Drake Lookout Geocache DNF

 11.5 miles with 1,000 feet elevation gain

January 18th 2021

I woke up and did not want to hike, I was tired.  I had trouble sleeping again and was not feeling the love of hiking.   But I was all packed and I need to lose weight, so I forced myself up.   Today was MLK day and the trails were sure to be crowded, so I opted to check out a logging road in the Wynoochee Valley that leads to the site of an old look out and a geocache. 

There are two different gates to park at for this cache.  I opted for the south gate because Google Earth hinted that there might be nice views on the way up.  There was really no view at all the trees had grown in.

I noticed it was very quiet.  I love the Wynoochee for quiet, I hardly ever hear an airplane in when I am in the Wynoochee Valley.   As I got near the top I saw a steep climb ahead so I decided to take a break and have a drink and send a text to my beautiful wife to be.  I texted her about how quiet and lovely it was.   Shortly I heard a vehicle approach, so I moved up a side road and around the corner to avoid being seen.  Soon a truck roared up the hill at a frightful speed.  I was glad that I had been stopped when I heard the truck.  I would have probably been really frightened by the speeding truck if I had been moving and it snuck up behind me.

I carried on up the hill and soon found the side road that led to the geocache I wanted.  I also started hearing logging noises and then the same truck came back.  I was already on a side road so they did not see me. 

I think the truck had raced up the hill and beyond to drop off a logger, that would explain the start of logging noised.  The truck was going at a much saner pace on the way down.

Lunch spot on the very top of Reed Hill. 

I could not reach the geocache location due to massive amounts of cut Douglas-fir on the ground.  I was a shame to push my bike so far up a hill only to get skunked.  The piles of brush were too much though.  I did not want to risk getting hurt crawling over it, on it and through it as would have been required.   

I gave up on the cache and turned around and went to the top of Reed hill and had my lunch.  There was no view from the top due to the forest making a futile attempt to grow back before Greed Diamond razes it again.

The trip back down was fun a slow and steady coast all the way back to my car. 

Kamilche or McCleary Geocaching in a Daze in the Rain

My GPS(r) with a geocache
I prefer this Garmen GPSmap 60CSX over the newer models

A sudden change of fortune this month has prompted me to stay closer to home.  Also the weather has been awful.  Never ending rain.  The sun breaks only serve to trick me into going outside just to be rained on.  Such dreadful weather is doing my head in.

I decided to revisit a geocaching area about halfway between Kamilche and McCleary.  I was last there just over a year ago and I had started working on a puzzle cache.  I've looked for all the other caches in the area, but I'm just not a fan of puzzle caches.

Started my hike in the rain with Sage.  I always try to get out of the car and onto the trail without anyone seeing me get started.  I try not to advertise that I am a woman hiking solo.  But there was so much traffic on the road, I'm not sure if I succeeded.  My efforts to stay safe can also rouse suspicion.  Why is that person hiding?  They must be up to no good!

So I wandered around in the rain in a terrible mood looking for geocaches.  Because I was in a down mood,  I fell a lot and because I was in a down mood each fall hurt much more than usual.  I hiked 2.6 miles in five hours!  I was moving slow and taking lots of pictures during the brief sun breaks.

When I had found the last cache and it was time to turn back I honestly had no real idea what way was back.  I was dazed and confused.  I mean, I knew that downhill would take me back, but I did not remember the lay of the land at all and without my GPS(r) I would have gone down the wrong drainage.  Okay it turned out it was not the wrong drainage, just not the one I came up.

An oldgrowth cedar stump  is all that is left of the ancient tree that once grew here.
I am going to really start documenting these stumps. One day even the stumps will be gone
 and then no one will have a clue how much has been lost and how big trees are supposed to be.

At lunch time I found a perfect log with perfect trees aligned perfectly so I could pitch my tarp.  It was a nearly perfect tarp pitch on the first try, I only had to tweak it one time!  But the log was not so perfect, it was bumpy and uncomfortable.  To add to my discomfort Sage began to shiver, so I knew it had to be a short lunch break.  I shared hot soup with Sage to help warm her up.

Sage was wearing her raincoat that keeps her back dry, but it was not enough.  I think Sage gets cold easier than Patches did too.

While under the tarp I got out my camera, mini-tripod, two wireless controllers and an off camera flash.  I used this to take pictures of some fungi that I had carried with me.  There under my dry tarp I was able to photo the fungi, while Sage shivered and I felt guilty.

I use my old half broken flash units for hiking, but I think I will start using my newer flashes for dry hikes.  I need to memorize how to use my flash system.

Poor person's gumdrops (Guepiniopsis alpinus)

This area is fascinating and probably about to be logged, so I intend to go back soon.  The forest is getting nice and that can only mean one thing in a tree farm.  As soon as a tree farm starts to resemble a forest it gets logged.  The moment you catch yourself thinking to yourself  "those doug-fir look big enough to support chanterelles" the forest will be logged.

The two gates closest to the gate where I went in said that there was active logging in the area and I could hear some logging noises in the distance. 

I found all of the caches,  but could not solve the puzzle to get the final cache.  I might never solve the puzzle.  Perhaps I should do like most cachers do and get the answer from someone else who has already solved it.

Red track is today I actually could have gone right down
that drainage and been fine instead I steered back towards the ridge

I know have 995 geocache finds.  I'd like to do something special for my 1,000th find.  I have not decided what that will be yet other than a hike somewhere new.

2.6 miles with almost 500 feet elevation gain

Westport and McCleary

Made two geocaching trips to McCleary and will make one more.  I think I uploaded a video of one of them.  I like this geocaching area, it's on Greed Diamond land, but it is still pretty and quiet.  A permit is required to hike on more and more Greed Diamond land every year, I won't pay it and I think they should lose their special tax status when they charge for recreational permits.


Here is my video, warning, I seem to be going through the change and it's making me very moody.



I picked a beautiful day at Westport, did 6 miles round trip on the public paved path at the state park.  Did some walking on the Beach too.  I like to catch Pokemon in Westport as they have a lot of ground, electric and fire type pokemon there.  Here at home we mostly have grass types.

I've been hiking in places with cell reception so I can get walking credit in Pokemon go, but also becasue the snow level is low this year and I don't have a Jeep anymore.

Geocaching in Kamilche

We decided to change things up a bit and go on a geocaching run on my hike day.  We still managed to hike 7 miles and gain some 1,000 feet of elevation while finding 24 geocaches.  We are both more tired than we are after a 10 mile hike.  Must have been all the off trailing we did.

Here is a sample of some of the caches we found: