[Sky Hiker]

Time to turn off the lights in Leavenworth

[treeswarper]

An irate bisideual citizen?

Einen Bombahaugen Threat

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What's especially fun about sock puppets is that you can make each one unique and individual, so that they each have special characters. And they don't have to be human––animals and aliens are great possibilities

[ale_capone]

the past couple weeks has been pretty busy. I return commute from Seattle around 3pm. There has been a line of cars going the other way from sultan past gold bar every day. I think the reservation system is going to make it a more frequent occurance. Hopefully it dies down a little after the holidays.

Our neighbours had a slightly rare encounter on highway 2 in gold bar on Christmas night. The hit an elk with their SUV. Vehicle is totalled, but neighbours are OK. Unfortunately, the elk was not so lucky. They managed to find and process the carcass.

[Sky Hiker]

Traffic has been horrible. On sat we were headed to the Methow. Traffic backed 3 miles into Tumwater canyon from Leavenworth. From the east side it was backed up to Phsastin light. Tonight traffic back up a couple miles east of Zekes. Everyone one surely isn't skiing that's for sure. Lots of wrecks. A semi crashed at Beckler backing traffic up bother ways for quite a while.

[Nancyann]

I know there is a lot of skier traffic, but who are all the other people coming and going? Today I tried to turn right on to Highway 2 from Kellogg Lake Road to run some errands about 2 pm. A nice guy let me in line, but that is as far as I got. After sitting for five minutes without moving, I just did a U turn and drove back home.

[Chief Joseph]

Everyone is heading for the hills since so much is shut down. Lot of people heading up the mountain loop, even though there are only 3 hiking trails easily accessible.

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Go placidly amid the noise and waste, and remember what comfort there may be in owning a piece thereof.

[ale_capone]

[Randito]

I remember a specific ski trip to Stevens in the '70s where we waited in the car for 4 hours between Stevens and the hairpin @ Tunnel Creek.   A school bus filled with ski school students had lost control, flipped and came to a stop lying sideways completely blocking the then two lane Bridge.    Everyone was evacuated from the bus and the WSP investigation completed before they moved the bus.

In retrospect, we would have got home sooner if we had U turned and returned home via Blewett and Snoqualmie.     

But it can easily turn the other way.  On Wednesday morning I-90 was closed due to multiple spinouts from chain up scofflaws and Stevens was crowded with many cars and Semis bypassing the closure.

Last year, during a particularly bad blizzard event, I ended up returning from Spokane via Portland because Stevens, Snoqualmie and White passes were all closed.    Even getting through Cascade Locks was problematic that time due to ice and snow on I-84 and semi traffic from all mountain passes in WA and OR redirected to I-84

It is useful to carry, food, water and a sleeping bag as well as chains when driving in the winter around here.

[Cyclopath]

I almost never hike from US 2 and this thread is making me feel vindicated.

[Sky Hiker]

[Jake]

Monday, January 18th, 5:30 PM. Google traffic map shows a solid backup from Sultan into Baring right now.

[kiliki]

I'm just coming out of it. We never go on 2 for this reason but we're coming from the Methow and needed to pick up the dog in Maltby. We were diligent about checking traffic but apparently there was an incident that necessitated alternating traffic at Sultan and things must have snowballed. I really couldn't say how long we were in traffic. I know we left Sun Mountain 6 hours ago. So maybe 2.5 hours from somewhere west of Index to Sultan.

We will now miss our dog pick up. Poor buddy.

[John_B]

Patterson Lake Rd was just closed for a bit due to an accident so at least you didn't start your drive off stuck?

[kiliki]

[Nancyann]

Sorry to hear about your long delay, kiliki. I saw what happened when I made a futile attempt to go down to Sultan to run errands mid-afternoon. A large delivery truck had attempted to make a sharp right turn onto 2 from the steep road just west of the SB Road. The driver neglected to check his mirror and didn’t notice that his right rear duals were suspended about three feet off the ground. By then the front of the truck was blocking the westbound lane of 2, which already was moving slowly due to holiday traffic. I made it as far as the post office and turned around after getting my mail, only to get stuck in the eastbound traffic that was backed up due to only one lane being useable.