[texasbb]

I'd intended to hike around Mt Adams last week but the darn thing caught fire so I had to find an alternate destination. I already had maps and hadn't been to the Goat Rocks in a couple years, so that's where I headed. I decided to go back to familiar areas but take in a few spots I'd missed in the last three trips up there: the little flat-bottomed bowl above the waterfall in Cispus Basin, Old Snowy, Hawkeye Point, and the short alternate loop route "95A" to a viewpoint on Goat Ridge. Full image set with commentary here if you're interested. With all the fires everywhere I figured the views would be marginal at best, but that proved true only looking south and west. In some cases the smoke was almost picturesque. As one of the few places not on fire itself, the Goat Rocks were quite crowded. The pretty weather didn't help. I headed up from the Snowgrass trailhead after driving over Friday morning. Took the Bypass trail up to the PCT then east/south to Cispus Basin. The route to the little bowl seems reasonably obvious from a study of the map, and indeed there's a fairly well tromped boot trail leaving the PCT where I expected. It goes essentially all the way there, but is ribboned and/or missing about as often as not. Here's looking into the bowl as I contour around to it:

It's an interesting place. There are parts that are dry and sandy, almost like dunes above the tide line:

Fragile ecosystem

There's a gardenlike stream:

Lush part of stream

And a mossy stream (same one, actually):

Mossy part of stream

A thickly yellow flowered stream (same one again):

Flowered part of stream

And quite a few lupines:

Bluebonnets!

You could definitely tell what was going on down at Adams:

Fire on the mountain

I set up camp and made my way up the lupined ridge to a saddle just to the west of Big Horn et al. Then I contoured around Point 7478 to the other saddle right over my little bowl. I goofed, though, and contoured up high in the rocks. I should have dropped back down to the grassy part; it would have been faster and easier, even with the elevation gain/loss. Anyway, here are some of the views from those saddles:

Layers, colors

Old Snowy, Rainier

Tieton Peak

Enormous hippie farm on the way back down:

Stick hippies

Next morning I moved camp over to the upper part of the Snowgrass trail, then headed north on the PCT. I bagged Old Snowy and walked the knife edge to almost Elk Pass. I met two thru hikers, at separate times, who both volunteered that the view from the ridge below Old Snowy rivaled anything they'd seen since Mexico.

The big viewpoint

Rainier beyond Goat Lake

Even Adams and St Helens tried to pose, smoke notwithstanding:

Smokey Adams

Smokey St Helens

Met two young couples and a group of guys from Portland on the summit. One of the ladies was celebrating her birthday on the peak, so we all sang happy birthday to her. She was kind enough to immortalize the moment for me:

Wildlife

I thought that smoke band over Rainier was interesting, even kind of pretty. I'm already wanting to walk this again:

Knife edge

McCall Glacier:

McCall Glacier

The third day was a quick jaunt up to Goat Lake, then up Hawkeye, then out Goat Ridge. Here's the lake from partway up toward Goat Ridge:

Goat Lake

Goat Lake from Hawkeye Point (see Old Snowy in the background):

Goat Lake

Mt Rainier from Hawkeye Point:

Rainier from Hawkeye

Mt Adams viewed on the way down from Hawkeye Point (trust me):

Yep, Adams is there

I'm a bit upset that nobody ever told me how worth it that 95A loop is. It takes you by an awesome farewell view into the Rocks:

Worth the side trip

Stopped at the pizza place in Packwood, which has no bacon cheeseburger on the menu but they'll modify something else for you. It was 85 cents extra for the cheddar and I didn't even ask what they hit me for on the bacon:

Tradition!

[Magellan]

Really nice. One of these years I will have to stop making excuses and visit Goat Rocks.