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Published: August 12th 2007
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We headed to Seattle and met up with Colleen, a friend of Shane’s from high school. We all cooked up a storm and headed to a 4th of July BBQ. Had much fun with Colleen and friends, and then moved on to a different part of town to watch a great fireworks display. A perfect all-American holiday! Next day we explored around Colleen’s hood of Ballard. Spent quite a while overlooking the locks, as we thought the ship transfer from sea to river would be exciting - after all, hundreds of tourists like us were overlooking the exchange! -- we learned the hard way that all you see is a slow raising of the water. Damn. We had many ideas of how they could improve the excitement - cannons, bursts of water, swordfights… alas, none were part of the show. From there we wandered around Ballard and Fremont, and found our way to the bar where Colleen works. She hung out while she could sneak breaks from work, and we had a quiet night back at her place, watching Little Miss Sunshine (great movie). Next day did the very touristy walk around the Space Needle, Pike Place Market to see the
fish tossed around, Bellmont, Elliott Bay waterfront, etc. After playing tourist, we met back up with Colleen and most of the group we'd met at the bbq for a delicious Indian dinner in West Seattle. Only one mishap of spilled paneer (a crime), but good times. On to a dive bar nearby, then Colleen took us to meet up with our friend Kyle from Dartmouth. We found him on the street in a suit (us in our grungy clothes) and joined his girlfriend Laura and much of her extended family for the after-party of their family reunion. Had fun meeting all of them, and a great time catching up with Kyle. Crashed back at his place around 3am. Slept in a bit after the late night, then headed with Kyle and Laura to the North Cascades. They had a big climb planned for the next day. We drove through the park, which was quite impressive with craggy peaks and seafoam green rivers and lakes. We found a good camping spot near the park, and had a chill night after our festivities of the night before. But it was great to get to know Laura and catch up with Kyle. They
were gone before we even woke up, but we found ourselves a new campground and hiked up the Cascade Creek Trail. Pretty hike along the river among huge spruce, doug-fir, hemlock, and cedar trees. Tried to wash off in the lake, but the 34 degree snowmelt lake water was a bit too chilly to linger for long. From there headed to the Marblemount part of the park and did a fantastic hike up the Cascade Pass. The last three miles of the road to the trailhead was washed out by the big floods of the previous year, but tacking that on to the hike was actually great, as the views were just as good from the road as from the trail. We had to walk across some steep snowpack to get to the pass, but we made it ok (one guy passed us in full ski regalia - we must have looked funny in our shorts and sneakers!). We saw a nice pudgy marmot on the way, then enjoyed the great views in all directions from the pass. We hiked down, and were hoping to meet up with Stacy for the night. Made it literally to the entrance of the
campground, as we thought connecting up with her was a lost cause, when the message from her came through on our phone. We turned around, grateful to have showers, a place to sleep other than our tent, and even better, to get to visit with Stacy! Had a fun night hanging out with her. We awoke refreshed, clean, and decided to take a hike up Cow Heaven, a trail right out her backdoor. We walked and walked, botanizing along the way, glad to have an expert with us, and saw many cool plants, including a new one to Stacy that got her very excited. Botanists! Despite never making it to the supposed cow heaven meadow, we eventually turned around and decided the hike was good enough without reaching our target! We reshowered while we had the chance, got some good tips from Stacy on Montana and Idaho travels, and were off for Leavenworth and the Enchantment Lakes…
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stacy
non-member comment
What I think
Is that there are very few pictures that actually capture a who a person really is and that picture of me sitting on the ground looking through that particular plant book really does it. Thanks for the photo and thanks for being awesome. Stacy