Water & Snow

Water

Last weekend we experienced our first car ferry experience by traveling to Orca Island. We chose a quick 6 mile hike called Turtleback Mountain to Orcas Knob. I say quick because it was a quick day... three hours worth of ferry rides to get to the Island, having to get back to the dock by 6:20pm and a combination of lack of hours in the day that provide day light and sporadic downpours led to a 19-20 minute per mile day.

Orca Island reminds me of Door County (for those of you not familiar with Wisconsin, it's the peninsula north of Green Bay, aka the thumb of the left mitten). Quaint little island town with three blocks of bakeries, shops and restaurants. We would love to book a cottage here in the summer - kayak, hike, wonder, eat, repeat.

Turtleback Mountain to Orcas Knob starts off ALL up hill. Thankfully the path was wide and free of rocks, tree roots, etc. to start. Unfortunately it was a steady downpour until we reached the woods. When we reached the summit we were blessed with a window of clear skies. We hope to come back to this hike in the summer with clear skies and sunshine because it would be quite nice enjoy the view a bit longer.

Snow

With the seasons changing we started to research snowshoeing hikes for our weekend excursion from our 800 square foot apartment. Though with the rain and warmer temperatures, (sunny and 55 today) we opted for Annette Lake Trail, a lower elevation hike that we wouldn't necessarily need to utilize snow shoes. A great perk about our 800 square foot apartment is it's accessibility to city life and nature adventures. Mount Baker Snoqualmie National Forest is about an hour drive east, which is great because there's a ton of trails and amazing views so close. Unfortunately that means this trails are heavily trafficked, especially on a warm Saturday when longer, higher elevations are covered in snow and much colder. I also find myself continually reminding myself that essentially EVERYTHING is east! Anyways...moving along. The traditional parking spots in the lot were already full (sigh), when we completed the hike we found some really, really creative parking solutions! I will have to take a photo next time.

Clear day equals views of Mt. Rainier — Mt. Rainier across Lake Washington

The 8.4 miles was a mix, but mostly snow covered and our micro spikes came in handy. The snowshoes would have been over kill for today's hike, but nice to get a taste of what future hikes with snowshoes might look like. Hiking in snow, having to pull over to let hikers pass (social distancing, masks and politeness are in full swing on the trails

which is really nice) really slowed down our

pace, but it was a really enjoyable hike and perhaps one we would revisit in the summer.