2017.5.27-29. Memorial Day Weekend in search of Lewisia Tweedy

5/27-29, Memorial weekend, another trip for flower.

5/27, Saturday. Dog Mountain (7.5 miles loop, 2800') is a popular hike, especially now. I come here every May, sometimes twice. The most difficult thing is find a parking spot. All adjacent pullouts close to the trailhead were also filled up. We hiked up on the old trail (steeper than the new trail), down via Augsburger connection. Balsomroot was in full bloom. The entire slope was yellow. Lupine was flowering only in the lowest elevations. Most of the purple is larkspur, and there were a lot of it. Phlox was also putting on a good show. Some paintbrush added a bit of color. Also saw a few Clarkia in the same spot as last year. When we arrived back at the parking lot in the sun, my car is registering 94°F. Hence we abandoned my initial plan of going further east for a couple of Columbia River WFR sites like Umatilla, Drumheller Channels National Natural Landmark, White Bluff at Hanford Reach NM, Ancient Lakes, Moses Coulee, and TNC's Breezy Hill.

Stopped by Catherine Creek to see Lewisia Rediviva. But only found one cluster of 3 flowers in good shape, after searching for over half an hour in 90°+ weather. All others have withered. Just one week! Beautiful blues of Blue Dick and Bachelor Buttons, and view Mt Hood.

Drove up to Ellensburg via Yakima River Canyon. Quite scenic. A few campgrounds, a couple are very big. As it was getting late, didn't do this Umtanum Ridge hike that I originally planned. Early evening sun casting a glowing light to the hills. Too hot too, even after 7pm.


In Ellensburg, visited Dick and Jane's Spot. Of course just the outside. I also signed this guest book. It's tacky and whimsical. A mishmash of recycled junk. I appreciate the owner's creativity and tolerance to strangers walking around their home.

Found a lone site to camp close to Hwy-97, close a small creek. The access is a short walk, but you can drive over the creek and steep bank if you have a high clearance vehicle.

5/28, Sunday, Wenatchee Ranger Station is closed (at least on Sunday). The lady at Leavenworth visitor center gave me a trail map of the area, and suggested Icicle Ridge (~5 mile RT, 1800'), which is snow free and short drive (all paved). Boy, a lot of people. Dry and hot. Plenty lupine blooming here. Some balsamroot, yarrow, lots of yellow grousel(?). Saw some Lyall Mariposa Lily (only one patch, about 5). Once you reach the saddle, continue right to the end of the trail, and cliff. The view is quite good, you can see Leavenworth below, and the green mountains around still dusted with snow. My big disappointment is that those granite peaks in the Enchantment Lakes zone are hidden behind those green hills. The bonus is over 10 hand-gliders adding color to the sky.

Had a mandatory stop in Leavenworth for beer and bratwurst. ~85°F. The water vapor now spraying on the roof makes the place cozy and cool. A lot of people in town. Hard to find a parking spot.

My goal of this weekend is looking for Lewisia Tweedy, a rare flower only grow in Wenatchee Mountains and central BC. I saw report of 10 days ago that they are flowering. Took Chiwaukum Creek trail (the other option I know of is Lower Mad River trail more to the east). This is a road next to Chiwaukum Creek next to private properties. In less than half a mile, we saw one on the right hill side. A bit more further along. They are very pretty and showy, growing on rocks!

Continue west on Hwy-2. Stopped by Deception Falls. This is a great view right by highway, in fact, you can walk under the highway for some water spray. The power of the river is stunning. Good time to visit waterfalls, due to the current hot weather and heavy snow fall this spring.

Backpacked to Dorothy Lake. 10 miles of gravel road, first half is wide and good. Gets narrower and rough further down, but still passable in passenger cars, including a concrete drain (yes, drive over water). Quite some cars parked here. The first mile follows East Fork Miller River, quite pleasant. Over-engineered trail. Lots of wooden boxes. The best is by the substantial bridge that crosses Camp Robber Creek, where it joins East Fork Miller River. On the way back, we went below the bridge for closer look of the white river. Very powerful. 10°F cooler! Along the trail, Tons of trillions. One patch of yellow glacier lily.

Good campsites near the outlet of the Lake, which is reachable in 1.5 miles. But the water is too high to cross without taking your boots off. We camped on the way to Bear Lake, on its east side. Quite a bit of up and down. All sites (not many due to snow and dampness) are a bit wet. Progressively more snow as you go south, less and less maintained trail.

Tried fishing, no luck.

5/29, Monday. Continued on the trail for Bear Lake. Totally snow covered at the lake's inlet. Didn't dare to cross, as the water is rushing in full force. Cannot see where the trail is on the other side. We walked to this waterfall, punching through snow holes from time to time, and turned back there.

The lake was blue and pretty this morning. Saw many kids on this trail.

Drove to Bellevue to meet up with a friend (drop off my old laptop), and then continued home. By the time I returned the car, it was past 11pm. End of yet another spring flower trip.

2017.5.20-21 Juniper Hill - Ochoco - in search of Bitterroot

2017.5.20. I signed up with the Nature Conservancy for Juniper Hill guided hike starting at 9am. It's a 4 hour drive, so I left Friday evening.

5/20, Saturday. Before the hike, I visited Rimrock Spring on the way (between Madras and Prineville). Walked the 1.25 mile loop trail, hoping to see some animals in early morning. None, apparently I was not early enough. The sun was already cooking the earth. There're two platforms (one still under construction, or needing repair) to look out the marshy ponds created by the spring. A bench looking out to western sky, and a sign showing what mountains you are looking at (Gray Butte, Mt. Bachelor, Broken Top, Three Sisters, Haystack Butte and Mt Jefferson. However Jefferson is behind trees. You'll see it better, when you pull out of the parking lot and into the highway. Many Desert Parsley, Milk-vetch (some tall ones and some low ones), Hood's Phlox, some larkspur.

About 20 of us showed up at the barn of Juniper Hill Preserve, including from the Portland office. The Nature Conservancy (TNC) has an onsite manager: Brooke. Her husband's family used to own this or maybe nearby land. They have a nice white house, and dog and pony, even though pets are not allowed on all TNC trails. Very nice couple. Brook told me a side route to go back to the cars, which gained enough elevation to see Crooked River and eastern side of the preserve. I also saw more bitterroot, and some barestem lomatium. Our guide today is Stu, a former medical doctor in Bend. We were given a plant list, ordered by Latin names - thanks to Stu's medical training, but hard to use for layman like me. Stu also shared some human and geological history of the place, which I don't remember, but still nice to hear them at the time. We walked around the Painted Hill section of the property. I asked specifically to see Bitterroot, and boy what luck we have. So many. They are beautiful, much smaller than the one I saw in Hoyt Arboretum 3 weeks ago. Other new flowers for me are: Blepharipappus Scaber, Mountain Dandelion, Blue Flax (non-native), Golden Bee Plant (saw them in John Day's Painted Hills), and some fluffy seed of milkvetch.

Afterwards, I decided to check out Deep Spring Campground which Stu said has gigantic ponderosa pines and waterfront campsites. It's also on the way to Big Summit Prairie according to Google (from the SE side, via Paulina Valley Rd and NF4260). Paulina Valley road is gravel, but wide and in good shape. It went over a ridge and descent to nice flat farmlands. Once on the side of the basin, it is NF4260 in Ochoco National Forest. Not marked, but the only other choice is someone's farm gate. The hill side here is covered with blue camas. NF4260 is narrow and rutted. So terrible, that after carefully negotiating 3 bad sections, I turned around in front of a small creek crossing. Now going back to Paulina, asked a nice old fellow in front of the general store. He said I could try Beaver Creek Road further east, but he wasn't sure if the access road to the campgrounds is bad. Google suggests an extra 20 minutes compared with the route I was on. Apparently not many Google users come this way, and I cannot tell the road size by looking at the map. I gave up, and drove all the way back to Prineville and took hwy-26 and NF42, all paved. About 100 miles and 2 hours wasted.

Big Summit Prairie captured my mind when I first visited 3 years ago. Just as the name suggested, it's big, flat, and high (~4500') in the middle of Ochoco Mountains. The NFS Prineville Office emailed me a brochure on the flowers of Big Summit Prairie. I have to wait till July to see the rare Peck's Mariposa Lily. Due to the delay, I only drove the south route, all paved, about 10 miles. Making stops on the road, or in small pullouts. All around is private land. Turned back around the bend, where FS42 cross North Fork Crooked River. Turning south before the River is FS4240 (rough grave, may lead to the campground I was looking for), turning north would be 30 (good grave, probably fine to take to make a loop), continue east is still paved, but signed for narrow road. I saw Shooting Stars, a patch of Grass Widow (not a lot), Ballhead Waterleaf, a couple of Old Man's Whiskers and Hairy Clematis (new to me). Didn't see any Brown's Peony that I was hoping for.
Some blue Camas, a lot of Lomatium (all 3 kinds that I know), pink Allium, some Paintbrush, most abundant is lomatium (all 3 kins that I know) painting everything yellow. Lots of Mule's Ear (last time, they were yellow).

Back to Independence Mine TH for Lookout Mt hike. The 0.8 mile road is rough, so I parked at Baneberry TH (seems flat and a good camping area even for a group among Ponderosa pines). I could have driven last ~0.2 miles. Hike in ~1.5 miles. The trail quickly turned into 100% covered by snow. Eventually I lost track of trail. No more footprints except for my own. Thanks to the GPS map I downloaded, I was able to continue in the correct direction. Near the top, it's more or less flat. Either snow or sticky mud. No flowers, yes, sagebrush. I didn't even see the shelter. Saw the sign of junction of 808 and 804. I continued to the right, saw two rows of fences, eventually reach the edge. Great view here. However, a bit too late. Once the slope starts to go down a bit, I turned around, and found a tree and setup my tent next to it, on the snow. At 6926', I'm on the top of Ochoco. A bit cold (especially compared to the mid 80Fs during the day), but nothing froze in the night. Good stars. The wind was an annoyance, making my tent very noisy.

5/21, Sunday. Woke up many times at night, and early in the morning. I waited until the sun was shining on my tent, before I got up. Dried a bit of my tent in the wind. Took this panorama shot, before heading down. Got lost again for a bit, sinking into the snow from time to time. Slow going.

Driving to Stein's Pillar viewpoint, 1.3 miles past the turnoff (FS500, with a well marked sign) to the trailhead. Actually there're some better views of the Pillar before the sanctioned viewpoint, which has a picnic table and bench, quite some paintbrush below on the slope. Not too many people come this way, so I just stopped by the side of the wide gravel road to take pictures. The farms between Mill Creek Rd and the hill where the pillars stand are verdant dotted with spring flowers. Quite pretty really. Now, back to FS500. About 2.1 miles. First half good, 2nd half a bit rocky. The TH has undefined parking spaces, and a few cars here and there. Soon after you get out of the seemingly disarray parking area, you are greeted with endless Arnica. I enjoyed very much the first 1/3-1/2 of the hike, with some open views to 3 Sisters, Broken Top and Bachelor. Small and large meadows now filled with flowers: Balsamroot, Paintbrush, Lomatium, Larkspur, Slender Phlox, Phacelia. Here I met a couple with full day packs and pen and notebook in hands. They are very nice and told me some names of the flowers and where I may find Lewisia in the area.
The rest of the trail is in the woods, and going downhill. Only Oregon Grape (now with yellow flowers), Western Serviceberry (now covered with white flowers). Don't bother to go to the Stein's Pillar view at halfway point (not as good as the view from the road). The last part is downhill on stairs, to get to the base of Stein's Pillar. By the time you get there, the Pillar is too big to take all in on one photo. It is quite impressive. Overall, an easy hike with gentle grade and nice views, flowers are a bonus. The trail was just opened 2 weeks ago.

Following the tip from the plant-id couple, I went back to Rimrock Spring trail to look for bitterroot. Found only a few, but they are more pink. So quite pretty.

Driving back to Portland via Catherine Creek instead of over Government Camp by Mt Hood. Hwy-197, south of Maupin, is quite pretty. Now with lupines and lomatium blooming profusely. This is open country, so to your west, you can often see those snowy mountains in the Oregon Cascades.

My 4th trip to Catherine Creek this year. Now everything looks dry and hot. 88°F now. Poa Bulbosa is everywhere here too, the waving brown is covering all the colorful flowers. Most prominent flowers now are Blue Dick and Bachelor's Button, both blue, mixed with purple vetch and dotted occasionally golden marigold. I found some bitterroot here and there, not as abundant as in Juniper Hills Preserve, same white color.

Still over 1.5 hours to drive home. By the time I returned the car, it was already past 8pm. I drove over 600 miles. This concludes yet another flower trip this spring.

2017.5.14. Wildwood through-hike

5/14, Mother's Day. 5 of us walked on Wildwood Trail in Forest Park, from the Max stop (just before the beginning of the trail), to Newberry Road TH. Tracy ferried 3 of them from Newberry Rd to Max stop where Nanae and I were waiting, but left because she wasn't feeling well. Tomoko bailed out at mile 16, where she left her car (Lower Saltzman Rd). The rest 4 of us finished the 30 mile march in 11 hours (including all the stops). My longest day hike (by distance) to-date. The hike leader today, Severt (in his mid-70's), has done this back and back (yes, 60.5 miles). Nanae's longest day hike is around Mt St Helens (took me 3 days two years ago). They are all fitter than me.

Due to road blockage, and one person got lost, we started out much later than expected. Light drizzle. My photo timed at 7:56am at the trailhead.
At mile 3 (9:10am), short detour to Pittock Mansion (trail was closed due to a landslide) so I could use a proper bathroom (a bit dirty) next to the visitor center. The map on the trail starts only from mile 3.
Around mile 5, saw this stone structure, maybe a restroom in the old days.
At mile 11, we had lunch on some mossy picnic tables. I forgot to take a photo, but the tables don't look much better than this bench I photographed earlier. Enough sweat to make us chilled quickly. Saw some hail along the way (dumped yesterday).
At mile 16, Tomoko bailed out. Here's a photo of the 4 of them before she hiked up to her car (another mile). I really wanted to follow her. By then, my legs and toes were sore already. The weather has cleared up.
Mile 20, a short snack break, no place to sit.
Mile 25 Lief Erickson Road, a longer snack break. There're a couple of trash cans here. No benches, but logs you can sit on. I tossed extra water, and dumped trash.
Mile 29 (6:29pm). Every 1/4 mile there's a blue diamond and a marker on top.
Mile 30 (6:51pm), the last mile marker, photo of the remaining 3 (I was taking the photo in both cases). There's no official plaque for end of the trail.

Overall, trail is in good condition, only 3-4 down trees that we had to climb over. No water, no toilet. I brought over 3 litre of water, but consumed less than 2, because of the low temperature. Need to cross roads a few times. Mostly flat, but added together, a bit over 3000'. Due to the many trailheads, we were never alone for long. Hard to find a place to pee. Very very muddy. I'm tempted to throw away my pants and boots. The trail looks about the same for all 30.2 miles, quite boring. If it were not for the other people in the group (Nanae and Dan are very talkative), I wouldn't have completed it.

Learned two new flowers today: Large-leaf Avens and Herb Robert. They are everywhere along the trail, so are maiden-hair fern, yellow violet, soloman's plume, minor's lettuce, some trillium in seed.