North Cascades, Olympic, Rainier: Washington’s national parks are situated in a way that suggest a road trip tour of all three making a big loop around northwest Washington. After a bit of planning we set off to do just that on the last day of July.
After a drive through the hot, dry, baked brown, eastern portion of Washington we arrived in the foothills of the North Cascades and set up a base camp near Mazama for a few days. Our first couple of days were actually spent outside North Cascades National Park, enjoying a couple hikes to some popular high mountain lakes along highway 20. Washington Pass offered our first views of the North Cascades.
We headed to the Blue Lake trailhead and although we probably didn’t appreciate it at the time, were lucky to get a parking spot that was not on the highway. As we started the hike the sky started to rumble. We mainly dodged the heavier rain under the tree canopies as we enjoyed more mountain views.
We were nearly to the lake when we spotted a mountain goat and her kid.
We had watched them make their way down a rock spine and they were milling around on the trail in front of us. I was hopeful they would head the other way on the trail, or continue down hill.
This is them, deciding not to do what I was hoping but instead start down the trail toward us.
We reversed course and started back down the trail. We were on a narrow section with a rock face uphill from us and a cliff on the downhill side, so continuing down the trail was our only immediate choice. Each time I glanced back, the goats were gaining ground on us. I was hearing the clip clop of the hooves behind me just about the time the trail widened so we could get out of the trail. It was none too soon, as I looked back to see a trotting goat with her head down right on my heels. We quickly got as far off the trail as we could and luckily the goats continued down the path. I grabbed a quick photo as they left us behind. It was over as quick as it started.
The rest of the hike was relatively uneventful. We arrived to the crowded lake and took in the views, but didn’t stay long, as the mosquitoes had us outnumbered by a pretty wide margin.
The next morning we headed back up highway 20, this time to Rainy Pass. We got a fairly early start and once again were lucky enough to get a parking space, one of the last ones before the crowd started spilling out to park along the highway again. While the views are great on these hikes, they are not the place to go in search of any solitude. We left a lot of the crowd behind by choosing to head to Lake Ann instead of Rainy Lake.
The wildflowers were in peak form all along the trail.
It was a quick walk to the lake, set in a nice cirque.
We headed back down the trail, and before we reached the trailhead we noticed a couple staring off into the woods. They mentioned they had just seen a black bear. Sure enough, just a few dozen steps down the trail we noticed a big black furball crashing its way through the woods. It moved too quickly to grab a photo of it, but it was nice to get a glimpse.
The next day happened to be a Saturday, and we were headed into the actual Park. With trailheads crowded outside the park during the week, would we be able to find a spot away from the crowds inside the park on a weekend? We’ll see in part 2.
