Morning on the mountain will slow the pulse and clear a cluttered mind
Last week we spent about 26 hours in Mount Rainier National Park and the gateway community of Ashford.
It was just enough time for me to take three short hikes inside the park boundaries, dine and converse with Ashford residents, soak in a hot tub beneath a star-lit sky, sleep restfully and awaken to the complex song of winter wrens.
I always look forward to my occasional outings to Mount Rainier, a mountain that has had an enduring place in my heart and in my mind ever since I climbed to the summit 30 years ago this July.
If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a thousand times: “You never look at the mountain the same after you’ve climbed it.”
On this mid-April trip to the park, we never ventured much above 3,000 feet. Winterlike weather in early April had dumped tons of snow on the mountain, avalanche danger in the upper reaches was high, and Paradise still was buried 13.5 feet deep in snow.
Spring was just arriving at the upper Nisqually River watershed. It was like traveling six weeks back in time from sea level in South Sound.
But there’s something to be said for visiting the park in early spring. You have the park almost to yourself.
A case in point: We hiked along Kautz Creek, a tributary of the Nisqually River, and never saw another person on the trail.
Stop at the Kautz Creek picnic area and trailhead on a warm summer day and the place is crawling with tourists. It’s the first pullover on the road to Paradise and offers a spectacular visual lesson of the violence of volcanoes.
The creek has a long history of floods and mudflows and has the jumbled landscape of strewn boulders, dead and broken trees and bleached-out old-growth logs to prove it.
After breaking a sweat on the Kautz Creek trail, we headed back to Ashford to meet and check in with Sarah Scott, owner of the Cedar Loft Cabin, a cozy, handcrafted guesthouse where the soaps and coffee are organic and electronics such as computers, televisions and cell phones are discouraged or unavailable.
A native of Tennessee and a former Olympia resident, Scott has escaped city life to live off the grid with her husband in the neighboring Gifford Pinchot National Forest environs.
An hour later, we ran into Scott and several other Ashford residents at the Copper Creek Inn, an Ashford business that also features cabin rentals in a forested setting.
Not long ago, the forests along state Route 706 and the forested hillsides behind Scott’s cabin on Mount Tahoma Canyon Road were threatened by logging.
Concerned Ashford residents, including those with ties to tourism, formed the Nisqually Headwaters Coalition in 2005 and reached out to the Nisqually Land Trust for help to preserve the four-mile stretch of forestland properties along the highway leading to the main entrance to the park.
What a successful partnership it has been. The two allies, along with state and federal agencies, Pierce County and the Nisqually Tribe, have secured more than $10.6 million in federal grants to buy forests in the name of spotted owl habitat, scenic vistas and healthy communities.
Before we dined on halibut in blackberry sauce and homemade blackberry pie, Copper Creek Inn owner Phil Freeman beckoned me outside and pointed across the road at a stand of mature second-growth trees lining the highway.
The trees enhance the experience of tourists and protect his property and buildings from southwest winds that roar through the valley in winter, Freeman said.
“We are so grateful to the land trust for what they’ve done,” Freeman said, noting that another land sale just closed last week, adding 600 acres to what is protected in the Ashford area.
Since the first purchase in 2006, the land trust has set aside 1,939 acres in the upper Nisqually River watershed, paying fair-market value to help maintain wildlife corridors and aesthetic links between Ashford and the park.
“We’ve had tremendous local support,” land trust executive director Joe Kane said. “This is a true community forest.”
The next morning after our night at the cabin, we took a leisurely stroll around Longmire Meadows, once again uninterrupted by other visitors. We shared the unimpeded view of Ramparts Ridge in the foreground and Mount Rainier in the background with red-winged blackbirds, white-crowned sparrows and red crossbills all atwitter with the arrival of spring to the high country.
We capped off our overnight respite from work with a short hike through an old-growth forest. I strained my neck to see the tops of the centuries-old trees and felt my pulse slow and blood pressure drop in the comfort of an ancient, still forest. Douglas fir, western hemlock and western red cedar were in various stages of health, decline and decay – a cycle of birth, aging and death that has played out on the flanks of Mount Rainier for thousands of years.
Back at the trailhead, I was awakened from my revere by litter. I picked up a 20-ounce soft drink cup for proper disposal, but the cigarette butts were too numerous to tackle.
We climbed into the car, and 75 minutes later we were back in the lowlands of South Sound.
Later that evening, I was stuck in a traffic delay at the new Boulevard Road roundabout. I felt my pulse quicken and my grip on the steering wheel tighten. I was late for an appointment. I swore.
From the peaceful setting of an old-growth forest to a traffic jam in a few short hours. The contrast is almost too much to bear.
John Dodge: 360-754-5444
jdodge@theolympian.com
This story was originally published April 25, 2010 at 12:00 AM with the headline "Morning on the mountain will slow the pulse and clear a cluttered mind."