2019.12.31. New Year's Eve at Seattle Center

12/31. Went to Seattle Center around 10pm. Surprised to find that the rain and wind had both stopped. T-mobile was giving out laser tube, scarf, beanie and paper glasses in the sign of 2020. So, everything is pink. A lot of people. Skate ring was open. Inside Center House, a band was playing, a few portrait drawers, and many food vendors. Space Needle had its own affair. Out on the lawn, people spread out blankets and waiting for the new year fireworks. Almost everyone (including dogs), of course, had pink laser loops, some were covered from head to toe with obscene amount of pink loops. At least 5 preachers holding signs of various Jesus sayings.

Got bored waiting. So went back home. Went to the crowded roof just before midnight for the fireworks which never came. I still had a great time.

2019.12.29. Hex Mountain snowshoe

12/29, Sunday. I was picked up by a couple from Shoreline at I-5's Stewart exit (later dropped off at I-5 Madison exit -- so very convenient), and drove to Hex Mountain. Total 9 people. Our host met us at the trailhead. He has newly moved to Ellensburg after being dishearten by how bad Medicare patients are treated. The parking pull-out is south of the bridge over Newport Creek, left of Salmon La Sac Rd.

The winter route is half on a 4x4 road, half on a trail (you'll see this sign in the above photo where the trail starts to your right). The road can be easily walked with just boots, only sinking a little occasionally. I wore snowshoes on the way down, simply because I was too lazy to take them off and carry them. The trail can be walked on in boots too by a light person, except for the last 100' of the summit, which is rather steep. This day, we started under dark clouds, then into the clouds (very mystical, with beautiful frosted leaves). When we finally emerged from the clouds the last few hundred feet, we could see the blue sky. But the view is largely obscured by trees, even though the trail is more of less on a gentle ridge. The summit has great views of Mt Rainier to the south and Mt Stuart to the north, today, a sea of clouds below us. Had lunch here, but didn't linger long, due to the low temperature. Wind was mild, but made it chilly.

Getting down through the clouds again. Could see Cle Elum Lake half way down the trail, dark and gloomy today. I took a wrong route, followed some road down. Didn't take any longer than the trail. Back to the car at 2pm. On the drive home, the clouds dissipated the west we went, all blue sky in Seattle.

About 7 miles RT, 2600' gain.

2019.12.22. GOH's Nutcracker

12/22 Sunday afternoon. First time watching anything by GOH, a local ballet school. Also my first time to Queen Elizabeth Theatre. Quite nice. This is the first performance of the day (many more this and last week). I'm surprised to see how packed house was. Very festival. A lot of characters, glittering costumes, simple and clear stage set. Not difficult technically, certainly not easy dealing with almost 100 kids and actors on stage.

An unusually sunny day. Walked to Vancouver Central Library, which is just a block away, before returning home.

2019.12.17. Mrs Doubtfire at the 5th Ave Theatre

12/17, Tuesday. 7:30pm. This Mrs Doubhtfire is a new musical produced by 5th Ave Theatre. Very funny. Totally updated and trimmed from the original 1993 movie. The Youtube ad insert is hilarious, when Mrs. Doubtfire was following cooking instructions online. Clever rendering. Fast and efficient change stage set. Very energetic, a bit too loud (musical is always amplified too much for my taste). Near full house: long long lines in front of lady's room during intermission. 5th Ave Theatre is an old establishment, not a lot of space to hangout during intermission. The Christmas tree in the lobby is adorned with many Asian fans, very colorful.

2019.12.14. Path of Lights at Green Lake

12/14, Saturday. 4:30-7:30pm. The annual Path of Lights at Green Lake. I've never heard of it until a couple of days ago. I walked along its eastern shore around 6:30pm. Light rain at times, a few tent booths, manned by the park service and various organizations (animal shelter for example). More than one booths were giving away light tubes. No wonder so many kids were wearing them. Quite a turn out. The lights were places on both sides of the walking path, spaced in about 10 meters. Very dim (seems battery powered) and small. Many people wear some holiday light fixtures on their clothes or head. I was most boring, wearing a headlamp (useful, quite muddy at places). A few kayaks decked with lights and cartoon figures (Santa, Snoopy for example), rowed by the shore around the lake. One booth was performing. I stood for two groups. Both were small, but quite fun. I also picked up a chocolate snake from the Kinds booth, which was a nice surprise.

2019.12.14. Franklin Falls

12/14, Saturday. Rained most of the day. Went to Franklin Falls, hoping to see icicles. Too warm this winter. No icicles, nor black ice. The trail (mostly road) was covered with slushy snow. On the way back, more black surface (better traction). The waterfall looked cleaner. Less dramatic, and less people. A nice walk for a rainy day.

The road is closed, so added 6 miles to the 2 mile hike. Still fairly easy.

2019.12.13. Christmas Boat Parade on Lake Union

12/13, Friday evening. Annual Christmas boat parade. I don't know when it started. The night falls around 4:30pm nowadays. I walked by Lake Union's southern shore around 7:30pm. Saw a string of boats going by, brightly illuminated under semi cloudy sky. Not a lot of people here. The near full moon was visible at times. I took a bus going along Dexter. When it crossed the bridge over the canal in Fremont, the traffic ground to stop and go, maybe due to the spectators coming and going. Was very lively. Also a better view of the lit lake from the bridge.

2019.12.12. (R)EVOLUTION at Cornish Theater

12/12, Thursday, 8pm. 2nd of the 3 performances by Senior Musical Theater Ensemble of Cornish College of Arts at Raisbeck Performance Hall. Stage Direction by Timothy McCuen Piggee, Music Direction by Clair Marx. This musical is an annual production by the senior students in theater major. Many of the numbers were staged by the students themselves. Attendance was largely of the students and their families. There isn't a plot. A string of sounds and dances about contemporary life. Quite energetic. The kids did a good job. Some of them are more timid than others. All body shapes: some are skeleton, some are plump. They wear whatever clothes they chose to. Over all, not bad.

2019.12.8. Tis the Season with SMC

12/8 Sunday, 7:30pm. One of my favorite musical groups is Seattle Men's Chorus (not their Women's Chorus). It's been awhile since I last heard them. Went to their annual holiday concert at Benaroya Hall, almost full house. I was mildly disappointed. Sure, a lot of fanfare. But not as funny as before. Dynamics is uniformly loud, no tender moments. Maybe this is the style of the new artistic director (not that new, 4th year in his reign). Another thing, begging for money is blunt and ostentatious. The concert itself is less than 2 hours, including a long intermission. 5 minutes were devoted to thanking financial sponsors. Total only about 10 songs.

I have a problem of service fees. Their ticket includes a $3 service fee, $4 facility fee (charged by Benaroya Hall), and if you buy it from Benaroya Hall's website, you'll be charged another $11 fee. This is outrageous. Online ticketing saves handling and shipping, also saves hiring a person at box office. Other than the facility rental, why all the other fees? To offset the credit card fee? So the income is not reported to IRS?

2019.12.6. Caroling in downtown

12/6, Friday. 6-8:30pm. The 33rd annual Figgy Pudding Caroling Competition. A great turn out. A lot of people. It stayed dry until after the closure. The winning team amassed more than $7000 donation. However, asking for money has never been so blunt and intrusive before. Not only they sell buttons and song printouts, donation box in front of every team, but also folks carrying boxes around to collect money. Oh, yes, you can use a variety of online and credit card payment methods. I just stuffed some cash in the box in front of a jazzy youth group, which I liked. Didn't had time to listen to all the groups. If you are not in the inner circle, it's hard to hear the lyrics, with street noise and people talking. Some troupes are better in their costume than their voice. One elderly group tap dances (not singing) in ugly Christmas sweaters. Very festival.

Around 7:30pm, all the groups collected their costumes and donation boxes. The judges (I have no idea who they are), and curators on stage, dolling out prizes in different categories. The winning team performed one song after claiming its trophy. This lasted one hour, ending with Beaconettes singing Twelve Days Before Christmas completely revised for 2019 Seattle (running bunnies, Viaduct torn down, Macy's closing, soccer championship, ...).

I met with two sets of friends. A fun time to meet, however, a difficult time to find anyone in the crowd.

2019.11.28-30 Thanksgiving in Olympic N.P.

Blessed with good weather during the Thanksgiving long weekend, we headed to Olympic peninsular last minute after reading a few trail reports on WTA.

11/28, Thanksgiving Thursday. After a large lunch (stewed pheasant with mushroom, baked wild salmon, Brussels sprouts, mixed spring salad), packed the leftover and headed to Edmonds-Kingston ferry. Arrived at the toll gate at 3:05pm, and got on the 3:15pm ferry. My shortest wait ever. The ferry wasn't even half full. Relaxing short ride with great view of Baker to the north and Rainier to the south.

Stopped by Jamestown S'Klallam tribal center and its Veteran Memorial, in Blyn, surrounded by Christmas lights at the south end of Sequim Bay, blinking in the dusk. 7 Cedar Casino is building a hotel, fence and construction material next to many more Christmas lights.

After checking into Sequim Bay Lodge, the closest hotel to our trail head, drove to Sequim downtown. Some lights on the main street, quiet around 5:30pm. All is closed. Then, to Sequim Bay State Park. The boat launch was under construction. A few camper vans.

A quick dinner of the leftover. Made sandwich for tomorrow. Set alarm at 6:40am. Retired early.

11/29, Friday, sunny, not a shred of cloud, cold. Breakfast is crepe, goat cheese, prosciutto, oat meal with dried fruits, banana. Headed out around 7:30am. 25°F. ~50 min drive to Upper Dungeness TH, ~2500', still 25deg;F. Upper Royal Basin was my favorite place in Olympics. When I was there in summer 2010, the small lake was a beautiful glacier turquoise, ringed by pink heather. Right now, the trail is in good shape, well signed (brand new signs), gentle slope if not flat. Now frozen ground, green moss, a few small patches of black ice, which can be easily skirted around. Only one large section where I put micro-spikes on (half an hour below the lake). A nice bridge in ~1 mile, some camp sites close by (where we camped 9 years ago). We continue forward, now on Royal Basin Trail. Upper Dungeness Trail turns left onto the bridge, it leads 7 miles to Marmot Pass. In another mile or so, near the junction of Mount Maynard way trail (up to the right), we entered the national park boundary. The first glance (9:35am) of the mountains is after the first hour, and we started to encounter light snow on the ground. Back in the trees, and break out a few more times (10:20, 10:30). Around 11:15, an open but narrow willow meadow. The frost on those twigs grew in star shape, all sparkling in the sun, like a crystal forest.

Finally, we arrived at Royal Lake ~11:45am. Bigger and prettier than I remembered. Everything sparkles. Saw another couple, who were cooking meal in a Jetboil. We had lunch here too. Warm in the sun, but still chilly in the shade. Camping area is to the far end of the lake and on the right. Two substantial toilets, yes, can still open. The through trail is on the left side of the lake, which is the only way marked on my GPS app. However, no visible track above the lake. Snow covered everything. The four of us had to rely on my map to find the trail. A little bushwhacking. My map shows that the trail is to the left of a creek, but there are multiple creeks here. In fact, you have to be on the right side of the first and second visible creek. On the way back, we took the other side of the lake, more straightforward.

After leaving the lake area behind, scramble along the slope (somewhat steep) on the left (right when you come down, as show on this photo) side of this meadow. As you crest the upper basin, you cross the main creek. The Upper Lake is to the right of a nice flat basin. Absolutely beautiful here. However, not the blue color I wanted to see.

Had a long snack break, wandered around the beautiful basin. We turned around ~1:50pm, the shadow was already catching us: the sun was dipping low over the mountains to the south. If you camp here, can extend your trip off-trail south over a ridge into Deception Basin or east over a ridge into Milk Creek Basin. I can see two small tarns on my map: something to checkout in the future.

On the way back, we visited the closed ranger station, just a tent platform now. Took the short trail to the waterfall, where I lost my camera 9 years ago. The waterfall was mostly frozen, small, not pretty. Encountered another couple when we put our headlamps on. Saw a tent with camp fire. We reached the car ~6:20pm. Good night sky at TH, could see milky way. 25°F again. Walked the last hour with head lamp on. Sunset was around 4:20pm now. Still I managed to trip over a small root, fell head over heel onto the trail. Got my knees and one hand bruised. Thankfully, nothing serious was broken. My left hand was swollen for the next 5 days.

Total 46K steps, ~16 miles RT, ~2600' EG.

11/30, Saturday, sunny, slight cloud. Didn't need to get up early. Packed out. Drove up to Hurricane Ridge. Stopped at the ranger station before the park gate, inquiring options. We decided on Klahhane Ridge, over Obstruction Point road and Hurricane Hill. Also hoped to fill water bottle. The filling station is outdoors, so practically frozen. Quite busy on this sunny Saturday.

Hurricane Ridge was beautiful today. About a dozen cars ~10:30am. The visitor center is heated, filled with light. Eating tables, big windows, viewing deck. An aged volunteer ranger, holding a cup of hot drink, was commenting on his frozen fingers.

The trail starts at the west end of the parking lot (closer to the road downhill). Goes behind the trees for a bit (chilly), by the lift. Not many people after Sunrise Point. Great views (almost) all along the trail. More or less on or next to a ridge. Quite a few zigzags to reach the trail junction with Heather Park trail. View to Baker, and Mt. Angeles jagged top. Of course Port Angeles below, and Victoria beyond Puget Sound. We continued further to the high point of Klahhane Ridge, before returning at 2pm, which gave us ample time to view the sunset and get off the road by 5pm (the gate will lock at 5). Klahhane Ridge continues a mile or so further before dipping down towards Lake Angeles. I think I will attempt the 12 miles 4700' gain Heather Park loop, anti-clockwise, to allow a dip in Lake Angeles 5 miles before the car. It'll save half an hour driving, but extra 2200' elevation gain. So more of an exercise.Total 26000 steps. Fairly easy, and what a view, in all directions.

Dumped my pack and poles in the car. Back at the visitor center ~4pm. At least 30 cars in the parking lot now. Some folks just came up for the sunset. I waited inside for the sun to set, facing the windows. Didn't even go down to the restroom, so not to waste the precious last 20 minutes of glory.

Satisfied, we drove down in increasing darkness. After a stop of beer and gas at the Longhouse in Blyn, we drive to the ferry. The sign along the highway warned "wait time 2 hours". We caught the very next sailing (7pm), the last 10 cars on the boat. It was full.

11/31, the weather turned south on Sunday.

2019.11.23. Sonnets for an Old Century

11/23, Saturday, 8pm. Went to the 2nd performance of Sonnets for an Old Century by Cornish College of Arts students at Raisbeck Performance Hall, former Norway Hall - my first time in the building. More than 30 students + maybe faculty members acted in this play by Jose Rivera. Not a traditional play: no plot, no central story, rather a collection of essays or "sonnets" being read out loud by individual actor, no dialog. Each very different from another. No stage real stage set. Some use of lighting. A couple of songs. I'm not sure I like this type of plays, not to discredit the kids. All very well done.

2019.11.23. Hack to Give Thanks

11/23, Saturday. Another tech hackerthon, this time at Code Fellows (one of the many software bootcamp in town), this time for a good cause. According to the introduction, Democracy Lab has hosted these one day event for ~10 times, since early 2018, in partnership with Open Seattle and Seattle Tech4Good. A community based on volunteers working on technology for a good cause. Today's theme is Thanksgiving. Next event will be early January for new year. Code Fellows open for the community every Tuesday evening.

About a dozen project leaders pitched what they wanted to achieve today, a wide range of problems to solve. Not just locally. One project is for Vietnam landmine clearing tracking, another in Africa, and one in India (need Hindi knowledge). All on-going project looking to get a piece of puzzle solved today, and recruit more volunteers.

I chose A/B Street, which I heard about at the CUGOS event a month ago. My Macbook's graphic card cannot support the game's 20 layer of rendering. There were other build issues, so didn't get the code to build until after lunch. I worked with a UW design student for a different speed panel. I thought it would be feasible to complete by the 4pm presentation. Well, no. I worked on it until well past midnight. Still had a few items I couldn't figure out. Made a PR with the partially functional panel with the newer look, and hopefully someone can complete it. I may work on this project in the future. It uses Rust, a language I may want to learn. Other team members today made a new logo, a nice presentation, and many suggestions.

I left right after our team finished the presentation. So many projects, this took awhile. Seattle Rep had a gospel workshop this afternoon between its two performances of Shout Sister Shout. Local musician Shaina Shepherd and a pianist lead the class. She is a very good teacher. It was quite fun. However, I realized that not only I cannot sing, I cannot even articulate fast enough to sing gospel. I went home after the break.

2019.11.22. La Storia di Orfeo with BEMF

11/22, Friday, 8pm. All by chance, I got hold of a free ticket to this concert at Benaroya Hall which I would not normally go. I enjoyed it very much. Well, not enough to turn me to a fan of early music. The owner of the ticket came down from BC for the weekend in order to attend this concert. One performance only in PNW, on tour of Boston Early Music Festival Chamber Ensemble with Philippe Jaroussky, countertenor & Amanda Forsythe, soprano. A collection of arias from operas about Orpheus, by Claudio Monteverdi, Luigi Rossi, and Antonio Sartorio, composers that I've never heard of.

The two singers have amazing voice, and graceful stage presence. At the end of the concert, they sang a duet from a Monteverdi opera, with words in the gist of "I finally see you". It was probably the most beautiful song of the night. A slight note: Amanda wore a beautiful blue-green dress; Philippe changed his shirt from white to black during intermission, same black suit.

Also went to the pre-concert lecture at 7pm. Certainly helped me appreciate tonight's performance. Both BEMP's artistic directors Paul O'Dette and Stephen Stubbs talked about the birth of opera, and how the story of Orpheus is so critical to the early operas. They also talked about the instruments, lute and theorbo, which they used tonight.

2019.11.17. Shout, Sister, Shout! at Seattle Rep

11/17, 7:30pm. Shout Sister Shout!, a musical about the gospel singer, song writer and guitarist Rosetta Tharpe at Seattle Rep. Near full house. Lots of energy, songs and dances. Simple yet efficient stage and lighting. Probably should turn off all the speakers: for a small stage, this show is too loud (I'm at the 2nd to the last row). Even so, I really enjoyed the performance. During the intermission, I got to listen to some original record that's streaming on two iPhones in the lobby.

2019.11.15-17 Samsung Enterprise AppDev Hackerthon

All weekend long, starting at 5pm Friday till 5pm Sunday, at Thinkspace, another co-working space. 4 Samsung employees traveled the country hosting these weekend events with some local hands. Catered food multiple times a day, drink (non-alcohol) all day long, blanket and shower if you plan to stay overnight (quite a few kids did that). Not well advertised: only 20 some people showed up, forming 6 teams. About a dozen predefined topics. Each team can pick one, and come up with some solution, using Samsung's proprietary technologies. Four were highlighted: Dex (extends a Samsung phone to a desktop look and feel, when connected to a monitor with USB-C), Knox (a security feature that locks down phone features), S pen (a stylus that has a remote sensor and a gyroscope), Tizen (a smart watch).

11/15, Friday. I arrived just before the 6pm presentation on Friday. After forming a team with 3 others, we chose an EMS topic. We decided to go with a webapp used by ambulance with two layouts for phone/tablet and desktop using Dex. The app will be in kiosk mode (using Knox). However, we were informed that Dex only works for a native app. After last weekend's exposure to WebAssembly, I'm no longer interested in Android App development. Plus, it took me much longer to setup the development environment than I thought. By the time I had my skeleton tab app working, it was already midnight. I told my team that I'm out of the competition, but will be available to help part time.

11/16, Saturday. 10-3pm. I went to Google campus in Kirkland for a Qwiklab study jam and talks. Back to Thinkspace in the evening. My team had changed their focus, and wanted to implement an Knox app on patient's phone. I got the sample app to work, and helped Jari to get it working on his laptop. That took awhile, and then I went home.

11/17, Sunday afternoon. I went to the presentation. It was postponed to 2pm. So I had time to eat lunch. A lot of leftover food. I liked the last two presentations. One aimed to unify patients record with a QR code, which can be displayed in various formats. One aimed to track outpatient visits for better accountability using NFC tag for ID, location and timestamp for schedule, and S-pen for signature. I then went home before the program concluded. Overall, I think only the one hour demo is worthwhile to attend.

2019.11.13 The Great Moment at Seattle Rep

11/13, Wednesday 7:30pm. Seattle Repertory Theater's The Great Moment, a new play by Anna Ziegler. We both didn't like the play. I like the stage set and the acting. The play has no plot. The author wants to convey the sense of aging, and the need to treasure the moment, but all through words, rather than story. Maybe too poetic for me. We stayed after the show for the post-show actors talk with 3 of the 4 actors today.

2019.11.13. MagniX

11/13, 6pm. The new CEO of Magnix since June 2018, Roei Ganzarski, spoke at Atlas, a co-working space. He's very enthusiastic. Spoke clear and loud. A shout-out for their vision, all electric planes serving small communities with existing runways more efficiently, aiming at distances under 500 miles. Their first commercial flight will be as early as coming December with Harbor Air. Their 9-seat passenger plane, Alice may fly in 2021. Ganzarski also answered questions regarding to charging and battery.

2019.11.12. Sounder's Rally

11/12, Tuesday. I unknowingly walked into the green-blue parade on my way from DOL. Had to ask a police for what's going on. Seattle Sounders won the 2019 MLS CUP last Sunday. To be honest, I couldn't remember which sports Sounders played, nor what MLS stands for. Quite a crowd gathered on the lawn at Seattle Center. Is everyone here not working or skipping school? A few local dignitaries spoke briefly on stage, including Mayor Jenny Durkan, majority owner Adrian Hanauer. A perfect occasion to sell team merchandise.

2019.11.10. Dracula at ACT

11/10, Sunday, 7pm. I met with a couple of friends for the dramatic adaptation of Dracula by Steven Dietz at ACT. Nicely staged, single act, packed with action, color and lights. Accompanied by a cello, and the player also sings. Quite enjoyable.

2019.11.8-10 NFJS Software Symposium

3 weeks ago, at a local Java User Group Meetup, I won a ticket to No Fluff Just Stuff's 2019 Software Symposium held at Redmond town center this weekend. A regular ticket costs ~$1000. No vendors, just software classes held in 4 classrooms concurrently. Two 90 minute classes in the morning, and two in the afternoon, no repeat, starting at 1:15pm Friday. Dinner on Friday, breakfast and lunch on Sat and Sun. A raffle after Sunday lunch. Snacks during the breaks. Food is acceptable. I attended these classes:

Friday
9:00-12:00 free class by Gradle, promoting gradle scan
13:15-18:30 Kubernetes by Johnathan Johnson (fundamentals, containier pattern, operator pattern). His online training classes at https://katacoda.com/javajon/courses/kubernetes-fundamentals

Saturday
9:00-10:30 Gradle by Kenneth Kousen
11:00-12:30 Thinking Architecturally by Nathaniel Schutta
13:30-16:45 Machine Learning by Brian Sletton (overview, NLP). References: https://tinyurl.com/bs-ml-gist

Sunday
9:00-12:30 Machine Learning by Brian Sletton (deep learning, TensorFlow)
13:30-15:00 WebAssembly Salon by Brian Sletton. webassembly.org
16:00-17:30 Decentralized Web by Brian Sletton. WebRTC, WebTorrent, IPFS. More reference.

I liked Brian's talks and Kenneth's gradle session Sat morning. The last two foretells a revolution of web in data hosting and presentation. I didn't care for the other classes, even though all of them are good speakers. My biggest obstacle is work, because I took my laptop to the classroom and was working on the side. Free also hurts concentration.

Puget Sound public transportation is a pain. The government/system simply doesn't care. Due to the east on-ramp closure of 520, bus 545 is rerouted via I-90, but none of the stops had any indication that the bus is rerouted, nor any alert on kingcounty.gov/metro website. Saturday, the bus was 12 min late, probably due to the reroute. Sunday morning, however, I waited for 43 minutes for the bus which is scheduled on a 30 min interval. I arrived 5 minutes ahead of the schedule, and the bus never came. A couple of very angry passengers on the next bus got off at Overlake which is many miles away from where they wanted to get off, simply because their stop is not serviced this weekend.

2019.11.3. Blanca Lake

11/3, Sunday, partly sunny. Blanca Lake is the most easily accessible glacier-fed lake if you live in Seattle, now that the access road FR63 is open all the way to the TH. Some pot-holes, not too bad.

14 of us met at Ashway P&R at 7am, one lady was almost half an hour late. After a stop at Safeway in Monroe, we met the 15th person at the TH, ~2000'. There were about a dozen cars. The trail starts easy, but soon gains elevation in a series of zigzags, to ~4600'. Snow/ice at the last ~200'. I brought spikes, but didn't use them. Good view of Glacier Peak near the ridge. Short descent to the frozen Virgin Lake. Soon past Virgin Lake, the snow disappeared, a few muddy spots. Not bad all the way down to Blanca Lake ~4000'. The best view is when you first saw the lake, rather than by the lake shore. Many logs at the lake outlet.

Spent over 1.5 hour at the lake. Back to the TH ~3:15pm, waited for the rest. Back to the P&R a little after 5pm.

2019.11.2 Kenmore Camera Digital Photo Expo

11/2, Saturday. Kenmore Camera's annual photo expo. Many talks showcased knowledge/work currently, and vendors sell everything you can think of. I really liked it, wish I could attend both day, even though I don't want to own a real camera. Definitely will try to attend its future expo. The talks I went to are:
Art Wolfe on his recent works: Wild Elephant, Human Canvas, and ongoing projects. He recounts the scenarios and anecdotes of some of the photos.
Charles Glatzer, a Canon Explorer of Lights, on some tips of his wildlife photos (anticipate!).
Tyler Beck on Video Basics.
A few minutes of Paul Van Allen, Nikon Trainer, on the new Nikon Z series camera.

2019.10.27. Buckhorn Mountain from Big Quilcene

10/27, Sunday. Sunny and calm. 5 of us met at Northgate P&R and then went to pick up a 6th person. All plus a little dog piled in Michelle's "bus", took the ferry at Edmonds. It was less than half full. As we approached Kingston, the sun was rising. Good timing. We met our 7th hiker and his dog at Upper Big Quilcene TH. Started hiking towards Marmot Pass shortly ~9:10am. Elevation ~2470'.

Cold (~1°C) at the TH. The trail is in great shape, gradual incline, soft (dirt not rocks), no snow, nor mud. Some rocks when crossing a talus field. Only when close to the final meadow, there were a couple of short stretches that had black ice (very slippery). We waited for everyone at a small waterfall (40 min in), at Camp Mystery, at the talus field (1:40 in).

Reached the pass at 11:50 (~5.5 mile in, 6000'). We regrouped and had a long lunch facing east (where we came, view of Puget Sound and Glacier Peak) below the pass (for no wind).

Turn north and up a boot path towards Buckhorn Mountain. About 1 mile and 1000' go to. The first half is quite steep, then it levels out. The higher you go, the more mountains you see. After cresting the butte (see in the photo on the right), you descend before the last scramble to the top.

The very top has a fat rock, but it's small. Can fit 4-5 people. More room below this rock. View is incredible. Canadian mountains, Baker, Glacier Peak, Rainier, Adams, Helen, many Olympic peaks, and Puget Sound. We regrouped here, and enjoyed the view for half an hour.

Coming down after the scramble is fast. Towards the last mile, Raven, the dog, decided to chase something and ran up the hill, abandoning his owner. The rest of us hiked back to the parking lot, only then I heard what happened. We waited for ~1 hour, asking everyone who came out of the trail if they had seen a dog and a guy. Raven has a collar with GPS, and vibration. Finally they came out, all was well. Got on the 7:45pm ferry. This time quite full. Back at the P&R at 8:20pm, a a very busy parking lot.