Goodbye Evergreen State

Next week I will be leaving the wonders of Washington State behind for another kind of land. This new land is not altogether unfamiliar, but I will become much better acquainted with it over the next few years. I may be far away from internet and phones, and many of America’s conveniences, but I will still have regular mail delivery. I look forward to hearing from anyone that may read this. In time, I will post a list of things that I might want or need, in case anyone would want to send them to me. I will also post occasional updates of how I am doing, and perhaps some thoughts as well. Unfortunately, I will not be able to post many details about where I am or what I am doing.

Lena Lake

Saturday March 3, 2007

Daniel showed up at my front door to visit. We invited him in and put more food on the table, and he proposed to leave that night to stage for a hiking trip in the morning. We got out the maps and after some discussion we decided on the east side of the Olympic National Park and Forest, in the Hood Canal area. So we both packed up our stuff and headed out to the area at 8:30pm. By 9:30 we made it to the area we wanted to camp, but found out the hard way that the road was closed and we couldn’t get there. So we stopped and got out the maps, and decided on plan B. (Every time I go on a trip with Daniel a road somewhere is closed) Half an hour later we here at another campsite, and set up our tent and went promptly to sleep at 11, with sounds of the swiftly flowing stream just outside our tent.

Sunday March 4, 2007

Daniel had set his alarm for 7:30am, but I don’t remember it ever going off. In any case, we probably needed the sleep. We slept well and woke up around 9:30am. Immediately after getting up I lit up the stove and started breakfast. We had lots of tea, along with Oatmeal and Ramen. There’s nothing like a hot breakfast in the forest. As I sipped my tea in the morning light I took a look around our campsite and decided I rather liked and would gladly come back again. After breakfast we packed up and headed to the Lena lake trailhead about a mile away.

Even in the off season one cannot completely avoid seeing other people on this trail. We didn’t have much trouble finding some solitude but I imagine it would not be so easy in the summer time. I had not expected the lake to freeze over because of the low elevation, but it was quite beautiful. I have hiked Lena lake in both winter and summer and think that it is a better hike in the snow. It was not a particularly difficult, and the snow did not begin until shortly before the lake. I think the best part of the hike was after the lake where Lena creek met the north end of the lake. It wasn’t frozen here, but there was snow everywhere else and quite pretty.

We wanted to go on to upper Lena lake, but couldn’t because we didn’t have enough time. The trail was also hard to follow, and we were not equipped for serious snow travel.

Once we got back to the car, we finished off our tea, ramen and oatmeal and then went home. I have been very impressed with my Jetboil stove and this was my first time using it on a camping trip. Overall, it was a leisurely hike, and very relaxing and enjoyable.