Walks with Moss: Copper Creek trail and a 4 hour traffic delay

Taken on the drive to the trail head in the morning Lake Cushman

Copper Creek

I got my little one off to school and headed for the Copper Creek trail. I felt this trail would be a good challenge that would be just short of over doing it. I did not want to overdo it because I have some photography work I want to do tomorrow and I still don’t trust my ankle. I’m happy to report that my ankle was just fine for this hike! I did wear boots and almost got blisters but I am so happy that my ankle was good. I made a point of stretching my calf muscles before I got to the trail part of the hike. The hike was 4 miles longer that I thought it would be.

This hike starts on a logging road and is longer than it used to be before the 2007 flood wiped out the bridge over Lake Cushman. This time of year you can see all the stumps from the beautiful cedar trees that the city of Tacoma cut down before they damned the North Fork Skokomish River.

I’m still a bit ill, so I really took my time hiking to the top and I spent a lot of time taking pictures. It was too cold and windy and foggy at the 3,000 foot viewpoint, for me to sit and eat lunch there, so I had my lunch back down by river near the trail head.

On my way out,I tried to explore some of the mining caves, but my headlamp batteries went dead and it was scary, so I’ll have to do it some other day. I’ve been trying to get my husband to go there with me for years. Now he is too ill to ever make the short hike to the caves, so it’s not going to happen. I’ll have to use Patches for protection.

Near the end of my hike I reached a really peaceful state that might be considered a state of transcendence, or hikers high or being struck by the muse. So when I reached my car I changed camera lenses and went back to the bridge to take a few more pictures. Then that state faded away as began to realize that my back was sore. Anyway, it was fun while it lasted.

On the way back I ran into a huge traffic delay. The power lines that power the damn that they destroyed the river (and created Lake Cushman) to build, got knocked down by a log truck.

I met a guy name Fred who was from Oregon and was stuck in the traffic jam; the way I met this guy was kind of funny. I had decided to wait out the traffic delay at Cushman Power Park rather than keeping my spot in line in the middle of the road. Cushman Park is nice, it was built by the city of Tacoma, and it has a boat launch, picnic tables, flush toilets, an old apple orchard and a saltwater beach. While there, I decided to head down to the beach to do some long exposure nighttime photography.

While I was taking pictures, I suddenly realized that the music I was hearing was live music and there was a human very near me, but I could not see him at all. I had thought the music was coming from a distant house. When he was done playing I could hear him walking near me and I could just barely make out his profile on that dark beach, so I said “hi” to him. I think I startled him. It turns out he was playing a ukulele. He was curious about my photography so we chatted about that a bit even though we could not see each other’s faces in the dark. I felt safe because I had Springer Spaniel Raging, Patches to guard me.

After a bit Fred and I went back up the parking lot and saw that the tribal fisher people who were stuck in the traffic jam and had been out since sunrise, decided to drive their boats home and leave their trucks at the boat launch, rather than wait in traffic. So a long line of them launched their boats in the pitch dark and headed across the Hood Canal at a very fast clip with no light source. I found that amusing.

At one point I went off in search of apples because I was getting hungry and then I found a young man’s wallet outside the bathrooms. The wallet had tribal fishing permits in it. When I finally got home I was able to find the owner on facebook and he is coming to get his wallet tomorrow. Fred gave me a hardboiled egg and some other food so I stopped looking for apples.

After seeing all the tribal folks take off Fred and I both decided to drive back to Hoodsport and grab some food at the grocery store before it closed. We did this because we were hungry and because the exhaust fumes from all the cars and trucks waiting in line were making the air really foul.

After grabbing some food we pulled off the road outside of Hoodsport to wait out the traffic away from all the auto exhaust. It turns out that Fred is a hiker who had done most of the peaks in the Cascades. I showed Fred my hiking pictures and he showed me his trip pictures. He was on his way home from attending his grand-son’s 6th birthday party on Orcas Island and It turns out that he lives in Nehalem. My great-grandpa is buried in Nehalem and he used to own a shake mill there, so it was interesting to me that he was from Nehalem. . He also knew about the horrible, but famous trip that my ancestors took over the Oregon Trail. (the lost Meek party) He told me that a man with my last name has a photography studio down there in Nehalem. I know he must be related to me, everyone with my last name is. Wow, the photography gene must really be in my family. I need to go track this guy down.

Fred had a bed in the back of his car and he was worried that I would get cold, so he invited me into his car for the night, but I declined. I felt much more comfortable in my own car. Finally at about 10pm the road was cleared so I went home, but first I offered to let Fred crash on my couch, but Fred decided to stay camped on the side of the road until morning. He said he was more comfortable in his car. Maybe he did not want to meet my husband? :)

I did not get home until almost 11pm and when I got home the house was trashed and my oldest needed me to retrieve her earring from the trap under the bathroom sink. I also felt the need to quickly track down the owner of the wallet I found. My husband and my youngest also wanted to tell me about their day. Whew… that was a lot to come home to, as tired as I was after doing such a hike and getting stuck in traffic for hours..

8 miles RT with 2,500 feet elevation gain.

Follow up, the guy just came and got his wallet. He was one of the fishermen who took off in a boat.