San Pancho Vida

To Protect a Mountain

I'm going to introduce you to three people in next few posts. I don't know them very well, but I know what they do, which is what I want to tell you about.

High up on the east slopes of Mt. Rainier, where, at 6400 feet, the paved road that reaches the Sunrise Visitor Center is the highest paved road in Washington, I encountered Sierra Willoughby.

It was serendipitous, as most good things are. Craig and I had taken our time down below in the Grove of the Patriarchs, which we visited in my last post. We drove leisurely up the mountain from there on roads whose shoulders dropped vertical in places. One wants to take one's time on those; it's difficult enough to keep one's eye on the road when at every turn the view is a delicious surprise.

Cascade mountains as far as the eye can see, furred on this dry side of the mountain with fields of wildflowers. The road takes so many twists that I swear we had no idea in which direction the mountain, invisible so far, would appear.

Suddenly, there it is.

It grows in your vision as you realize you are high upon its slopes.

Sunrise is different from Paradise, a much smaller facility with no overnight lodgings. They don't put a lot of fancy into the structures, as they're only occupied from late June to early October, which is as long as the road is open, being buried in snow the rest of the year. 

We had a couple of burgers in the café then went over to the main visitor center. We were perusing the many educational and interesting exhibits when a young man strode in and made an announcement that he would be leading an informative nature walk in ten minutes. Ten minutes? How could we turn down an offer like that? We didn't.

Sierra Willoughby works for the U.S. National Park Service, the entity that protects and interprets Mt. Rainier National Park. We saw the work of the Park Service everywhere we went on the mountain. The cordial visitor centers, the trail systems, the buildings, the careful attention to preservation, the education of the over one million people who visit the park each year. 

Sierra greeted us at the foot of the steps and we followed after him like fifteen assorted ducklings. He paused along the way to discuss the fragility and beauty of the meadows. 

The diagonal trail below has not been used for fifty years, yet, in this usually frigid world with a short growing season, the plants are still trying to get a foothold. But you can also see the designated trails above it, two of many on the mountainside where people can meet the terrain up close.

Sierra is a font of information, as enlightening as he is entertaining. He talked to us about the Emmons Glacier, the enormous ancient ice rock which flows down this side of the mountain.

Six major rivers have their sources in Emmons and other glaciers of Mt. Rainier, and the Emmons is a popular route for mountain climbers on their way to the top.

We learned that the vertical hexagonal columns of rock that we'd seen around the mountain were formed from hot flowing lava cooled by contact with the glaciers, which once were much larger. As they retreated, the lava columns were left behind like walls of giant black crystals.

Sierra grinned. "Ice beats fire," he said. 

Toward the end of his talk, he spoke about the Park Service and about how it seems to be one of those entities that is never first in line for tax money and often is one of the first to be robbed for other programs. I often wish we could designate our tax money to go to a our favorite recipients. That would be an interesting way to get messages across to lawmakers, wouldn't it?

National Park Service & Mt. Rainier

If I could, I'd put the U.S. National Park Service right up there in my favored few. Thanks, Sierra. Hope you have a cozy winter somewhere and that you're back at Sunrise next June to appreciate and reveal to us ducklings the magic of nature on Tahoma, King of the Cascades.

Okay, So I Lied

I didn't mean to. I had every intention of publishing another post right after that last one. Then my son came for a visit to the Northwest and so did Carol, after which packing happened, which believe me was a long-term project. Then there were all the last minute errands and shopping that are always necessary when leaving the States for an extended time in Mexico. And meanwhile there was the having fun part.

We boarded an Alaska jet last Thursday morning. We had one of those dream pilots who fly the plane over the top of every magnificent mountain in the Cascade Range. We waved goodbye to our now cherished Mt. Rainier, and shortly afterward saw this incredible sight out the airplane window.

Mt. Saint Helen, who used to look like Mt. Rainier before her eruption on May 18, 1980. 

We're now back in golden San Pancho, where were greeted by dear friends, greenhouse weather, the drama of stormy skies and surf created by Hurricane Marie off the coast...

...and a table for two in the sand.

Helluva planet we live on, isn't it?

How Many Pictures...

...Can a Person Take of One Frigging Mountain??

Let's find out, shall we?

Last week, we spent five days in another perfect cabin, this one in Ashford, just outside the gates of Mt. Rainier National Park. We'd been gawking at the mountain for weeks, the Seattle area having enjoyed some of that crystalline summer weather that is the reason people stick around up here. These days are like the toy in the Cracker Jack box, the rainbow Easter egg in the spidery grass, the fat ripe blackberry hiding in the sticker bushes. 

And there was Rainier dominating the horizon, hovering above scene after scene, and constantly moving, it seemed, to a new location around another curve.

So we decided, the heck with gawking. Let's go meet this mountain up close.

The closer we got, the more the volcano showed off. Rainier, known by the first peoples as Tahoma (which name I prefer), is a complex being, different on every side, moody at times, benevolent at others, changing his appearance and his textures but forever emanating his power.

We crept up on the Paradise side first, eyes boggled as Tahoma grew and grew and began to reveal his intricacies.

Tahoma is about as bare as it gets in August. Always, though, its glaciers remain, ancient slabs of ice hundreds of feet thick that advance and retreat through the ages. Up close, the glacial ice glows a mysterious green beneath its snow cover and in its deep crevasses.

Rainier is still an active volcano. Its last eruption in 1894-95 was a minor one. According to the U.S. Geological Survey, the mountain we know began 500,000 years ago atop the eroded remains of an ancestral volcano which had been active one to two million years ago. It is considered one of the most dangerous volcanoes in the world not necessarily because of potential lava eruptions, but rather because of its proclivity to lahars. Lahars are flows of mud and debris that can be hundreds of feet thick and rush downhill at 40 miles an hour, a hazard multiplied by this volcano's proximity to highly populated cities and towns.

So, as I was saying, we spent five days up there.

But we weren't the only ones to brave the geological dangers. Nearly two million people make the pilgrimage every year into magnificent Mt. Rainier National Park. We reached Paradise Lodge on a Saturday and lucked into a parking space. Paradise has been a visitors' destination for a long time.

The lodge hasn't changed all that much, apparently.

Trails lead from the lodge in every direction. The one we took wound through subalpine fir and wildflower meadows.

Paradise, on the wet side of Rainier, receives over seven feet of snow on average, with plenty of rain during the months it's not snowing, so it is greener and lusher than Sunrise, on the east side of the mountain. In late spring and summer, glacial and snow melt fills creeks and waterfalls and the mountain runs like a fabulous fountain, with six major rivers sourced from its glaciers.

With all that water, plus fertile volcanic soil, it may come as no surprise that Tahoma also shelters some real big trees.

In the Grove of the Patriarchs, we walked the beautifully maintained trail into the heart of this remaining old growth forest.

As in Cathedral Grove on Vancouver Island, this forest is largely undisturbed, the ancient downed trees nourishing new growth, the oldest trees protected as much as possible from the people who flock to visit them.

One thousand years old. That's how old this redcedar is. 

Around the time when Viking Leif Eriksson '"discovered" North America and named it Vinland (in the same years the southwest's Pueblo Anasazi were moving from hunting and gathering to agriculture and building their cliff dwellings), this tree sprouted in the ashes of an enormous wildfire that burned the earlier forest.

We said farewell and wandered on.

Nearby stand these twin Douglas firs of a similar age to the redcedar. Many of the trees here are 200 feet tall.

Did I already say "magnificent"? Next post (surprise, surprise) we're still on the Mountain, and also on a visit to some local art treats. I'll publish sometime between now and next weekend 😏.