30 Aug Meeting My Mountain
Born in Seattle, one of my earliest delights was the rare glimpse of Mt. Rainier in her full glory, shimmering through breaks in the clouds. Family weekends, holidays and even commutes across the Cascade Range were punctuated by visits to Paradise, Tipsoo Lake, the Grove of the Patriarchs and Sunrise. We had a hit list of favorite trails and viewpoints that we visited every time, an itinerary that became a family routine, unaltered for nearly 40 years, surviving our ten-year hiatus abroad and my brother and I moving away from Washington state. Mt. Rainier has been part of my life for as long as I can remember and my familiarity with these sites gave me the impression that I knew the mountain like the back of my hand. Mt. Rainier was practically a family member; it was my mountain.
Embarrassingly, it was only ten years ago that I discovered the existence of the Wonderland Trail, a 93-mile backcountry trek circumnavigating the mountain. I had to hike it. The trouble was that my backpacking buddy and I both live at sea level in the tropics, so the 4,000 foot minimum elevation with a promised elevation gain and loss of 22,000 feet along the way was a little daunting.
“Perhaps we should start with the Eastern Loop,” my friend had suggested.
The fact that I knew even less about the Eastern Loop than I did the Wonderland Trail only reinforced my growing realization of how little I knew my mountain. My experiences had lacked breadth. I knew a handful of short trails and look-outs well, but clearly there was much more to Mt. Rainier.
I hadn’t doubted there was more to my mountain than I knew. I’d never summited and had no desire to, for example, but I was under the impression that I’d already hiked the best hikes and viewed the best views. It was becoming disconcertingly obvious that this might not be true. I felt as if I’d discovered some family secret that changed everything.
As I did my research, I rejected the Eastern Loop (a route that involved hiking along the road for several miles) and convinced my friend that the Northern Loop was a superior alternative. At 36-miles it was longer and reportedly more treacherous than the Eastern Loop but promised a truly backcountry experience with unrivaled views. I knew we’d made the right choice when we arrived at the Sunrise Ranger Station to claim our permit and the ranger didn’t stop praising our itinerary, suggesting side routes and explorations we might pursue.
Our itinerary was designed to take it slow and steady, averaging 6 miles a day for six days. We wanted plenty of time to enjoy the wildflowers, admire vistas, explore waterfalls, and observe and photograph bears, marmots, pikas, mountain goats and any other wildlife we might encounter.
Mountain-top snow glistened against a brilliant blue sky as we hit the trailhead adjacent to the Sunrise Visitor Center. The weather was on our side and despite an early start on a week-day, we found ourselves among crowds of day hikers. Our comparatively huge packs drew attention and inspired way-finding volunteers to ask where we were headed.
“Ah, the Northern Loop,” one of them replied to our response, “That’s a nice little walk.”
Nice little walk? Granted it would be a third the distance of the full Wonderland Trail, but little walk wasn’t how I would describe our nearly 40-mile backcountry hike. And yet that first morning did feel like a bit of a stroll despite the 50-pound pack on my back and camera strapped to my side. The trail meandered down ridges, along streams and through meadows studded with wildflowers seemingly sorted into sections having different combinations of color, height and texture – a patch dominated by purple lupine, Gray’s lovage, and red paintbrush, here; avalanche lilies tucked beneath the trees, there. The sun was warming, the breezes cooling. My new pack fit comfortably. The further we walked, the fewer people we encountered. As we dipped down one bend, we spotted a herd of mountain goats on the cliff above. Twenty or thirty goats of all ages trotted across a snowfield, congregating on a patch of rocks where the snow tapered off on a gentle slope to provide basking opportunities in the sun.
We split a huckleberry wine sparkler on a log surrounded by waist-high tufts of beargrass blossoms in Grand Park, a meadow I’d never visited. As we gazed past flowers and evergreens at an expansive view of the peak, my friend commented that these landscapes were some of the most spectacular she’d seen in her entire life, a big compliment given that she’d spent a couple of years living in Grand Canyon National Park. I had to agree. In some ways this was the familiar scenery from my childhood that felt like home, but I was experiencing it anew. I was getting to know my mountain; and I like to think it was getting to know me.
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