North Cascades NP

This blog post presents images we took on a recent trip along Hwy 20 in Northern Washington State through North Cascades National Park. It is a fascinating place with many things to see and lots of things to do. This set of images is only intended to give you a feeling or microscopic sense of the area, it really must be seen and lived and absorbed in person to get the true magnificence and beauty of this magical place.

Here is our route along Hwy 20 - we stayed in Winthrop and drove over to Marblemount and then back. It took us about 4 hours each way with various stops. It is about 87 miles one way. These images and the places visited are presented in sequence from Marblemount to the east in Winthrop.

Going east out of Marblemount is this sign announcing the start of the North Cascades National Park. It is a place of high mountain peaks beautiful trees and pristine waters. The city of Marblemount is about 315 feet in elevation and the high point at Washington Pass is 5,744 feet. We will climb a bit.

This is Diablo Lake as seen from the designated pull out and observation point along the highway. The lake was formed when Diablo Dam was completed in 1930 on the Skagit river

In the previous view of Diablo Lake there is a small island in the lower left portion of the image. This is just a close up of that island. Fascinating small rock outcropping with some trees growing among the rocks.

We thought this was an interesting image, the yellow tree against the granite backdrop. Many of the deciduous trees are starting to turn, it is fall.

Here is a look at Ross Lake as it extends to the north. It is about 22 miles long and was formed when the Ross Dam was built in 1949. There is a resort at the lake where you can stay - There is a ferry across the lake or you can hike across the dam and around to the resort.

We took this excursion in the middle of October. Winter is coming but it has not arrived yet. It was fascinating to see the trees turning their bright yellow mixed among the conifers.

Unlike the trees in the previous image, this tree has been turned too many times. It is rather twisted around and fairly old. It is right along a walking path at Washington Pass Overlook. Perhaps it had been struck by lightning many years back. That is certainly possible at this exposed elevation.

Here in the upper reaches we see the tops of the cragy peaks. Winter comes a bit early here. On one of the higher peaks we could see snow falling already. Hwy 20 does not stay open in the winter. The snows will shut it down in Mid to late November and it will stay closed until April.

The winding road is coming in from the east and rises up to our location.

This view is from the Washington Pass Overlook. The mountain on the right is Liberty Bell Peak and Early Winter Spires are situated to the left. These are most impressive chunks of rock. If you are interested there are lots and lots of images of the North Cascades available on the Internet.

This image provides a view to the east towards the Methow Valley and Winthrop. Winthrop is about 31 miles to the east from here.

The high rock mountains rise up in virtually every direction. Great views.

Another of the many views of the lofty mountains.

On our way down to Winthrop we turned off the road to see the Klipchuck Campground. Before getting there we crossed this small stream, It was named Early Winters Creek.

Looking over the edge of the bridge and down into the little creek it was amazing how crystal clear the water was. We could imagine it was fairly cold and opted not to go swimming.

This is a map of the Klipchuck Campground found at the campground sign in station. The campground is about 19 miles west of Winthrop and is a wonderful campground with nicely spaced sites and various hiking trail opportunities.

In mid October on Monday afternoon there were only 2 campsites taken so pack your tent or hook up your trailer and get out there. It is a beautiful, peaceful spot.

We are about at the end of the sojourn.
We wanted to just back track a moment to show a sign from the Diablo Lake overlook. As you can see it clearly states, with an image,¨No Drones¨.
Years ago we were camping in our trailer and stopped for a couple of nights at Pichaco Peak State Park in Arizona. They also had a ¨No Drones¨ rule and we, out of curiosity, asked them why. The ranger stated there were some number of folks that liked to sunbathe with clothes as an option and did not want pictures taken of them in such a condition.
That might not be the reason here but not a bad idea to limit the Drones.

There are a lot of hiking trails scattered throughout the park and the Pacific Crest Trail crosses over Hwy 20. We saw numerous cars parked at several trailheads as we wandered around.

We hope you enjoyed this all too brief look at North Cascades National Park. It is a wonderful place and well worth your visit.
Let us know if you have any questions or comments.
All the best
George & Deanna

Eat Your Vegetables

Remeber when Mom told you to eat your vegetables and you turned you nose up, screamed and threw a tanturm and uttered the words I'm not goonna. Well here are a few small examples of what our friends in the bird world are offered for every meal.

It seems to me that what mom had us eat, despite our misgivings, was not all that bad, all things considered. Enjoy - have fun

Johnson Hollow Wheat Harvest

On Friday August 12 we took a ride around parts of Walla Walla Country. The wheat harvest is mostly finished in the western portion of the county but over toward the eastern side and in the higher elevations it is still ongoing. We decided to go have a look. The map shows our route with most of the images being taken in the upper right side of the map.

This is a picture of the upper end of Johnson Hollow Road. It pases by Covello which we had posted about earlier. The road is paved closer to highway 12 then as it wanders up the hollow it turns into a decent gravel road and a short ways past Covello it becomes an increasingly narrow gravel track. At one point in the upper end we came to a fork in the road and took the road least traveled, always the most interesting route.

Not far past Covello there were a few trees and amongst the trees was a large flock of Common Ravens. There were at least 34 Ravens that we counted and probably more that we missed. We could not see any reason for the gathering. By the way, a large group or flock of Ravens is sometimes called an “Unkindness”. Who makes these things up anyway?

This is a field of Chickpeas or Garbanzo Beans. They are the same plant but with two different names. As you will see they are planted, allowed to grow during the year, then allowed to dry and finally harvested in the late fall. Chickpeas are used to make hummus. In the distance you can see the wheat being harvested, we will get to that in a moment.

The above image showed a wider view of the chickpea field and here we are looking a little closer.

Closer still we can see the individual plants and the beans. Chickpeas are in the Fabaceae (legume) family, related to soybeans, snap beans, peas, peanuts and many others. They are the third most widely grown legume in the world, after soybeans and beans.

In this image we see the dried husk of the chickpea and a couple of the actual chickpeas. There is generally one chickpea in each husk.

We are up in a higher elevation where the windmills spin. We saw this Red-Tail Hawk riding the currents looking for lunch. This Red-tail could use a little work on feather management, it seems to be missing some feathers.

This is a large wheat harvesting operation. There are several harvesters and associated bank out wagons that take the grain from the harvester and transfer it to a large truck for transport to the grain silos. We are probably viewing a commercial harvesting operation where you pay a company to harvest your wheat field. Each of the harvesters costs approximately $750,000 to $1,000,000 new. That price would include the leveling system enabling the harvester to tilt to follow the contour of the steep ground and the header, the wide part that cuts the wheat.

We are looking closer at the harvesters cutting the wheat. The long lines you see behind the harvester in the wheat chaf and it will most likely be baled and used for various purposes.

Here we see the wheat being transferred from the harvester to the bank out wagon. Oftentimes the transfer will occur as the harvester is moving along and cutting the wheat. One of the large harvesters will hold about 300 bushels of wheat and if the wheat is cutting at 75 bushels an acre you need to empty the harvester fairly often. Additionally some of the wheat fields in this part of the country are fairly steep so you must be conscious of the weight in the harvester lest it starts sliding on the steep hillside.

This is just an interesting image showing the wheat harvester against the backdrop of the windmills.

We hope you enjoyed this brief look at the wheat harvest and the Chickpeas getting ready for your next batch of hummus. We rather enjoyed the outing along Johnson Hollow and other parts of the country and seeing all the activity.

Let us know if you have any questions.
All the best - Be Well - George and Deanna

Many Wildflowers, Some Butterflies, Lots of Birds, and Bunches of Fun

We took a ride with some friends, Rodger and Ginger, up into the mountains to look for some wildflowers and a few birds. On the map above we are showing the start in Dayon, Washington, Moose Creek Cafe identified on the map is in Dayton. We headed south out of Dayton down South Fourth Street towards Bluewood Ski Area. We turned east on Hatley Gulch Road way before reaching the ski area and wandered toward Godman Springs Campground. We mostly traveled along Skyline Road. It was largely slow travel along a very dusy road, sometimes through an old burn and sometimes through heavier forest. There were lots of wildflowers and many other things to see which slowed our travels even more.

Actually we had seen this sign earlier, on a road we were traveling, it is not along Skyline Road. There was a logging operation where they were chipping a bunch of wood and the chips were flying all over. You certainly had to be cautious and watch for flying material. At least they were off on a side road when we traversed the area. It is a fun sign.

Having that side note out of the way we turned on Hatley Gulch Road and immediately found this Western Kingbird. They are a very common flycatcher. This is most likely a juvenile or young bird, note the very light coloraation, an adult Kingbird is quite a bit darker in color.. We found about eight of these birds just after turning onto Hatley Gulch. Most likley there were a couple of nests there and the kids were getting kicked out and forced to move around.

Here are some other juveniles, in this case juvenile Brewers Blackbirds. They were a bit further up Hatley Gulch in a flock of about 7 of them. They were foraging among some small cedar trees along the side of the road and adjacent to a wheatfield. Often times juvenile birds are difficult to identify because they don't have many of the adult markings.

You go up Hatley Gulch by climbing through a canyon. The road was in great condition, not dusty and rather smooth. It appeared to have been sprayed with a dust retardent or sealer. It was in great shape and there were lots of birds in the canyon. After you get up on top you are on a plateau and can see for some distance. This shows some of the many windmills we have chatted about in a previous blog.

Here is an image from along Skyline Road, lots of wildflowers. The redish colored flowers are Indian Paint Brush and the tall row of flowers in the background are Fireweed.

This is a better look at the Fireweed. Years ago when we were volunteering in Homer Alaska there was an ice cream shop that had some interesting flavors beyond strawberry and rocky road. They had a flavor called Fireweed and it was fabulous. They would not divulge their trade secrets so we don't know what it was made from, it was delicious so we just ate it.

We are certainly not the foremost of wildflower identification people so we do a bit of research and make a guess at the species of flowers. We believe this is a Sulphur flower Buckwheat and if some one knows a different and more accurate name please let us know and we can learn something. It is a pretty little flower nonetheless.

The yellow flowers dominating the front of the image appear to be St Johns-wort while the row in the background is more Fireweed. The St Johns-wort was incredibly abundant along the road. There were patches of it where it was very thick and lined the road on both sides.

We had mentioned Indian Paintbrush earlier. This is a close-up of the flower.

We had during our various travels seen various amounts of Indian Paintbrush. We had never seen it in the volume that we found along Skyline Road. There were major extensive patches of Indian Paintbrush along both sides of the road. The flowers were quite colorful.

We saw many different butterflies working the various flowers. This is a Painted lady. A fairly common butterfly. We also saw many Swallowtail and Pale Yellow Swallowtail. It was great watching the butterflies.

We think this is a Mountain Aster. We were definitely in the Mountains about 5,300 feet in elevation and this certainly appears to be an Aster so the name fits.

We stopped as we were leaving Godman Springs for a look around. This shows the mountains off in the distance. It is great country.

You not only see large displays in fields of wildflowers but you can find hidden gems as you look around more closely. This appears to be a Canterberry Bell, a beautiful bell shaped blue flower. Again if we have mis-identified some flowers please let us know through the comments capability of this blog.

Starting down the road from Godman Springs we looked back and saw these trees on the horizon. They look like ghost trees to me, mere silhouettes of their former selves. At this elevation the winters can be harsh and the exposed trees take the brunt of the winter winds.

We are now heading back and so just like this bluebird, we are out of here leaving behind lots of beautiful wildflowers, wonderful things to see, and great times.

We hope you enjoyed this brief look at the wildflowers and other sights along Skyline Road and around Godman Springs. It was a rather enjoyable adventure.

Let us know if you have any questions.
All the best - Be Well - George and Deanna