Mount Ellinor Chute Flats from Big Creek

Mount Ellinor Chute Flats from Big Creek
Campground Upper Loop completing the loop on the way back. Also looped through the upper Ellinor trail head on the way down.

Too tired to write about it! 12 miles 3520 feet gain. That's a "24" on the "Hike Difficulty Calculator"

My husband after reading the Forest Service PDF file on Mount Ellinor insisted that I take my ice axe with me. I told him I was not going to go anywhere near the areas that would require an ice axe. Just to make him happy I carried the damn thing.. :) Oh well at least it looks kewl to pack around an ice axe, not that anyone else saw me. I also carried my damn cell phone to make my husband happy. I was able to call him from the connecter trail and I talked to him for about 1/4 of a mile.

He was worried about me going up Ellinor because a guy named Bill got lost on the Ellinor trail months ago and had to have search and rescue come get him. We listened to the Search and Rescue operations on my scanner. It took a VERY LONG TIME for Olympic Mountain Rescue to reach him and just as long for them to get him down from the mountain. The call first came in to the local police at about 1pm and they did not have him off the mountain until after we woke up the next morning around 9 am.

Bill got lost in 1/4 inch of snow and hiked down the wrong side of the mountain. From what I could tell listening along and looking at my map he was on the other side of Mount Rose when they found him!

Not long ago, we had a mission to Mt Ellinor to find
a lost hiker. The man had gone to the top while
ignoring the weather signs of the incoming clouds.
Long story short, he made it to the top, but then the
weather socked in and started to rain and snow. On
the way down he lost his way. We were out in the
thick of it. I do not think that any of us were
completely dry after spending the night out there.

All these mushrooms are frozen solid. From Top to Bottom, Frozen Chanterelle (C. formosus), Frozen Fall "oyster" mushrooms (Panellus serotinus), Frozen Witches Butter (Tremella mesenterica)

Kennedy Creek Salmon Trail

This is a short intepretive trail that is open only in November. The purpose of the trail is to view chum salmon spawning. We went the first weekend in November and got rained on and soaked through but saw very few salmon. We were too early to see the bulk of the run and the river was too high and muddy to see what was running. Today we went again and we were too late to see the bulk of the run. My toddler enjoyed looking at all the dead fish but my 8 year old was threatening to throw up from the stench of rotting salmon.

Then we carried on to the Capital Forest. Well perhaps it was the Capital Forest, I'm not having much luck actually finding the place! I can see what I think is the forest, I even found a street called Capital Forest Dr. But I can't seem to find the entrance points to the forest. I wish I could find better directions.

What ever we found it was kind of nice, it was a board walk running around a wet land area that had been logged over perhaps 50 years ago. We admired the old growth stumps and hunted for mushrooms. Gee I can't even remember the name of it. Ok I found it on google, it was Mclane Creek Centennial Demonstration Forest. It was part of the Capitol Forest. I'll have to do some more exploring in the Capital Forest but the fact that it is also for mountain bikes and ORV's coupled with the fact that I live just as close to Olympic National Park makes me slow in going to explore it. What could possibly be better then Olympic National Park?

Capital Forest is closed to ORV's and bikes from November 1st to March 31st so this would be the time of year to hike it.

I know where I am going to hike this week and I'm excited about it. I'd rather hike on my usual day but there is an 80% chance of rain that day so I will wait until Wednesday with it's 30% chance of rain. I'm going high and don't want to be in a blizzard!

Matsutake Hunting Failures

This morning our breakfast consisted of Zeller's boletus, Fall Oysters, a taste of delicious milkcaps and leftover turkey.

With high hopes I set out with my two daughters for an area where I remember seeing Candy Stipe plant this summer. My husband stayed home to nurse a fever. Well I don't like driving in the snow so I did not go where I intended. I knew there might be snow. I have only seen Candy stipe plant in the mountains.

Much to my oldest daughter's pleasure on the way down the mountain I found some earthstars. They are not edible as far as I know but they are interesting to look at.

We decided to look around in the lower parts of the National Forest since the upper parts were just too hard to get the stroller into. We walked down some roads and found nothing. The baby screamed and screamed about being forced to sit in her stroller. We caught the attention of a park Ranger and he asked us what we were doing. He did not know much about mushrooms but he thought the mushroom season was over.

The ranger was busily pursuing some dirt bikers and at first he thought we were with them. The ranger bid us farewell and we carried on down the road to our parking spot and I let the baby out of the stroller and had a cup of coffee while watching the show of the ranger backing up and down and then up a dirt road trying to catch the motor cyclists . Finally he did catch them, my oldest daughter and I had a good laugh! The ranger just wanted them to slow down a bit because they were tearing up the forest too much. When he was done talking to them he drove past us and waved to us.

We tried another spot in the National Forest but still had no luck so we gave up and went back to yesterday's spot. We had only explored half of yesterday's spot. Still no Matsutake but we did bring home a few Chanterelle and Elfin Saddles.

It was a bit cold today and the baby wet herself more then her diaper could hold so she was even colder. At the car I changed her clothes and her diaper then put her in her car seat and draped my down jacket over her and put my hat on her head. She really thought it was cool to "wear" mama's coat!


I'm pretty tired, I walked most of the day and was pushing a baby stroller the entire time. We only had a few scraps of turkey with us so we were all famished by the time we got home. At home we feasted on thanksgiving left overs. I just had a piece of pumpkin pie for desert and am now thinking about the cranberry sauce.

I don't know where I will hike next week. I'll stay at a lower elevation if I want to gather mushrooms but maybe I will decide to play in the snow and hike up a local 3,500 foot mountain.

Tomorrow the plan is to sleep in and stay home until my husband wakes up and if he feels well enough we will all go to the Kennedy Creek Salmon Trail . If he does not feel well enough I guess I could stay home and feed him what's left of the matsutake soup.

Hood Canal

I went on a mushroom hunt with my 8 year old today. My husband was kind enough to babysit most of the day. It was raining too hard to take the baby. I hope to go mushroom hunting again tomorrow with both girls.

I found one older matsutake and one that had been chewed on by something. We also found what I think are Oyster Mushrooms (first picture) and we found what I think are lactarius deliciosus (second picture). We are hoping to eat the unknown ones but are waiting on spore prints and email verification before we give them a try.

I got to give my new rain gear a good test on Thanksgiving day and it worked out well. But my boots are still not waterproof. I am going to return my boots to REI in December when I have to go to Tacoma anyway.

We were tip toeing through a park that had a sign in the entrance that said "no mushroom picking" I tend to ignore signs like that. If I obeyed a no trespassing sign in my neighbor hood I never would have found my prized chanterelle spot. The spot is on public enough land but the bridge to get to it is on private land.

Anyway while tip toeing through the Russulales I spotted another human doing the same. She showed no fear so I also showed no fear. She said to me "We are crazy huh?" (Because we were out in the rain and cold) I said yep.. She then peered into my daughters basket that was filled with all kinds of mystery mushrooms.. she basically picks every new mushroom type she finds and then take to them home to try to identify.

I asked this person "having any luck?"

She said "I only found one old one."

So she knew that we knew that she knew that we were, that is we all knew that we were there for one reason only. That reason was matsutake.

Thanks to Irene on Usenet I think I have these narrowed down a bit more. The oysters are Panellus serotinus as I had suspected. The milk cap is probably L. deliciosus var. olivaceosordidus

Lower South Fork Skokomish

I was able to get out early again today. I woke up at 6am nursed the baby and said goodbye to my husband. I did not waste anytime eating breakfast or making coffee. In the future I am going to brew a pot of coffee and take a thermos full with me in the car to save money.

I stopped for Gas at AM/PM where the prices are pretty good. They also charge $1.79 for Clif Bar so I passed those up and had a Tiger's Milk Bar for breakfast. I've not had them before and they taste pretty good but are probably a waste of money. May as well buy a Snickers bar for half the price.

I was on the trail by 7:30 am. The first mile of this trail goes through some amazing old growth and it was a bit primeval in the morning fog at twilight.

I hiked to camp comfort and back with a lot of little side trips for a total hike of about 9 miles. I found TONS of a certain kind of mushroom but they had all been hit by frost and were worthless. Maybe next year I'll got a little bit earlier and get them. I only saw two other people on the trail but they did not see me. I was off the trail looking at mushrooms.

No sign of any Matsutake on this trail. Too bad my head was filled with visions of bags full of Mastutakes all night.

This was my first hike since my Grandma died four days ago. I did not take a lunch break because as soon as I sat down I started thinking of my Granmda and it made me too sad.

After I hiked back to the trail head I drove up to Lebar Horse Camp 1/2 mile up the road. On the side of the road I found a large pile of Chum Salmon. They had been stripped of their eggs and dumped. They must have been dumped very recently as there was very little stench. Perhaps this is what the local ndns do with the Chum now instead of dumping them in the Hood Canal. I took the time to light a smudge stick of sage and blessed the salmon. I don't know if it made the salmon feel better but it made me feel better!

The chum were too far gone at the time of harvest to have edible flesh but still I hate to see this slaughter and stripping of eggs.

Ok now my thoughts are on Thanksgiving dinner and how I am going to burn it off, but first I have to cook it. I'll need to do a strenuous hike next week perhaps a turkey burn? This one would do the trick:

Nov. 29, Sat. - Marmot Pass Turkey Burn (S) (USGS or GT
Tyler Peak; CC
Buckhorn Wilderness) 10.4 mi. RT. 3500 gain.
Come on out after Thanksgiving
and burn off that food before it
changes your belt size. Meet 8:30 a.m. at
Quilcene RS.

I wonder how much snow there is on Marmot Pass right now? I'd like to join the mountaineers but it's rather expensive and I really enjoy my solo hikes. With two busy children to take care of the rest of the week it's vital to my mental health to go solo. It's the only time I can hear myself think!