We decided to get out last weekend and go for a hike. The Norawarren Trail in Herring Cove looked like a good hike for a toddler so we thought we’d give it a shot.

Our first impression upon arrival was not positive as the trailhead started in a subdivision. However, it didn’t take long for the trail to feel remote. We saw other groups, but only a handful during the two hours we spent on the trail – so better than some actually remote hikes we’ve done in the past!

The trail was well maintained and generally easy to hike. A good portion of the hike was over rock (granite?) so the path was very solid and smooth as it was worn to bare rock. It wound through a well-treed woods and passed a good-sized pond. We stopped there due to a hungry baby and a tired toddler. The only complaint about the hike itself was that there weren’t any human entrances to the pond, just lots of dog entrances. It would have been nice to be able to stick our feet in the water after the hike out.

On the whole, 8/10 would hike again.

An example of the typical trail. Holly was a great hiker on the way out.

The surface on the latter half of the hike. Somebody loved it!

Water achieved!

There were a couple of tired kids on the way back.

Backlog post (January 17, 2021): The holidays were a bit quiet for us this year, and as Nova Scotia was recommending against travel over the holiday’s due to Corona virus so no exciting trips :(. But last week those recommendations were lifted so we drove south along the water an took a little family hike in a small park.

Cleveland Beach is a small island – or peninsula  – depending on the tide with probably less than a kilometer of trail, but the inclement weather (wind gusts up to 60 km/hr and intermittent rain) in combination with a walking 1 year old made that kilometer count. Even though it was a short trip, it was very nice to get back out of the city again, and hopefully we can keep trips like this up for a while.

Less than intrepid exploration.

As it starts to warm up and get sunny everyday here in the Pacific Northwest, one thing is clear – Mt. Rainer dominates the skyline. To get into the season, we decided to go out to the mountain for a hike. Since it is only early May, a lot of the access roads are still closed so we picked a major road, Route 165, and drove as far as we could to Mowich Lake, stopping at the farthest open trail head.

So we got to do an awesome, and rather quiet, hike down to a river and up the hill to Mowich Lake, then back the “road” to the car. The one big bummer was that while I brought my nice camera, I forgot the SD card at home…. so I hope you all like cell phone pics. Overall, quite happy with the hike, but we will probably never do it again as there are just so many cool hikes to do around Rainer and this one doesn’t really stand out as awesome as it was.

The hike started as it should – a log bridge over a cascading creek.

Sometimes the shitty sensor of a cell phone camera makes a photo artsy?

Now with Rainier views!

Mowich Lake was still very frozen. It almost comes across in the picture, but the lake was a haunting, pale blue – probably the highlight of the trip.

The 5 mile hike back in 3 to 12 feet of sort-of-melting snow left something to be desired, unless you desired post-holing every step.

Now that it is fall, Jasmine and I are taking advantage of the season and going on hikes all over the greater Seattle area. This weekend, we took a trip northeast of here to the Tolt River Park in Carnation just off of the Snoqualmie River. It is fun to get out of the city and suburbs for a bit on the weekend and have an enjoyable day wandering around the trees and river.

The park was next to the town of Carnation which grew many of the titular flower so I had to include a picture of a flower farm.

The first part of the hike was the prettiest – a nice river crossing on a very wobbly bridge.

Behold my attempts at pretty photography.

There was access to the river so we got to spend time on the banks skipping stones.

And we also hiked up a mossy mountain trail which seemed like an appropriate name at time, though fern hill may have been more accurate.

After spending most of the summer with sailing lessons on Lake Union, we decided to switch it up and go for a nice long hike in the Snoqualmie National Forest. And after not being in the mountains for a while, it was delightful to go for a hike again. The trail was moderately well traveled with a 15 mile round trip and 2100 ft of elevation gain. Not too shabby for a first walk back in while, but we were both tired the next day.

We got to see a bunch of alpine lakes which, as is the usual case, were nicer the higher you went up in altitude. The coolest part of the whole deal was that the second highest lake was the shade of turquoise blue you only find at higher elevations and had a family of otters swimming around it. I have never seen otters anywhere but Monterrey, so that was pretty cool.

Trees! Everybody likes cedar forests.

The trail was not that steep to walk up, but it was steep against the grain.

Pretty Blue Lake. Otters not pictured.

Alpine lake. Swimming Lloyds pictured.

Fording the streams in the US is a bit more civilized than in NZ.