of it to her and the rest got left behind. From now on I’m only going to pack dry dog food for her and I am going to tie her up where I can’t see her begging. Why should I carry a heavy ham steak for her to only turn her nose up at it as if it were dry dog food?

When I left he peak I bushwhacked back down to the trail because it was the most direct route. I’m not sure if I would do that again, as I had to go through a huge patch of salmon berries and devils club.


Salmon Berry and devils club trap

Walking the long way might have been easier. All in all, I did manage to cut about half a mile off the distance of my return trip by taking more direct routes.

On the way back to the car I started to feel relaxed and felt a bit of hikers high or had my moment of transcendence. This was good because and the start of the hike I was not too happy. It was nice to end the hike feeling good. I had really been looking forward to this hike all week, so I was surprised when did not feel like hiking this morning. I enjoyed the last half of my hike and did not find my self looking forward to getting back to my car like I sometimes do, but my car was still a welcome site. I don’t know if I would do this particular hike again but I do want to do more exploring in the Capitol Forest. And this hike made a nice change from my usual hikes in the Olympics.

13.7 miles
3,300 feet total ascent
car to car 7 hours
Average moving speed 2.4 mph



Nice blossom of Witches Butter on a snag


Trail #30



Tracklog


The Mountain



Snag




Red tailed hawk and Mount Saint Helens


Old Growth Stumps.
This must have been a beautiful forest before it was logged


Satsop Nuclear Plant


Hill view


Mount Saint Helens and the Source of all the Murcury in the high country lakes.


Evelvation profile log. A few ups and downs.


Had to do some route finding here



Mount Adams, I will return to you!



A tower on the Peak