Employees Only

Day 205: Of course I am joking when I say this trail is only for employees of Mount Rainier National Park, but its existence is not well-known. You almost have to be on foot to spot its starting point at the northeast corner of the bridge at Longmire; consequently only those of us who walk instead of drive to the other side are among the few who know it's there. It leads only half a mile or less up-valley beside the Nisqually River before terminating at the channel of an intermittent stream. I call it the "Lunch Trail" because I often patrol it in search of lichens, Calypso Orchids and precious solitude.

Having gone in pursuit of lichens on a particular knobby outcrop of rock above the trail, I found myself thwarted by a dome of snow, the colonies of Cladonia buried beneath its cap. Although the white stuff is melting rapidly in the Longmire compound, it's holding on in the sheltered forest. At the margins of winter, only the leaves of a few wildflowers are beginning to show. Such is the season here: nine months of winter, a few weeks of spring and fall at either end, and full-blown summer glory from mid-July to early September.