Long Walk For The View

Day 159: Okay, there was a shorter way to reach this spot, but I prefer to park where there's some security against a car break-in. Consequently, I began my day's adventure at Pack Forest's "campus" (the complex of buildings which houses offices, equipment sheds, a greenhouse, a small convention hall, etc.). And to be honest about it, I was really only planning to do the five-mile loop of the 1000 Rd., but then I thought I might be able to find some Snow Queens (add a mile detour), and then when I got back to Kirkland Pass and started down Butterfly Alley, I really didn't feel like I'd put in a good day's walk. The 1300 Rd. looked tempting. I'd only been up it once, and that, at least a decade ago. Okay, I can make the trip do double-duty by making an invasive-plant patrol out of an extended trek.

Pack Forest's best view of Mount Rainier is out a spur road (the 1330), just beyond three cell phone towers which are visible from Eatonville. It's also just about as far from campus parking as it's possible to get on an east-west axis. When did I ever let a little thing like that stop me? It's just a matter of putting one foot in front of the other one, right? Well, there was a little backtrack involved when I forgot to waypoint a nasty infestation of English holly (something Pack particularly wants us to hunt down), but I eventually got to the cell towers and the view. Now what? Do I go down the short way and continue back to the campus on the remaining stretch of the 1000 loop, or do I take my chances with the 1300 Rd., hoping that it will come out where I think it does? At that point, I said to self with appropriate harshness and reproach, "You shoulda brought the bloody MAP!" Well, yes, but I hadn't been planning to make a major expedition out of the project when I'd left the car.

Turns out the 1300 was quite a bit longer than I'd expected because it joined up with the 2500 for a couple of miles. By the time I'd connected to the 2000 Rd., my dogs were barking. I don't usually get sore feet, but the weather was unseasonably warm (read, "too damn hot to be hiking") and I'd worn the Gore-tex boots which don't breathe nearly as well as the promotional materials would have you believe. With wool socks added to the equation, my footsies were overheating. At the junction with the 2000 Rd., I resigned myself to the consequences of having three miles left to go to get back to the car and, to add insult to injury, I was retracing the steps I'd taken to check on the Snow Queens. By the end of the day, I'd put in twelve miles, climbed at least two more hills than I'd intended, and had 15 instances of invasives to report, a process which ate an hour of my evening. Y'know, I really feel like I deserved that bowl of ice cream I stopped for on the way home.