Two Great Hikes

See all the pictures here;
First, two reminders: 1) you can click on any picture to see it bigger, 2) when you click on any picture it will take you to the album where you can see all the pictures from this album. Or you can just click here to go to the album.

Julie and I spent our labor day weekend up in the mountains. Hike #1 was to Table Mountain. We left Sunday at 3:45 PM with the idea of catching a sunset up on the top of Table Mountain, from which you have an amazing view (and yes, Table Mtn. is the same place I recently built a memorial for my Mom). Problem was, the weather didn't quite cooperate. As the weather forecasters promised, it was unseasonably cold, windy, drizzly and very cloudy. It was fun in a way, being up there in the clouds as they whipped by; but it was cold and the mountains were hidden the whole time we were up there. Still, as we made it back to the car at 8:00, some of the clouds around the parking area revealed a setting sun...it was beautiful.

Hike #2 was to Skyline Divide. This hike is 3.5 miles to a beautiful wildflower meadow at 5900 feet. After we got to the meadow we laid out in the sun, er, uh, fog/clouds for awhile; and then decided to continue on to a nearby summit. The trek to the summit was worth it (summit at about 6500 feet) as we got away from all the other hikers, and there were many, and found some peace and quiet on top of a mountain. Mt. Baker made some "peek-a-boo" views through the clouds, fog and mist. Still, as you can see from the pictures, this hike was much more pleasant as the sun did come out a bit to keep us warm.


Some highlights from the hikes: the amazing wildflowers, the sunset on Sunday, and this really cool fossil that Julie found. The fossil appears to be a clam or some kind of shellfish - and yes, this was at about 6000-6100' up. The ranger station confirms that these fossils can be found...I don't know how Julie found it. Amazing. Click on the picture to see it a bit larger.



Also, check out these two: what a difference a day makes, eh? Click here to see the whole album.

AUS day 6: Beach Day

Day 6 was to be our 2nd beach day of the trip. The day started sunny and beautiful and we started by splitting up our group; Julie, David and I taking the nephews to a park while the rest of the troop ran some errands in town. The park group had fun playing baseball, kicking field-goals and going for walks, all while anticipating an afternoon in the water. Click here to go directly to the pictures of this day.

Lunch came and went and we made it to the beach. Not exactly a hot day, we nevertheless spent a bulk of our time in the water. Highlights were:
- burying Andrew in the sand
- burying all three boys in the sand
- throwing the football around
- body surfing
- baby Gecko
- the signs at the beach warning of all kinds of terrible things that could happen to you (it was, thankfully, the "off-season" for the jellies).

After the beach I believe we ended up downtown for dinner again.

Another special memory for Julie was her walk with Kyle that morning. While David, Me, Nathan and Andrew were playing ball, Julie and Kyle took off for a nice long walk together (no pictures).

Again, to see all the pictures, click here.

Remembering Mom

Yesterday marked the one year anniversary of my Mom's passing. It was a bit of an emotional day. To mark it, I had a chance to spend the afternoon/evening up in the mountains, a place my Mom loved to be. It felt good for me to make a little memorial for her. The two pictures are the same memorial; one with Mt. Shuksan in the background, the other with Mt. Baker in the background. The following is in memory of her. Click on each photo to see it full size. Click here to see more pictures from table mountain.

AUS day 5: Port Douglas, Mossman Gorge

Day 5 involved a lot of driving. The day started with some noisy Cockatoo's and ended with a rushed/late dinner at Hungry Jack's (Burger King). Click here to see all the pictures I uploaded, and/or read on to hear more about the day.

The morning was beautiful and I started by heading down to the dock. After getting back, a big flock of cockatoo's decided to hang out right above our place. They were fun to watch and I ended up shooting a bunch of pictures of them.

Following our morning we jumped in the car and headed out to Port Douglas. We ended up eating lunch in Port Douglas and visiting the place where Mom/Grammi lost her cane many years ago. This turned out to be a little bit of an emotional time for many of us, but after that we jumped back in the car and headed out to Mossman Gorge to do a short hike through the rain-forest.

Mossman Gorge was beautiful, although I was constantly reminded that we were seeing it in "dry season" where there was very little water. Still, highlights from this hike were seeing the huge trees, (the bigger ones are fig trees I believe) and other plant life in the forest. Our group split up a bit at the Gorge with some of us doing a 2 mile loop hike, and others going to a shorter loop by the river. Unfortunately, those who thought they were doing a shorter loop found out that at the very end, the path was blocked and they had to go back the way they came.

The ride home featured a rushed stop in Port Douglas to try and find dinner (unsuccessful for most, except Julie who managed to get a great little pizza), followed by a late-night Hungry Jack's stop. A fun day, albeit a long one...







Again, click here for all the pictures.

North Twin Sister

So my and my three brother-in-law's made an attempt on the North Twin Sister. Alas, we got close, but not all the way to the top. Still, it was a fun day, if not a grueling one...

Getting to the trail-head requires a bike ride of 6 miles, gaining about 2500-3000' of elevation. Unless, of course, you take a wrong turn on the logging roads (which we did), in which case it's a 7.5 mile bike ride...and that just got us to the trailhead. Needless to say, I was gassed. Once there, it's a fairly easy hike to get to the ridge, which leads to the summit.



So how far did we get? We got up on the ridge and followed that a ways before mercilessly stopping...we got about this far (see image below); although one of us, Derrick, charged ahead and made it very close to the summit.



Will I do it again? Already the memory of the grueling bike ride has faded and the desire to reach the top is growing...we'll see. Scroll down for a few more pictures;

AUS day 4: Kuranda

Day 4 was our Kuranda day. We broke up into two groups to start the day; the skyrail group (me, Julie, Terri and the boys) and the van group (Dave, Scott, Traci and Dad). As usual, click here to see all the pictures.



The skyrail ride was very cool and very scenic. You literally go over the rain-forest. We were able to get out at two different points and look around. The first stop was at a rain-forest boardwalk which was nice, but the second walk was even better, stopping at Barron Falls. This water-fall is amazing in the wet season...unfortunately, we were there during dry season.


However you can check out the video below of Barron Falls (the transformation from dry season to wet season is amazing).



Kuranda itself is a great place to spend the day to do some shopping and eating; which is exactly what we did. The day was unfortunately remembered for Nathan's arm injury. He got hurt pretty bad towards the end of the day but after a doctors visit and some prayers, he ended up being just fine in the end. The other bummer was the hat I found that I ended up not buying...still regret that to this day. Also in Kuranda, the three girls got matching purses (they are really cool).


After our day in Kuranda we made a mad dash home and ended up dropping Kyle, Andrew, Dad, Dave and Traci, while Julie and I accompanied Scott, Terri and Nate to the E.R. (Julie and I tagged along so we could get dropped off downtown while Nate was getting checked out). It was during this time that the bird pictures were taken - I'll admit, this is not my best photography work...I had some problems getting my ISO set right, etc. However, still a nice evening. And then, after Nate got the green light from the ER, we had to go to the Night Market to celebrate with some McDonalds and a crepe. Click here to see all the pictures

Camping: Icicle Creek, Leavenworth

Just got back from an overnight camping trip to Icicle Creek in Leavenworth...went with Julie's brother and his wife, Dave and Kathryn. We were originally intending to do a 3 day back-pack trip to Hannegan Peak but due to an unusually high amount of snow still on the upper slopes, we were forced to change plans (and save a valuable vacation day). Nevertheless, we had a blast! To see all the pictures I've posted, click here.


We car-camped and spent the night at a campground along the icicle creek area. We ate well and had a great evening, followed by a beautiful day hike to the Lake Colchuk area; (this is the beginning of the trail to the Enchantments). On the way home, Julie spotted a black bear off the side of the highway just hanging out!

Summer Hiking...

Before I move on to the next Australia post, I must take some time to blog about our recent hikes...in order, Alger Alp, Goat Mountain and Sauk Mountain. To skip the writing and go straight to the pictures, click here.



Alger Alp was a short and rather "boring" hike. It ascends to the top of a big hill in the town of Alger. Towards the top you do get a nice view of Baker and from the top you get a view West towards the islands; however, the hike is entirely on a logging road and once on top the Chukanuts partially block your view west. Perhaps we are "snobs" now but it's hard to do a hike like this when so many other, better hikes loom so close. Hikes like...



Goat Mountain: this is probably one of the toughest hikes we do as it is about 4 miles long and ascends about 3000 vertical feet (according to my handy altimeter). However, once on top the views are worth it as it offers about 250 degree panorama. The only downer to this hike is you do have about 2 1/2 miles of switchbacks through a forest before you get to the really good views. And once you read the next hike, you may not want to hike Goat Mtn...








Sauk Mtn. Julie and I did this hike with a couple of friends of ours, Dan and Bill. It takes a bit to get there (about 1 hour 20 minutes) but is worth the drive. This was our first hike off of highway 20 (North Cascades Hwy) and we were blown away. For those looking for "bang for your buck hikes" (read: short, but beautiful), this is your poster-child hike. The road to the trail-head is rather long (7.7 miles off of the hwy) but the reward is that the views start from the parking lot. The trail is only 2 miles long and ascends 1100' to the summit; very doable (although we wouldn't have felt comfortable without our trekking poles). The wildflowers and views begin from the parking lot and never let up. From the summit you have a 350 degree panorama (the only thing keeping it from being 360 degrees is the true summit of Sauk mtn, which requires some rock climbing skills to reach). This hike was a photographers dream; between the views of the mountains, wildflowers, marmots and then the sunset, I was in heaving...albeit longing for a wide-angle lens and a tripod (neither of which I packed).



At any rate, too many pictures to put them all here...so if you want to see the rest, CLICK HERE!

AUS day 3: Sugar World

Ok, I'm finally getting my days together...Day 3 is Saturday in my book and this is the day we went to Sugar World. As usual, I only put a few pictures here in the blog; if you want to see all the pictures from this day that I've uploaded, click here. First things first, though.


We woke up to a beautiful sunny day and went down to the pier in the morning followed by a trip to Rusty's; the local Farmer's Market in Cairns. Rusty's was fun, although I'm sure I didn't enjoy it as some of those in our group. What I did find that I loved at Rusty's was some good Humbow, (although they call it something different).


(Julie, Nathan, Me and Andrew)

After Rusty's we packed up the van and headed to Sugar World; a water park with water slides. I must say; I've done water slides before but not quite like this. No, they weren't bigger or faster or scarier then what I've done in the past, but they were more painful. The first 4 times I went down the slides I got injured; a scrape here, a jammed finger there, a bruised elbow here...in fact, as of this writing on July 18th, I still have a very tender elbow thanks to the water slides. It did remind me how in America, probably as a result of everyone suing each other, we make everything perfectly "safe." At any rate, I survived thanks to a great tip from Scott and the rest of the day was a blast. (Lots more water-slide pictures here).

AUS day 2: Hartley's Crocodile Farm

This was one of my favorite days of the trip; highlights being the animals mainly, but also watching the boys as they watched the animals. We ended up spending the entire day out there starting with a show on a boat at 10:00 and ending with the Koala feeding at 4:30. Read on for my memories and a few pictures; to see all the pictures I've uploaded (29 from this day), click here.


The highlight, of course was the salt-water crocodiles. They are amazing creatures...and deadly. One of my memories was the "sound" they make when they snap their jaws shut. They had names for all the crocs; the biggest one being named "Spartacus" (or "Sparty," for short). They did a show (feeding) with all the crocs, (probably at least 30 in one big area) which was great. I heard, however, that after the official show ended the crocs really got active.




Other memories of our time there were lunch, where Julie tried her first taste of crocodile (very tough), the aviary which was filled with amazingly beautiful tropical birds and the casuary and watching him feed, (this is the bird with the big "horn" on it). The casuary swallows his food whole and you can actually watch it slide down his throat. The avaiary was amazing; especially the huge spider that met you as soon as you walked in the door.



However, all that said, there is probably one memory that outshines them all; "Tipsy," the baby Koala. Tipsy was located in a part of the park that also had kangaroos running around wild. We had seen Tipsy's Mom earlier in the day but not Tipsy. Something I didn't know; Koala's have pouches and actually spend their first 6 months after birth in their Mother's pouch. Tipsy had only been "out of the pouch" for 2 weeks; and I'm guessing, only comes out for a few minutes a day. At any rate, about 4:00, right before we were going to the other part of the park to watch the Koala feeding, Tipsy decided to make an appearance. Tipsy was probably the cutest thing I've seen in a long time and we were privileged to see "him/her."



We also learned that 10 of the 11 deadliest snakes in the world not only live in Australia, but live in Queensland (the state we were in). Made you think twice about going out for a "walk about." Don't forget to check out all the pictures I've uploaded from this day - (click here).