Highway 2 Corridor

Deception Falls (off Highway 2 near Stevens Pass)

June 24, 2003 Just a quick afternoon drive in the mountains with the girls. This is what living in the northwest is all about.

January 2, 2000 The parking lot for Deception Falls is literally right off Highway 2. You pull into the parking lot, go down about 20 stairs or so, and <<poof!>> you're there! There is an upper and lower falls and a short loop (apx. .5 mile) will show you everything. It's not so much a destination spot, but it sure is a good place to stop if you're driving by.

Lake Serene and Bridal Veil Falls (off Highway 2 just before Index)

December 6, 2003

I took the opportunity on the drive home from Lake Chelan to stop and do one of my favorite short, but heart-pumping, hikes.  :)  The trail to the falls is only like 1.25 miles and a quick hour roundtrip.

There were a few pictures from the hike... the obligatory "what does the falls look like this time" pics that I won't bore you with... but this one was particularly cewl. I like moss.

September 1, 2003

It was an absolutely gorgeous Labor Day Monday and I was well overdue for a hike. After not doing a SINGLE hike in August (OH MY GOD THAT'S SAD!!), I figured I'd once again head up to the lake. This is such a wonderful afternoon hike because the trail is in the shade by mid-morning.

I hit the trailhead at 11:30, ready to get my butt kicked by the fun fun stairs. 45 minutes to the Fall cut-off, 2 hours total to the lake.

I counted the stairs again... for some reason I was thinking there was supposed to be 353? Go figure. Anyway, I counted 344. Pretty close to last time. What I realized this time was that it's not the stairs that are the difficult part... it's the sandy, dirty, rooty, rocky, steep rest of the trail that makes it that much more difficult.

Without any other commitments calling me home, I spent an hour at the lake on the lunch rock... even climbed down to the lake. Damn! That water is cold. There was also a nice breeze that kept it from being too hot. Ahhh.  :)  Happy goober.

After an hour and 15 minute descent, I was back at my car... which just happened to be in full sunlight. Yuck. I hate it when that happens.

Okay, enough for the hike... I have a couple of personal announcements: Last Friday was my last day of work. I worked there for 7 years and was part of the senior management team. I put my heart into that place. They moved my dept to Chicago and since I wouldn't move, I got laid off. It was a long time coming... I knew back in May, but it's still really sad. The company has no leadership, no vision, no direction. Actually, it's a very very good time to get out. So, after I take some vacation... get the girls off to school, play some ET, do some hiking, and head off to Amsterdam for a couple of weeks... I'm starting my own company. A company that can do all the great projects WG never would and small, agile, and well-run enough to really be successful.

So back to this hike... I don't know why I always think it's going to kick me. It really doesn't, not as much as some of those longer North Cascades hikes that leave you sore for days. It's just a mental note... I'm probably not even going to be sore tomorrow. Go figure.

:) More soon.

April 20, 2003 I took the girls up for a quick stroll to the falls today.  :)  ...and got more good pics.  :)

March 29, 2003

So I needed to get my ass kicked today and I figured the stairs to Lake Serene would be up to the task. My hiking buddy was working today, so for the second weekend in a row, I went alone.

I had a lazy morning and didn't leave the house until 8:45 or so... made a few stops... bought the new Linkin Park CD... didn't hit the trailhead until 10:15. It was a beautiful day for this hike: mild, overcast, not raining. I decided to make it not rushed, and took it at my own pace. I didn't stop a lot, but didn't go too fast either. I made it to the falls cut-off in 35 minutes and to the lake in 2 hours.

In order to keep my motivation up through the stairs, I counted them. I figured that every 100 stairs I would take a break. That's what I told myself anyway. After I hit 100, I decided to just keep going... changing my thinking to when I got to the lake, I would eat an apple for every 100. That didn't happen either... so I counted 346 wood stairs, nevermind the rock stairs or regular trail incline.

Index was amazing. As soon as I hit the last snowfields (yes, there was snow, but not much), I started hearing avalanches. When I got to the lake, I found the lake 100% frozen and more avalanches than I could count. tee-hee.  :)

I spend an hour at the lake and headed back down. What an awesome way to spend a Saturday. Boy, I'm going to miss this.

October 17, 2002

Took off from work a bit early today (again) for a nice mid-week hike with my dad. It's been years since we hiked together, and it was kind of nice. The water flow was very very light... scary thing for being October.

June 13, 2002

Hiking's not just for weekends!

It's 90 degrees in the city today... it's a Thursday... my hiking partner's out of town... what to do?? Gotta hike! Woo-hoo!

I left work a few minutes early (at 3:45), and headed out 522 toward Monroe. Beware of Echo Lake Rd and Maltby traffic! Yuck. So I sat in traffic for awhile and finally broke out of it.

I hit the trail at 5:00. I must say I love this trail.

You can barely tell where the trail washed out a couple years ago, almost looks like it was supposed to be that way. The temp was still pretty warm, in the 80's at the trailhead. In spite of the heat, I reached the Falls cut off at 5:30 and decided to head up to the falls. I was undecided until that point, but all those stairs to the lake just didn't sound like a fun thing today. In another 15 minutes I reached the Falls. They sure do create a lot of wind! It was wet and cold and in the shade. Nice and relaxing nonetheless. It made me remember the first time I went there... a late August afternoon basking in the sun and spray. :)

I headed down after a 15-20 minute break, and decided to go up the lake trail a bit to the lower falls. There was lots of water... more than the last few times I've been. Got back to the Falls cutoff around 6:30 and headed for the car... at the car by 7, home by 8. Can I say I love the Northwest!

September 30, 2001

I woke up this morning at 5am. I had a choice to make... do I haul my ass out of bed and up a mountain, or do I stay in bed and be lazy. Well, since I hadn't been hiking in a couple of weeks and my waistline is suffering from the lack of hiking this year... It was not too difficult of a choice. I had to hike.

Left the house at 5:30, reached the parking lot in the dark at 6:20 or so. Fiddled around, still in the dark, pulled out my flashlight, and hit the trailhead at 6:30. The flashlight was only a requirement for the first twenty minutes or so... it was light enough to see (finally), and I reached the falls turnoff just past 7. My goal was to see the sun rise on Mt. Index, but I feared I would be a bit late, so I pushed on pretty hard. Damn. I never remember how many stairs there are in the 2 miles from the falls trail to the lake. They seem endless. Along the way, however, I did get some great shots of fog in the valley looking back towards civilization. It made the trip a bit easier, but each time I stopped, I felt just that much further away from my ultimate goal... seeing Mt. Index from the lake.

When I finally reached the lake at 8:10 (1h 40mins from the trailhead), I was almost pleasantly surprised, the sun was still coming up on the mountain, and had not yet hit the lake. I found my favorite spot, the glacially-polished rock facing Mt. Index and sat down for a rest. I happened to bring my cell phone with me this morning and was very surprised to get a signal. Well, sitting on my rock by the lake, the signal wasn't good enough to keep a call, but I did talk to Paul on my way back down the mtn... I could get an almost full signal once I got out of the guarded area of the lake.

Okay, so I sat there for about twenty minutes, and headed back down at 8:30. There were two groups (three people total) camping at the lake, the one group of two had a small campfire... supposedly neither camping nor campfires are permitted within .25 mile of the lake... well then why are there camping spots?? Oh well. I met three or four groups on my way down, but didn't see the first other people on the trail until well past the falls trail, so I had most of the trail to myself. Good thing. :) My hiking boots were in Paul's trunk, so I wore my tennis shoes. On the way up, I didn't have any problems, but the way down was a different story. Both of my big toenails are completely purple bruised and I kept turning my ankles... fortunately nothing serious, although we'll see what happens with my toenails. I reached the trailhead at 9:45 and was home at 10:45. It was a nice, quick, much-needed hike. :)

May 27, 2001 Well, it wasn't as nice as last time I was here, but at least we made the hike! :) I wasn't able to take too many pictures because my camera battery died, but at least for contrasts sake... here you go...

May 7, 2000

This was my kind of Sunday... sleep in... have a nice, leisurely breakfast... and head up to the mountains... sun shining, of course. It would have been better, probably to get to the trailhead a bit earlier, but even at 10 there weren't too many people there. :)

This time you could actually SEE the mountain... Here is the view of Index from the parking lot. :)

Yay!! Made it to Bridal Veil this time! It looked just like I remembered :) The half-mile hike (or should I say, flight of stairs) was definitely one to do on the way TO the lake... otherwise it wouldn't get done, because it's a real bitch of a side-trail. Oh... don't mind the finger... it's mine. The spray was heavy and I was covering the lens until the last minute so it wouldn't get covered with droplets... I guess I waited too long. The sun's nice, though...

The water in the lake was the most amazing blue-green... the color of my favorite type of tourmaline... yes, the very same color... I'll show you if you're ever in this neck of the woods :) ...Anyway... the reflection of the mountains and snow on the glassy surface was also veeerrryy nice.

Do you see what I see? No, that's not a waterfall! Look closer... The lake greeted us with quite a number of avalanches on Index's slopes, this one Paul was fortunate enough to catch... pretty cool, huh? Yep... very. tee-hee! I took a little nap at the lake... on a log, floating in the super blue-clear water. I watched little insects pick apart a pine branch that had settled on the lake floor... they were picking off a piece and carrying it away. It was fun just to watch. Then... before I knew it, it was time to go home... had to be back at a reasonable hour, you know... being Sunday night and all... The parking lot was quite full when we got back to the car... good thing we went early (or somethin').

February 6, 2000 Bridal Veil Falls was the first falls that I visited back in August. I had tried to go here again in January, but the trail was flooded and I couldn't go more than a quarter mile or. So, I was relieved this time when the water wasn't quite so deep. Since I had seen Bridal Veil Falls before (and it's not a very long I thought it would be good to continue up the trail to Lake Serene to see what there was to see… well, it was awesome… take a look for yourself.   In the thick fog/clouds, the naked trees stood out... que beleza.

Yay! Moss! ...	Yay! Waterfalls!

Stevens Pass January 4, 2003 So after having come up here a bunch for skiing, Paul and I finally came up for a bit of snowshoeing. There's a snowshoeing trail that heads up the left side of the ski area. It was snowing and fun. We had lots of fun building snowmen and laughing at snowboarders trying to make it through the trees.

December 29, 2002

The girls have decided they like to ski... and they're getting pretty good at it too!  :)

December 1, 2001 I just put my snow tires on... and had to test them before heading over to Wenatchee next weekend. It was snowing heavily and I inquired about ski lessons... we might need to come back after the first of the year and learn to snowboard!

West Fork Foss Lakes (off Highway 2 a little past Index)

July 2, 2000

Happy Birthday, Mom!

This was my first hike with my mom, and her first hike in a great number of years. All in all, it was very nice. :) Good job, mom!

Kay... so everything I had read led me to believe this trail would be wide and trampled and chuck-full of people... the Hwy 2 version of Mt. Si. Well, I was pleasantly surprised. There were only about 7 or 8 cars in the parking lot when we arrived at 9am and most of those cars were left from Saturday (people camping at the lakes). I think this is one of the first hikes I've been on so far this year that I actually saw tents and stuff. Oh, well, I suppose it is July... time files, you know?

Anyway, the first 1.5 miles to Trout Lake is a nice, relatively flat jaunt over rocky, then narrow trail. There was a field or a meadow or small clearing... whatever... of FERNS! Ferns taller than me... an entire area filled with gigantic ferns. It was way too cool. :)

When you are almost to Trout Lake, or you think you should be, you come across this little creek pond thing. The creek runs through it, but it's a relatively large area... maybe 30 feet square? Anyway, the water was deep-ocean-blue aka teal aka glacial stream green. Whatever color you want to call it, it was gorgeous.

After I was done taking in the wonderful cool colors, Trout Lake was a scant 5 minutes further. This is where everyone was camping... tents and people were scattered around. Apparently this is a real common place because many areas were "Closed for Restoration" especially along the shores of the lake. I stopped just long enough to take some pictures and we moved on... ready now for the steep part of the trail just ahead.

The next couple of miles up to Copper and Malachite Lakes were supposed to be the most difficult, and they were definitely steeper than the first stretch. Even still, they weren't too bad and Mom just trooped up, keeping a good pace and not stopping too often. The typical scenario was me stopping to take pictures while she kept going and then I would catch up to her. There was definitely lots to take pictures of. Below is Malachite Falls. It drops 4-500 feet right along the rock from the exit creek of Copper Lake. This stream then tumbles down and (I believe) flows into Trout Lake. The talk of this falls in recent WTA trail reports was the entire reason I chose this hike for this day. :)

The entire time we were climbing the narrow trail along the mountain-side viewing and hearing the waterfall from a variety of angles, I realized that where we were headed was the plateau at the top of the waterfall. In the end I was glad to not be able to see it any longer as we neared the exit creek, the calm at the top of the falls, and the lakes.

You know you're close when this sign greets you...

On the map it looked like Malachite Lake was closer so we started off in that direction, but about 10 feet in that direction, the trail disappears... I guess it's just not quite trampled enough for goobers like me. Oh, well. I'll save that lake for next time. So... onward to Copper Lake.

It actually wasn't too much further anyway. You really get a good opportunity to walk along the exit creek for a half mile or so. There was still quite a bit of snow here (4 feet?) so I couldn't get too close to the creek, but it was very nice nonetheless.

And the lake... Copper Lake... it was very beautiful. There's a log jam at the exit that you have to walk over to continue the trail on the other side to continue to more lakes... We had lunch at the log jam and afterwards ventured across to take some pictures.