Weekend Hike - Mail Box Peak

You are at a get-together with fellow hikers and you throw around something like 'I did Mail Box Peak over the weekend' and you will notice that your friends start looking at you with new found respect. That should tell everything one wants to know about this brutal hike.

It is as though the trail was designed & conceived by a hard task master who is mean and who was at his foulest of moods when he designed the trail. Bcos there is no other way you can explain the logic behind the way this trail has been designed. As it is frequently pointed out, it is like being on the stair-master for 2.5 hours straight (put in the number of hours it takes for one to get to the top). There is just no respite from the steepness throughout the hike. Each and every step you take, you gain some elevation. And there is one point in the hike almost 3/4ths of the way where I thought I had reached the summit only to be disappointed, bcos the summit was a good 45 mins away. Finally, after a lot of huffing & puffing, got to the top.

Though there is a 360 degrees view at the top, I wouldn't go far enough to say that it was all worth the pain getting there. There is indeed a mail box at the top (picture of which can be seen below) that has a registry, some dog tags and a few envelopes. Since it was October, it was way too cold at the top. Should have been in the high 20s. Since I had forgotten to take along any gloves, I couldn't stand the cold and after experiencing hypothermia for a few fleeting seconds, we started our descent.

The descent is equally painful. Beyond a point, it became so arduous & painful on the knees, that I started cursing but with no one else to blame for my decision to do this hike, the cursing did not go all too well. I surrendered myself to my fate and started looking forward to that trail head that I so badly wanted to get to.

I hike with one or 2 of my hiking buddies. And our usual routine is that we chit chat all the way during both our ascent and the descent. But was not the case with this hike as the only things we kept on repeating, after seeing switchback after switchback and one steep slope after another, were 'Are they serious?' or 'Is this hike for real?' After all, when every inch of your lower body is in unbearable pain, you can't really chit-chat, can you?

Some stats about the hike:

Distance: 6 miles RT
Elevation gain: 4000 feet
Time up: 4 hours
Time down: 2.5 hours
Difficulty level: Most difficult

Though my hike to the summit of St. Helens (done over a year ago) still remains the toughest of my hiking career, this one comes a close second. Overall, a memorable hike that you can be proud of yourself.

Mt. St. Helens - A climb like no other

Climbing permit - 22$
Stay at motel close to trail head - 85$
Peeking into the crater from the summit of an active volcano - Priceless...

That's exactly how it felt when I completed this arduous 9-hour hike last weekend. I have been hiking here in the Seattle area for 3 years now and ever since I heard that we would be able to hike up to the rim of the St. Helens crater, I have been waiting for the day when I would be atop the summit of the mountain, standing at 8365 feet (The St. Helens Wiki is a good place to know about the mountain's eruption history). Last year, we had a very busy hiking season with close to 100 miles covered during summer. But we just didn't plan enough to finish the St. Helens hike before the hiking season ended.

But this year around, we had decided right when the hiking season started, that we should finish this season with this hike. Though we did not do as many hikes as we did last year, we still covered enough miles to keep us in shape to complete this hike. We knew that you have to register to climb this hike and so, when we started the process to register for this climb, we ran into a small snag - the forest service only distributes 100 climbing permits per day during the summer and almost all the weekends in summer usually get booked right when the online booking started back in February or something. So, when we started looking for dates with available permits, all the weekends & most of the Fridays in summer had been sold out and finally, we got one Friday towards the end of summer - on September 12.

Thus began our preparation & anticipation for the big climb. Many a time during the hiking season, this climb proved to be the motivation for the regular day hikes that we do in this area, bcos on days when we were not motivated enough to go on a hike, the thought that we had to be ready for St. Helens convinced us to go on the hike that we had planned for that day. The other preparation that I did for this hike was by making myself as the person who has read the maximum number of trip reports of people who have hiked the mountain :) I would frequently search for St. Helens trip reports, both on the hiking forums and in blogger and by the time the D-day was around, I would have read at least a good 50 trip reports. All trip reports basically said one thing: that the hike is not merely tough but it is brutal. Even professional hikers seemed to agree to that.

The terrain and nature of the hike is what makes this hike unique and a hike unlike no other: the first 2 miles through the forest is like most other trails but you only gain 1000 feet over those 2 miles. Trailhead is at 3800 feet and so, after the treeline is done, you are at 4800 feet. Then starts the first of 2 tough phases of the hike - the scramble through the rocks & stones over 2 miles where you gain a good 2200 feet. Then comes the 2nd tough section of the hike - walk up loose sand (it is actually lava ash and is almost like beach sand) for close to a mile over which you gain the last 1365 feet.

Then came the big day. Most hikers camp at the trail head on the night before the hiking day. But since we have never done camping before, we decided to book a motel 30 mins from the trail head. Left Seattle on Thursday evening, checked in at around 9pm and then went to bed rightaway as we had planned to get an early start. Woke up at 4:45 and were at the trail head at 6:30. The forecast for the day was just perfect hiking weather.

The first 2 miles were as I had mentioned before was almost like a stroll in the park. We finished the forest section of the trail at around 7:40.

Only when we came face to face with the rocky section of the hike, did we realize the magnitude of the task lying ahead of us. Then, we started the long hard hike up the rocks (some of them being as big as big as compact cars). Bcos of the rocks, there was no set trail. There were only tall white poles every 100 feet or so, that kind of acted as guide to the hikers, as to where they should be headed towards next. The rocky section was truly energy sapping, as we drank a good 60% of the water we had carried during this section. Often during this section, we would come across a really steep vertical section of rocks (like in the picture below) and we would think that should be the end of the rocky section.
But only after we get to that point, would we discover the next one. And this one went on for a good 7-8 times after which we were finally done with the rocky section (time at this point was 10:30)
There were couple of seismographic equipments at this point which I presume, were observing the mountain in some way.
After this, was the long hard climb up the lava ash. The only good thing about this section is that right after the rocky section is over, we were able to see the summit of the mountain and people sitting at the rim of the crater.
But this phase of the hike was easily the toughest and the fact that the rocky section of the hike had sapped all the energy out of us, only made things much more difficult than they already were. There is not even a good place to rest during this section and the hiking poles were our only source of rest. And finally, after a lot of huffing & puffing and countless number of stops and shouts of 'you can do it' among ourselves, we made it to the summit exactly at 12.

The feelings that went through my mind as I realized that I am looking into crater of an active volcano was just unbelievable. You can almost call that feeling spiritual. The size of the crater as such was huge and even looking at all those pictures from those umpteen trip reports had not prepared me for what I saw.
There were some gases that were fuming at a few places and since I have read before that they are normal activity, I didn't panic!!

From the summit, one gets amazing views of 5 of the tallest peaks in the area - Mt. Rainier, Mt. baker, Mt. Adams, Mt. Hood and Mt. Jefferson (the last 2 in Oregon) We spent not more than 30 mins at the summit bcos of the high winds and the sand the winds were kicking up. So, took a lot of pictures and then it was ready for us to leave. We had originally planned to have our lunch up at the summit but then bcos of the winds & the sand, decided against it.

While we were at the summit, another cool thing happened. A hiking group had brought a golf club & a bunch of golf balls along with them and they were taking turns hitting the golf balls into the crater. That I thought was pretty cool and added to our list of unforgettable memories at the summit.

So, here are the vital stats:

Distance: 9.4 miles (Round trip)
Time: 9 hours (Ascent - 5.5 hours, descent - 3 hours and 30 mins at the summit)
Elevation gain: 4500 feet
Difficulty level: Most difficult

When I finished the hike and got back to the trail head, I looked back at the mountain we had just conquered and I was truly surprised that I had just climbed that towering mountain. This was easily the toughest hike that I have ever done and the unique terrain of the trail just makes this a hike unlike no other. I am even tempted to call this the biggest accomplishment of my life and when I do ponder about it now, a week removed from the hike, that line of thinking would not be way off the mark.

Weekend Hikes - Lake Serene & Bridal Veil Falls

Summer is out in all its glory and that only means one thing - the hiking season has truly begun. Though avid hikers start their hiking season sometime during the first week of May, folks like me who hike for pleasure start their hikes only after all the snow has melted in most of the trails in this area. Thus, we started our hiking season with hikes to the easier hikes in the area - hike to Twin Falls and the Rattle Snake Ledge. But these were hikes that I have already done. So, I wanted to start the Weekend Hikes series for this year with my first hike that I have not done before.

Lake Serene in the Mt. Baker National Forest area is the one we chose. Though myself & my wife had done the previous hikes, since they both were pretty easy on the difficluty level, this was our first serious hike. The note at the trailhead says that the trail is for serious hikers only. That did not come as a surprise bcos before going on a hike, I usualy read a bunch of trip reports about the hike during the week leading upto the hike. So, I was kind of ready for it.

The first 1.5 miles of the hike is pretty easy as you only gain a total elevation of around 600 feet. There is a sign for a sub-trail that takes you to the Bridal Veil falls and we decided to do it on our way down. You also get a view of the falls (not in its entirety, though) on your way to the lake, just past that sign post. Once past the falls, the trail gets down to some serious business. The remaining 1500 feet of elevation is gained in the next 2 miles to the lake. So, needless to say, it left us panting real bad. Since this was our first tough hike of the season, both myself & my wife found it real hard. But there is one thing that always drives me during such hikes and it is the reward (in the form of a falls or a lake or a view point) that is waiting for us at the top. So, we finally made it to the lake and the lake was worth every calorie that was burnt and worth every foot that was hiked. Since this was early summer, the lake was frozen almost 90%. It was one beautiful sight.




We spent about 45 mins at the lake, had some light snacks and then started our descent back. It is usually the descent that I like most about these hikes but this one was an exception since it was almost as tough as coming up. While coming down, couple of hikers who weren't even close to the half-way mark, asked the often repeated question 'Are we there yet?' and I felt real bad to break them the bad news.

Date: June 28, 2008
Distance: 7.2 miles RT
Elevation gain: 2000 feet
Time: 5 hours (including 1 hour at the lake & the falls)
Directions: From Redmond, go north on I-405 and get off at State Route 522 off exit 23. SR 522 winds down and joins US 2 at Monroe. Drive east through Monroe and continue eight miles east of Gold Bar to the well-signed Mount Index Road on your right at milepost 35.
Notes: 23 switchbacks and a lot of wooden stairs through the hike. Most of the hike is under shades inside the woods with the last 3/4 of a mile that was over small & medium sized rocks.

Weekend Hikes - Rachel lake

Date: July 29, 2007
Close By: Snoqualmie Pass, WA

Directions: From Seattle, drive East on I-90 and take exit 62. Turn left, following the signs for Lake Kachess Campground. After five miles on FS Road 49, turn on left on FS Road 4930, and follow about four miles to the trailhead parking lot. Around a quarter mile into the FS 4930 road, there is a fork. Take a right on that fork.

Things to remember: The hike started off in a rather steep way and after the initial ascent, the next 2-3 miles are mostly on level grounds. It was almost like a stroll in the park, kind of hike. But the trail passes through so much bushes which will have you keep your hands looking heaven wards. At the 3 mile point is when the trail gets to business. I had read before that the last mile of this hike is famously called the Mile From Hell. The reason was quite simple - during the first 3 miles of the hike, the elevation gained is a meager 700 feet and it is in the last 1 mile that the remaining 1300 feet of elevation is gained. The last mile was easily the toughest that I have ever encountered in my short hiking experience. Not only was it steep, but the trail too was ill-maintained with ourselves getting lost atleast a couple of times. The last mile is almost like climbing stairs, only that the stairs were made of the roots of the huge trees. Throughout the last mile, the longest stretch where we encountered flat terrain was probably 10 feet. At times, we were looking at nearly 40 degree slope. But the good news is that the lake is absolutely worth the tough hike. It is so pristine, calm and bcos of the tough hike, borrowing an often used phrase, it was not crowded at the top. It starting getting cold a bit (temperatures would have been in the high 40s) and as the clouds started engulfing the lake, it was as beautiful a sight one can get.

Distance (RT): 8 miles
Time (RT): 5 hours, including 30 mins at the lake
Elevation: 2000 feet
Difficulty Level: 3.25

Here are some pictures from the hike:

Weekend Hikes - Margaret Lake

Date: July 08, 2007
Close By: Snoqualmie Pass, WA

Directions: From Seattle take I-90 to Snoqualmie Pass, get off on Exit 54 and turn left. Follow the frontage road for Gold Creek. At 3.9 miles turn left (uphill) on road 4934. Continue 0.3 miles to the Lake Lillian/Margaret trail head.

Things to remember: Toughest hike of the year (at least until that point). The first half of the hike just kills you. Almost like a staircase. Trail goes through a lot of bushes. But once it gets into the woods, the trail becomes normal. The single most remarkable thing about the trail is that it offers amazing views of Mt. Rainier and keechelus Lake that runs alongside I-90. Even at this time of the year, the way down to the lake was mostly covered with snow. As a result, the trail could not be located beyond a point. So, we just walked through the snow and got to the lake. The lake as such was a disappointment as it was very small and it was almost like a pond. But we will remember the hike for the awesome views of Mt. Rainier it offered on the way.

Distance (RT): 5.0 miles
Time (RT): 3 hours, with 15 mins at the lake
Elevation: 1500 feet in, 300 feet out Level: 2.75

Some photos from the hike:

Weekend Hikes - Lake 22

Date: June 30, 2007
Close By: Granite Falls, WA (Mountain Loop Highway)
Directions: From Seattle, get to the city of Granite Falls (40 miles from Redmond). From Granite Falls, follow the Mountain Loop Highway for approximately 12 miles and the trail head is about 2 miles on the right, after you pass the Verlot Public Service Center. The trail head is in the Mt. Baker/ Snoqualmie National Forest.

Things to remember: The trail is not very steep but there are occasional rocky sections and thus the descent from the lake back to the parking lot is very tough on your feet, due to these rocky sections. We started the hike at about 7am in the morning and thus had the whole lake to ourselves almost the entire duration of time we spent there. The first group (after ours) got to the lake as we were about to start our descent. There is a very well laid out trail around the lake which gives us some strikingly different views of the lake. Too many bugs and since we were the only group at the lake, all of them seemed very intent to drive us away :) A neat and short hike.

Distance (RT): 5.0 miles
Time (RT): 4 hours, with 1 hour at the lake
Elevation: 1300 feet
Difficulty Level: 2.25

Some photos from the hike:

Weekend Hikes - Annette Lake

After the first 2 hikes, this was another step up for me bcos the difficulty level of this hike was moderate. The site where we pick these hikes from grades each one of the hikes by their difficulty level and judgment is pretty darn accurate. On their scale this was a moderate one but to me, this was real strenuous. Though I have hiked tougher hikes since I did this one, I will always remember the Annette Lake hike as the first moderate level hike I ever did.

Date: June 23, 2007
Close By: Snoqualmie Pass, WA

Directions: From Seattle, drive east on I-90 to Exit 47 and turn right. Drive 0.2 miles to road 5590, turn left and drive 0.3 miles to the large parking lot and trail-head.

Things to remember: Starts off steep, becomes relatively easy for a while before gets steep again. Good part is that the last 1 mile or so is on level ground and there is no elevation. Trail is in good shape. You might want to take another 0.75 mile trail called Nature trail which is at the trailhead. The lake is beautiful. Lot of logs. Lot of bugs too, on the way and at the lake.

Distance (RT): 8.0 miles
Time (RT): 4 hours, with 30 minutes at the lake
Elevation: 1400 feet
Level: 3

Weekend Hikes - Wallace Falls

This was our second hike of the summer. A lot tougher one than the first hike mainly bcos of the elevation gain. It was 500 feet in the first hike whereas the elevation gained in this one was 1200 feet. The one thing that I have learnt from doing these hikes is that the distance covered in a hike does not really matter. It is pretty easy to cover longer distances. I have done hikes that are as long as 5 miles one way and I have not been very tired. But once the elevation gained starts increasing even by a few hundred feet, the hike gets a lot tougher. I realized this the moment I started this hike and was literally panting like a dog at the end of the hike.

But the good thing about this hike was that the falls at the end of the hike was way too beautiful. The sense of accomplishment that we get when we complete a tough hike like this is just unparalleled and when the destination of the hike has something as beautiful as the Wallace Falls, it makes the accomplishment all the more sweeter.

So, here are the details and photos of the second hike of the season.

Name: Wallace Falls
Date: June 10, 2007
Close By: Gold Bar off of US-2
Directions: Drive US-2 east from Everett to milepost 27.9 in Gold Bar. Turn left (north) at the Wallace Falls State Park sign. From there it's 1.7 miles to the trailhead.
Things to remember: 3 falls. The Middle Falls is the most beautiful of the three. If you are extremely tired, skip the Upper Falls. Trail is extremely beautiful, like walking through a rain forest. Trail runs parallel to a creek and you can find benches to get some rest & get some good views.
Distance (RT): 5.5 miles
Time (RT): 3 hours
Elevation: 1200 feet
Difficulty level: 2

Weekend Hikes - Twin Falls

Summer is the best time of the year in Seattle and so folks here always advise anyone planning on visiting Seattle to try to make it here during summer. That is when the beauty of this city in particular and the pacific northwest area in general is brought out to the core.

Among several other activities that one can do during summer here (playing cricket, golf & soccer to name a few), hiking is one of my favorites. Reason being hiking serves 2 purposes - the obvious reason of letting you burn a few calories and the second reason, is that it lets you explore the beauty of these surrounding areas. There are just numerous hikes in this area that constitutes of about 30-50 miles from my place and most of these hikes end up either in a lake or a waterfalls. I got inspired by this very idea of hiking from a desi group from Microsoft who have been doing this hiking & such activities for the last few years. Picking up from them, myself along with my friends decided to go on hiking during the summer time. Last summer was when it started and we did a total of 3 hikes.

But this year, we decided that we will do a minimum of 5 hikes this summer. We pick the hikes from this site Washington Hikes and also refer to sites likeVTrail, Washington Trails Association, Cool Trails and Local Hikes for more detailed information about the hikes that we have picked from the first site. So far, this summer we have already met our target of 5 hikes and since a good portion of the summer is still before us, we have now increased the target to 10 hikes. The one good thing we have done consistently is that we have started the hikes quite early in the day - as early as 6 am in the morning. Most of the times, we were the first ones to arrive at the trailheads. Starting the hike early solves 2 problems - the crowd and the sun. The sun is very benign when we start the hikes and it is when we start our climb down do we usually see all the crowd making their way up.

And just like how I have been posting these Weekend Movies posts, I thought may be I should start posting Weekend Hikes posts. I kind of wanted to have these posts form a sort of travelogue. So, it might be boring for folks from other places (except may be for the photos that I am planning to post) but I am sure folks who are reading this in the Seattle area will find something useful in here.

So, here are the details and photos of the first hike of the season.

Name: Twin Falls
Date: June 9, 2007
Close By: I-90
Directions: From Seattle, drive east on I-90 and get off at Exit 34 (468th Avenue). Turn right on 468th Avenue Southeast, drive about a half-mile, then turn left on Southeast 159th Street. Continue a half-mile to road end, parking area and facilities
Things to remember: Lots of kids; pretty simple hike.
Distance (RT): 2.5 miles
Time (RT): 2.5 hours
Elevation: 600 feet
Difficulty Level: 1.5