My brilliant plan to rehab my injured knee on the gentle slopes of Kaleetan last weekend was thwarted by my kneecap popping like an M-80 and shooting across the Denny Creek Trail halfway to Melakwa. So I went with Plan B - the Snoqualmie Tunnel.
What better way to spend a sunny afternoon than limping around inside a dark, damp, echo chamber full of hooting idiots and their screeching zygotes? It wouldn't be all fun & games, though. Up until now, no one has done a Snoqualmie Tunnel trip report on NWHikers, so this would be a scientific expedition more than anything else.
The huge, gaping maw that is the entrance to the Snoqualmie Tunnel is posted with dire warnings of the perils within. And although I am confident I have the skills and training necessary to explore the dark catacombs, I was extremely hesitant to proceed inside. Somewhere between 0 and 100 people perish within the subterranean depths every year, and I had no intention of becoming another statistic. So, after assessing the danger and carefully weighing the risks, I was still unable to decide whether I should continue on or go to Twede's for an E.Coli burger. Eventually, I just flipped a coin and lost the toss.
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Hibox Peak from scenic Iron Horse Trail.
Apparently, they have trouble with people camping inside the tunnel.
Speak Friend And Enter
There's something Freudian about the Snoqualmie Tunnel, but I can't quite put my finger on it.
One can't help but marvel at the sheer amount of force it took for Mother Nature to carve a passage through 2.5 miles of Snoqualmie Batholith (80 percent granodiorite, 12 percent quartz monzonite and alaskite, and 8 percent gabbro and diorite). Hundreds of years of pounding wind and rain created a smooth, straight line straight through the base of a mountain - precisely at the spot where they just happened to be laying some railroad track. Remnants of those forces still remain, as water showers down from the tunnel's ceiling for the first 100 feet or so. I counted about 950 gallons of glacial water raining down within perhaps a space of six minutes. I can't be 100% certain, for I was running through the torrent and giggling like a schoolgirl at the time. I suspect the water is seeping down through the rock from a source above, but I will have to get up there with a ladder and poke around a bit. For all I know, it could be broken fire sprinklers.
There seemed to be some sort of primitive metallic structure used to shore up the sides of the tunnel, with chain-link fencing at the top to prevent rocks from tumbling down. This may provide access to the ceiling on a future trip, but with my gimpy knee I was unwilling to attempt an ascent during this particular venture. The metal appears galvanized, which may lend credence to my theory that the structure is man made.
Metallic structure appears almost man-made.
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The first thing one notices when exploring the infamous tunnel is that it is extremely dark. The second thing one notices is that it reeks like the men's restroom at a Barstow-area Chevron station. Then, when the stench subsides, one notices yet again that it's dark. And it only gets darker. The pale, blue glow from my cheap Wal-Mart headlamp did little to penetrate the thick shroud of darkness, and if it wasn't for the tiny pinhole of light at the tunnel's far side - as well as the constant screeching of someone's zygotes deep within the bowels of the mountain - I would've been completely lost.
Strange scurrying sounds surround me. The echoes of my own footsteps, perhaps?
Something brushed against my leg right about here.
Moving on past the waterfalls, the ground becomes dryer and the air cooler. The temperature seemed to drop a good 30 degrees merely 1/4 mile from the entrance. I am unable to explain this sudden drop in temperature, but it may be due to the sun's inability to penetrate through 2500 feet of solid rock. Indeed, the sun was conspicuously absent for most of my voyage, and until my eyes grew accustomed to the darkness I could hardly see anything at all. Then suddenly, and without warning, amorphous white shapes and bizarre markings materialized on the tunnel's walls.
Beads of moisture adorn the walls.
Bat Guano? Mayhaps.
More bat guano.
Strange oozing sores on an otherwise unblemished tunnel wall.
Who was MP? And what lured him down into these dark depths?
Dark blue shapes dance on the tunnel walls as if lured there by my cheesy Walmart flashlight.
Bat guano was my first guess. But the peculiar lack of bats suggested that the tunnels were neither a hibernaculum for a large bat colony, nor a maternity roost for the species of torpid bats that often dwell within cascade caverns. Alkali, then? Not likely. There hasn't been an alkali in these parts since they were hunted to near extinction in the 19th century. In any event, the spots were like oozing, pus-filled sores on an otherwise unblemished stone surface, and the more I gazed upon them, the more nauseated I became. So I pressed on.
In the middle of the tunnel, with no vegetation to be found, a stick floats in a pool of water. Another one of Snoqualmie's great mysteries.
A colorful chamber branches off from the main tunnel, reminiscent of Carlsbad's Temple of the Sun.
Strange hieroglyphics adorn the walls; a remnant, perhaps, of the tunnel's prehistoric inhabitants.
Halfway through the tunnel, I was suddenly aware of how strangely quiet it had become. The normal ear-piercing screech of the zygotes was gone, to be replaced by the incessant dripping of bat guano and the shuffling feet of meth freaks looking for a fix. One such denizen of the deep shuffled past me as I was inspecting some more bat guano. His pale blue face seemingly materialized out of thin air as he stumbled into the half-light of my cheap Wal-Mart headlamp. "Howdy," he said. "Howdy" I replied, and then watched in horror as the shadows appeared to lurch forth and swallow him.
The pinhole of light at the far end of the tunnel beckoned me onward, but I decided to cut my journey short lest I fall prey to the Heebie Jeebies. The other half of the voyage would have to wait until a future date. Probably this Sunday, if the weather holds up.
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